AGROECOLOGY FOR FOOD SECURITY AND SOVEREIGNTY

PRESENTED AT THE 5th FANRPAN High-level Food Security PARTNERS’ MEETING

Vuningoma Faustin

SG PELUM ASSOCIATION REGIONAL SECRETARIAT

Pretoria/SA, 30th May, 2013

Brief information on PELUM• PELUM Association is a civil society member driven

regional network of 220 civil society organisations, operating since 1995.

• We are in 10 countries of Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

• Very soon we will also be in Burundi, Ethiopia, South Sudan and Swaziland

• Our mission is: To improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers and the sustainability of farming communities by fostering ecological land use management.

PELUM’s take on agro-ecology • As PELUM Association we see agro ecology as a form

of agriculture that integrate natural, regenerative processes; minimize non renewable inputs; relay on indigenous knowledge of farmers; involves locally adapted practices and encourages biodiversity.

• Our ELUM is a production system that sustains the health of soils, ecosystems and people.

• It relies on ecological processes, biodiversity and cycles adapted to local conditions, rather than the use of external inputs.

• ELUM combines tradition, innovation and science to benefit the shared environment and promote fair relationships and good quality of life for all involved in the ecosystem.

Approaches to promoting agro-ecology • Farmer field schools through lead farmers

The community farmer field school is a result of ToT that has a capacity building multiplier approach, where each lead farmer targets 10-30 farmers.

Approaches to promoting agro-ecology cont.

• Training, Mobilisation and awareness raising

This approach takes on a bigger number of farmers at a time and most theories are captured in these sessions

MOBILISATION AND TRAINING

Mobilsation and training of the farmers on cassava production

Approaches to promoting agro-ecology cont.

• Holding training with exhibitions

Approaches to promoting agro-ecology cont.

• Community seed production for seed sovereignty hence food security through use of regenerative OPV seeds

• Value addition and Market access; Once value is added market linkages are created by bringing together different players in the value chain.

• Networking of like minded organisations for best practices sharing and strengthening common voice for advocacy.

• Communication and information sharing through publications, resource centers and e-sharing

Farmer to farmer experiences• On-farm soil management, water conservation & harvesting

Farmers plant fodder on the boundary of the contour to make the soil firm while at the same time providing feed for the animals, adding nitrogen to the soil and also providing mulching material

Farmer to farmer experiences cont.

• As a result of adopting mulching, farmers have Testified to increased yield and ability to maintainProductivity amidst harsh climate conditions.

Farmers dig a ditch (left & below left), fit in a tapoline and then introduce water weed to purify as well as minimise water loss through evaporation. A farmer from Masaka district (below right) demonstrates the use of a simple water pump to draw water from the well to the animals and for irrigation

Farmer to farmer experiences

Challenges of scaling up agro ecology • Lack of support from Governments: Most African

governments have deliberately promoted conventional agriculture at the expense of agro-ecology.

• Interference and pressure from multinationals; whose focus is maximizing profits through creation of monopoly supply of high cost external agriculture inputs.

• Research agenda geared towards conventional agriculture: There has been deliberate negligence of undertaking farmer participatory research to avoid shading scientific proof that support agro-ecology.

Challenges of scaling up agro ecology cont.• Unfair trade policies: Trade policies that favour

multinationals at the expense of the small scale farmers who still stand to be the bigger producers of food eaten world over.

• This is done through protection of IPRs and harmonization of trade laws of goods and services that have undergone formal approval and registration that undermines the exchange of small scale farmers produce (seeds) which would be classified as illegal.

Conclusion• There is enough practical evidence that agro-ecology is

the way to go not only to sustainably feed the world population, but also to raise the rural poor household incomes.

• African governments and donor community have for long supported conventional agriculture that has only benefited the small number of commercial farmers and multinationals dealing in agriculture inputs. This trend needs to change.

• We call upon FANRPAN to critically analyze the ongoing seed trade harmonization regulations for the benefit of the SSFs and advise policy makers appropriately.

Agro-ecology can feed the world

THANKS FOR YOUR KIND ATTENTION