Subsistence farming in the Sahel
One of the target countries in this project is Burkina Faso, a landlocked country in West-Africa, with a population of about 15 million. Burkina Faso is part of the Sahel, an east-west oriented eco-climatic zone of transition between the Sahara desert in the North and the tropical savannas in the South. The Sahel forms a belt, 400 to 1000 km wide, spanning Africa from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea.
Burkina Faso has one of the lowest Gross National Income per capita in the world: US$440 (World Bank 2008). More than 80 percent of the population relies on subsistence agriculture, i.e. self-sufficiency farming in which farmers grow only enough food to feed their families. Planting decisions are made based on survival strategies. Subsistence farmers use simple manual tools, without advanced techniques.
In 1960s and 1980s the Sahel region was struck by several periods of drought, which caused wide-spread famines. Currently, the rural conditions seem to be improved. Recently, studies using satellite data have revealed a considerable improve in vegetation and in number of trees, since the last twenty years, in an extensive part of the Sahel (Hermann et al. 2005). Amongst the causes for this extensive re-greening, human intervention is believed to be one of the contributing factors. Adoption of sustainable land management techniques, by innovative farmers, in Burkina Faso, but also in Niger and Mali, have resulted in soil fertility, rising groundwater tables, an increase in the number of trees and in crops. These activities together have had a considerable positive impact on living conditions of rural communities, largely improving their food security. The increased number of trees in the Sahel might have an additional positive side-effect in term of CO2 mitigation.
Re-greening activities
Re-greening of the Sahel has recently been attributed to improved land management by subsistence farmers, including natural regeneration of trees. Natural regeneration employs techniques to promote natural growth of trees sprouts by preserving the scare water resources, applying natural fertilizers (like animal manure), stone banding, pruning appropriately, — all simple manual techniques that use available resources. These Re-greening activities are grass-root initiatives of farmers in small-scale areas, occurring without large external (international development) interventions. The success of re-greening activities depends on the scale in which it is adopted. Farmer-to-farmer communication, exchange of (indigenous) knowledge and spread of information are therefore essential.
Recently, re-greening activities have been supported by local NGOs. The importance of communication amongst farmers is becoming evident. With help of the NGOs new channels of communication are being deployed, amongst others, agriculture extension workers, community radios, farmer-to-farmer visits, mobile telephony. As in the whole of Africa, mobile telephones are available in these farmer communities. Almost every household in rural communities in Burkina Faso owns a phone or has access to one. The situation in Niger and Mali is similar to Burkina Faso’s.
Still, channels of communication and access to information should be improved. Currently, there is growing awareness of the value of indigenous knowledge, owned by farmers. This knowledge should be stored and made accessible for more people. The knowledge of e.g. re-greening could be expanded with the use of innovative ICTs, which are adapted to the local situation.
Opportunities and constraints
The existence of mobile telephony, including the wide coverage of the mobile networks over the country, the wide-spread availability of community radios, the emergence of cybercafés with computers and access to the Internet in many villages all over the country, all represent opportunities for access to information and to better communication in rural areas in the Sahel. There is a growing awareness amongst the local communities on the importance of ICTs. In Burkina Faso a number of small and medium enterprises exist, which already provide web services and other ICT services in the country. Especially amongst the Burkinabe youth interest in ICTs, the Internet and the World Wide Web exists. Community radios have many listeners. This channel of communication is already successfully used by the supporting NGOs for awareness creation and information sharing amongst farmer communities.
Still, many constrains exist, preventing successful deployment of communication services in the benefit small scale farmers. Many farmers speak local languages only, and are not able to read and write, and rely on voice communication only. Several local languages are spoken in Burkina Faso, which complicates communication.
From the technical point of view, the mobile phones used by farmers are very simple handsets, without any functionality to access Web services. Infrastructure for Internet connectivity at local community cyber cafés is poor. Bandwidth is very limited, and the costs of Internet access are high for the people in the region. There is much to gain in the provisioning of innovative technologies, if adapted to the local needs of theses rural communities in the Sahel.
Innovation
Information and communication needs and constraints of farmers in the Sahel, are very similar to those of other poor communities in developing countries. Generally speaking, it is their necessity to create, store, process and share knowledge. Up to present, ICTs have been created for the context of rich industrialized countries. Adaptations are needed to make ICTs usable in the context of the developing world. This will help bridge the digital divide.
Innovations which remove barriers to information and communication technologies will therefore serve, not only the farmer communities in the Sahel, but also a much broader context of people in the developing world.
