Climate Smart Agriculture |
The government is
implementing the Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) initiative that will
improve land and water management, with experts urging its speeding up
to enable farmers shift from traditional to improved mode of farming.
The CSA initiative
is looking at best practices and technologies applicable to the country
by establishing efficient and effective mechanisms to address climate
change adaptation and mitigation to achieve sustainable agricultural
development in Tanzania.
The initiative also
looks at agriculture that sustainably increases productivity and income
(profitability), raises the ability to adapt and build resilience
against climate change and enhance food and nutrition security while
achieving mitigation co-benefits in line with national development
priorities.
Ministry of
Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries Development's senior officer
Theresia Massoy said that urgent action was need to build resilience to
climate impacts by improving agriculture that sustainably
increases
productivity and income, increases the ability to adapt and build
resilience to Climate Change and enhances food and nutrition security
while achieving mitigation.
"Currently, the
country faces amplified water stress which calls for need to improve
water management practices, improve irrigation, planting pits and basins
as well as water harvesting, storage and mulching.
"The agriculture
land and water management government policy should address water
availability and climate when considering irrigation plans," she said.
Adding that, there
was need to make farmers aware of the need to adopt water harvesting
means, water storage investments and adoption by smallholder farmers
system of rice intensification (SRI).
"CSA initiative is
aimed at maintaining ecosystems services by providing farmers with
essential services, including clean air, water, food and materials," she
said.
She said that the
goal is to use the agricultural land and water according to its
suitability and conserve it with respect to its needs, ensuring
sustainable livelihoods and to enhance resilience and reduce
vulnerability to climate change in agriculture.
Another goal is to
establish efficient and effective mechanisms to address climate change
adaptation and mitigation to achieve sustainable agricultural
development.
However, Climate
Action Network (CAN) Tanzania executive director Sixbert Mwanga said
that despite governments' ambitious plans they were yet to be integrated
to farmers.
"A majority of our
farmers still depend on rain fed agriculture which is no longer
applicable due to the current weather variations caused by climate
change," he said.
According to him,
the government should come up with a strategy that looks at mechanisms
that will empower farmers to stop dependency on rain-fed agriculture.
Explaining further,
he said that the country's semi-arid areas still depend on rainfall to
practice agriculture while there are so many options including water
flowing which the country still lacks mechanism to harvest.
Stressing on that,
he said that after the rainy season, potential areas like Kongwa,
Mpwapwa and Kondoa have water flows which if it were to be harvested it
could have helped farmers to use have water even during dry spells, but
this has not been being done due to lack of technical know-how.
There are
initiatives like charco dam which the government needs to invest in and
make the public aware because it is a simple method of capturing running
water by both pastoralists and farmers especially in semi-arid areas.
Meanwhile, he said
that countries like Burkina Faso, Mali and even Kenya have adapted
technologies that can address drought known as the Zai pit where farmers
come up with holes like pits in potential areas identified for planting
their crops so that when the rain comes, water is not allowed to flow
out but it is retained there to enable plants grow.
He noted that the
country is yet to adapt this practice and while it is still in the
process of doing so, it should integrate farmers by providing them with
weather updates to make them aware of when to farm or not to farm.
According to him,
it was important because if the country experienced dry spells of up to
30 days before farming it was likely the farmers would lose a majority
of crops before they grew further.
For his part, a
consultant with the Open Forum on Agricultural Biotechnology in Africa
(OFAB), Dr Nicholas Nyange said climate change has brough about many
adverse effects including drought and now armyworms which destroy crops
and cause farmers to incur huge loses.
"Researchers are currently on the ground looking for solutions aimed at killing the armyworms," he said.
According to him,
researchers from Tanzania, the region and other parts of the world are
collaborating together to find quick solution as the fall armyworms
attack all the leaves, and the stem is left with no support to produce
food for the crop to grow.
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