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| Title: | Indigenous versus introduced solutions to food stress in Africa |
| Author: | Moris, J.R. |
| Book title: | Seasonal variability in Third World agriculture: the consequences for food security |
| Year: | 1989 |
| Pages: | 209-234 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Africa |
| Subjects: | food shortage food seasonality |
| Abstract: | This chapter examines how indigenous and introduced technologies have been employed by African households to cope with fluctuations in food supply. The discussion draws mainly upon areas of East and southern Africa, but evidence is also adduced from the Sahel. The evidence supports the conclusion that food deficits are a priority concern for African smallholders. Farmers' rejection of introduced technical packages becomes comprehensible when the returns obtained from labour at planting time and cash outlays required during the critical hunger period are examined. Indigenous production choices - diversification, root crops, exploitation of vertisols, livestock, bush collection, off-farm activities - generally outperform introduced options - specialized commercial production, mechanization, irrigation - in these two key areas, which under conditions of increasing insecurity become more rather than less significant. Recommended technical packages necessitate a dependence upon outside service agencies whose own reliability is decreasing now that many countries are in a continuing state of financial crisis. Under such conditions, entry into 'modern' agricultural production makes sense only for those with a cushion of nonfarm income to tide them over periods of food scarcity. Notes, ref. |