Africa's food shortage blamed on poor soils

A new report by the Alliance for a Green
Revolution in Africa (AGRA) says that while farmers in many
parts of the world regularly harvest up to five tons of maize
per hectare, those in Africa harvest just one ton on average.
Outdated farming practices combined with inherently low
soil fertility has been blamed for the low yields.
Many countries in Africa often face food shortages, as
farmers struggle to grow enough produce for the entire
population.
A new report published by Alliance for a Green Revolution in
Africa shows poor farming practices has led to poor soil
fertility.
The analysis found many farmers have failed to rotate crops
and apply organic fertilizers. It says there is also a problem
of persistent soil erosion.
AGRA soil health program coordinator Abed Kiwia says the
organization is trying to promote basic farming principles in
order to improve soil fertility and produce more food.
"Like for example, you weed your crops in good time, you
do the right spacing, and then you also do water and soil
conservation, you have terraces along your farm so as to
control soil erosion, you control loss of nutrients. So there
is a package where we are integrating a number of what we
call best-bet agronomic practices," said Kiwia.
So far, AGRA's soil program has trained three million
farmers in 13 African countries in an approach to growing
crops dubbed "Integrated Soil Fertility Management."
Kiwia says the approach involves mixing in organic matter
to the crops.
"Here we are telling them, 'Use fertilizers.' Because we
know fertilizers in Africa are expensive we are telling them
integrate them with organic input, which are found locally,"
said Kiwia. "For example we have farm manure, green
manure, there are also agroforestry trees which are very
good in providing organic nutrate."
But soil scientists in Africa are not getting the same result
as their counterparts in Asia. Soil researchers say part of
the problem is that in most areas, the soil has rocks, giving
it lower fertility.
Dr. Keith Shepherd is a principal scientist at the World
Agroforestry Center. He says there is need to determine the
nutrients that are missing in the soil.
"There is need to carefully target which fertilizers are
appropriate where, and this needs soil and plant testing to
diagnose what are the limiting nutrients and we are faced
with an extremely variable situation in small farming
systems in Africa, and even within the same farm we have
very different patches of poor and good soil as a result of
past management," said Shepherd.
Agricultural experts say despite the obstacles soil fertility
can be improved, and if proper steps are taken there should
be no need for African countries to import food.