Despite increasing land degradation in sub-Saharan Africa, investment in sustainable land management (SLM) remains low. Empirical evidence show that smallholder farmers tend to prioritize investing in SLM practices with short-term turnover—e.g., composting and crop residue integration—in order to improve soil fertility and yields to the neglect of practices like agroforestry whose benefits tend to materialize in a relatively longer period. While it is crucial for farmers to prioritize both short-term and long-term SLM practices for the maintenance of overall ecosystem health, the factors that shape the concurrent adoption of short-term and long-term SLM practices remain underexplored. Using data from a cross-sectional survey with smallholder farming households (n = 512) in Malawi, we employed logistic regression to examine the determinants of the concurrent adoption of short-term and long-term SLM practices. Our findings show that plot size, farmer-to-farmer knowledge sharing, presence of a chronically ill person in the household, active household labor size, wealth and women's autonomy are noteworthy determinants. A unit increase in plot size was associated with increased odds (OR = 1.41, p < 0.01) of simultaneously adopting short-term and long-term SLM practices. Similarly, a unit increase in the active labor size of the household (OR = 1.30, p < 0.001) was positively associated with the concurrent adoption of short-term and long-term SLM practices. Households with no chronically sick person were 3.2 times more likely to adopt short-term and long-term SLM practices simulataneously compared to those with chronically sick persons. Farming households that exchanged farming information (OR = 2.50, p < 0.001) with other households had significantly higher odds of adopting short-term and long-term SLM practices concurrently than those that did not share farming information. Compared to households in the poorest wealth category, those in the richer (OR = 3.14, p < 0.001) and richest (OR = 3.64, p < 0.001) wealth categories were both significantly more likely to adopt short-term and long-term SLM practices concurrently. These findings suggest that initiatives targeted at promoting the holistic adoption of SLM practices—a combination of both short-term and long-term practices—must pay attention to contextual nuances including household wealth, gender, farmer training and land access dynamics.

中文翻译：

---

小农采用短期和长期可持续土地管理做法的决定因素

尽管撒哈拉以南非洲的土地退化日益严重，但对可持续土地管理（SLM）的投资仍然很低。经验证据表明，为了提高土壤肥力和产量，小农倾向于优先投资于短期周转的可持续土地管理实践（例如堆肥和作物残茬整合），而忽略了农林业等实践，其收益往往会在相对较短时间内实现更长的时期。虽然对于农民来说，优先考虑短期和长期 SLM 做法以维护整体生态系统健康至关重要，但影响同时采用短期和长期 SLM 做法的因素仍未得到充分探索。使用来自小农户的横断面调查数据（n= 512）在马拉维，我们采用逻辑回归来检查同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践的决定因素。我们的研究结果表明，地块大小、农民之间的知识共享、家庭中有慢性病患者、活跃的家庭劳动力规模、财富和妇女的自主权是值得注意的决定因素。小区面积增加一个单位与几率增加有关（OR = 1.41，p< 0.01) 同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践。同样，家庭的活跃劳动力规模每增加一个单位（OR = 1.30，p< 0.001) 与同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践呈正相关。与有慢性病患者的家庭相比，没有慢性病患者的家庭同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践的可能性高 3.2 倍。交换农业信息的农户（OR = 2.50，p< 0.001) 与其他家庭同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践的几率显着高于不共享农业信息的家庭。与最贫穷的家庭相比，较富裕的家庭（OR = 3.14，p< 0.001) 和最富有 (OR = 3.64,p< 0.001) 财富类别更有可能同时采用短期和长期 SLM 实践。这些调查结果表明，旨在促进整体采用可持续土地管理实践（短期和长期实践相结合）的举措必须关注背景细微差别，包括家庭财富、性别、农民培训和土地获取动态。