As the world struggles to respond to the latest famine in the Horn of Africa, many are asking what can be done to reduce the risk of a disaster of this magnitude from happening again. Although a common answer is found in the call for increased long-term development aid and agricultural support, there is more that can be done. Efforts that safeguard the region’s remaining forests, and promote reforestation and agroforestry can also help to alleviate food insecurity:
Forests and food security: an obvious link!
Forests play a crucial role in the disaster unfolding in the Horn of Africa. Pastoralist and sedentary communities in the region’s dry lands depend on trees for food and fodder, energy, construction, and agricultural implements and utensils.
Research has shown that between 25 and 35 percent of the annual income of people living near forests in Ethiopia is obtained from those forests; figures that are reinforced by the preliminary findings released in June from a six-year global study carried out by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR).
In addition, trees frequently form the basis of livelihood diversification, risk-minimization and coping strategies, especially for vulnerable households led by women and children. However, deforestation and land degradation now hinder their capacity to both cope with disaster impacts and adapt to climate variability and change in the long-term.
Dry forests like those found in the Horn of Africa and elsewhere are also a last line of defense against creeping desertification. Unfortunately, they are disappearing at an estimated rate of between 50,000 and 250,000 hectares per annum.
The increasing importance of forestry
Research by CIFOR shows that forests play an increasingly important role in supporting livelihoods. In Mali, for example, forests are no longer seen as a safety net but have become an integral part of daily subsistence and a fundamental element of adaptive climate change strategies. Of course, this transition also points to increased pressure on forest resources during dry years.
Similarly, CIFOR studies in Malawi show that although forests currently do not feature in the anticipatory adaptation plans of rural households, they have the capacity to augment both food and income during shortages brought about by weather-related crop failure.
A community-based solution
Despite the millions of dollars that have been spent on reforestation and agroforestry activities in the Horn of Africa, such as tree nurseries and planting, few efforts have had a substantial impact in the region. Most initiatives have experienced technical and social obstacles, low tree survival rates and low replicability at the village level. Nonetheless, experiences using the ‘Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration’ (FMNR) technique in Niger and Ethiopia provide important lessons for approaches that address vulnerability, environmental degradation and poverty.
In 2008, 25 years after the FMNR technique was first introduced in Niger, village committees and food-for-work programs had transformed over five million hectares of once barren land into agroforests. The technique, which uses the living stumps of previously cut down trees, significantly enhanced food security and community resilience to drought, and increased local incomes.
The FMNR technique is also being implemented in World Vision’s Humbo Community Managed Forestry Project, Africa’s first large-scale afforestation/reforestation initiative. The project involves the regeneration of 2,728 hectares of degraded Ethiopian native forests containing indigenous species and is expected to generate 338,000 tonnes worth of carbon credits by 2017 and a secure income stream of more than US$ 700,000 to local communities over 10 years.
CIFOR efforts over the past few years, through its projects in the dry forest areas, have attempted to increase awareness of the importance of these forests, and have helped their national partners build research and education programs on sustainable management dry forests and marketing of products to benefit the poor. As a result, CIFOR now has national research programs and graduate study programs in the management of dry forests in Ethiopia.
The World Agroforestry Centre
The work of the World Agroforstry Centre (ICRAF) shows that agroforestry (the incorporation of trees into farming systems) can increase soil organic matter and available nutrients, thereby improving the fertility of soils and increasing the productivity of the land. Trees also provide erosion control, improve water infiltration, provide land cover and shade and act as windbreaks. For example, in Senegal it was found that planting strips of Casuarina trees in the Niayes coastal stretch north of Dakar was enough to stop the movement of sand dunes and provide shelter from the sea winds that hitherto had made any type of agriculture impossible. Market gardening is now thriving in the area and provides a livelihood to an increasing number of settlers.
Fertilizers to the fore
ICRAF has also shown that fertilizer trees, which capture nitrogen from the atmosphere and deposit it in the soil, provide a low cost way for farmers to improve soil fertility and boost crop yields. In Malawi, Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania, Niger, Burkina Faso and other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, fertilizer trees are doubling and tripling average maize yields. The lack of fertilizer alone is linked to food shortages that affect up to 90 percent of the 13 million families in southern and eastern Africa who produce maize for subsistence. Such trees provide an alternative to chemical fertilizers in countries with high fertilizer costs and inadequate transportation systems.
Alternative food sources
In Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia, up to 80 percent of rural households go hungry for three months of the year because they cannot grow enough from their poor soils, with up to 50 percent of them reliant on indigenous fruits to survive. By growing trees on their land, farmers can break the cycle of hunger and provide their families with balanced nutrition.
In West and Central Africa, tree domestication by local farmers is having a large impact on the health and welfare of rural communities. For many poor farmers in the drought-plagued countries of Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria, these new farming techniques have boosted incomes and provided food security, especially during the ‘hungry season’.
The use of fodder trees as an alternative feed for livestock in agropastoral systems reduces grazing pressure and the risk of grazing damage. In East Africa, an estimated 200,000 smallholder dairy farmers are using fodder trees as a source of high quality nutritious feed to boost milk yields.
Trees can help diversify risks as they provide alternative streams of income and increase food security. Through the introduction of trees, farmers can decrease their dependency on a single staple crop or solely grass for their livestock. Also, the diversity of plants used in agroforestry systems can provide multiple harvests at different times of the year. All of which will reduce the risk of further catastrophic food shortages in the Horn of Africa.
Picture courtesy Peter Casier/CCAFS