Crop Selection, Insurance and Other Community Measures Help Smallholders
Experts use many numbers when talking about climate change. However, rising temperatures, the resulting crop failure and consequent loss of livelihoods and destitution of millions of households are this year’s most important and urgent developments for millions of smallholder farmersacross African agro-ecological landscapes. To illustrate the unfolding crisis, let us consider the case of Malawi, one of the few countries to have achieved a fair deal of agricultural success but is now facing the worst drought in over three decades. As is the case with many countries in southern Africa, Malawi has experienced widespread crop failures due to a devastatingly strong El Niño. The country has witnessed late onset of rains, erratic rainfall, floods and prolonged dry spells this year. Thus, the production of maize — the country’s main staple crop — is estimated at just over 2.5 million tonnes in 2016. This is 16 per cent lower than the reduced harvest in 2015 and 34 per cent below the previous five‑year average. Consequently, 39 per cent of the population are dependant on national and international food aid to survive — a 129 per cent increase over last year’s vulnerable population. In the hardest hit areas, harvest reduced by 70 per cent while farmers in some areas simply couldn’t plant as the rains never came.
Tim Green