ABSTRACT

Meeting multiple, often competing objectives when seeking to sustainably intensify their agricultural operations is a constant challenge for smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa. Trade-offs between social, economic and environmental goals at different time and spatial scales need to be reconciled, making best use of scarce resources. This study explored how different types of farm households in Northwest Ghana, Eastern Burkina Faso and Central Malawi make choices about resource allocation and farming strategies, and how they manage the trade-offs encountered. It used both quantitative (questionnaire survey) and qualitative (household case studies) methods to identify trade-offs experienced by farmers and to analyse trade-off management strategies used by them. The 10 main trade-offs identified across the 3 countries occurred across sustainability domains, across time, across spatial scales, across types of farmers or a combination of these. Famers were disincentivized from prioritizing long-term sustainability in their farming operation by resource constraints to meet multiple farming and livelihood objectives, mainstream agricultural policies encouraging short-term productivity gains and adoption-focused interventions, which disregard the diversity of farming households.

摘要

在寻求可持续地集约化农业经营时，满足多个往往相互竞争的目标是撒哈拉以南非洲小农面临的持续挑战。需要协调不同时间和空间尺度的社会、经济和环境目标之间的权衡，充分利用稀缺资源。本研究探讨了加纳西北部、布基纳法索东部和马拉维中部不同类型的农户如何选择资源分配和耕作策略，以及他们如何管理所遇到的权衡。它使用定量（问卷调查）和定性（家庭案例研究）方法来确定农民所经历的权衡并分析他们使用的权衡管理策略。在这 3 个国家中确定的 10 个主要权衡发生在可持续发展领域、跨时间、跨空间尺度、跨农民类型或这些的组合。由于资源限制，无法满足多种农业和生计目标，主流农业政策鼓励短期生产力提高和以收养为重点的干预措施，而忽视了农户的多样性，从而阻碍了农民在农业经营中优先考虑长期可持续性。