Restoring Soil Fertility in Semi-Arid West Africa: Assessment of an Indigenous Technology
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2006
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Abstract
Low soil fertility and surface sealing, leading to severe water loss through runoff and to a drastic decline in vegetation cover, are major Sahelian agricultural constraints (Casenave and Valentin, 1989; Bationo and Mokwunye, 1991). Owing to lack of financial resources it is often not possible for farmers to utilize external inputs to solve these problems. Increasingly, attention has focused on low-cost but effective alternative solutions. Given the region’s poverty, new innovations will only get adopted if they are cheap, easily accessible, and minimize the use of external inputs. Further, the chances for adoption will be higher if the proposed technology is based on some improvement of traditional practices.
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Mando, A., D. Fatondji, R. Zougmore, L. Brussaard, C. Bielders and C. Martius. 2006. “Restoring Soil Fertility in Semi-Arid West Africa: Assessment of an Indigenous Technology,” IN Biological Approaches for Sustainable Soil Systems,N. Uphoff et al. (Eds.), pp. 391-399, CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group,Boca Raton, FL.