Elsevier

Agricultural Systems

Volume 193, October 2021, 103229
Agricultural Systems

Research Article
Is the system of rice intensification (SRI) pro poor? Labour, class and technological change in West Africa

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2021.103229Get rights and content

Highlights

  • SRI is widely promoted in West Africa. Yet, research from Asia cautions against negative impacts on employment and equality.

  • We explore adoption patterns and impacts of SRI in West Africa with mixed methods, using existing survey data and a qualitative case study.

  • Marginal and accumulating farmers adopt SRI. SRI increases yields, profitability, and labour use during a bottleneck. Thus, farmers hire more labour.

  • SRI benefits all: Accumulating farmers who employ hired workers, as well as marginal farmers and hired labourers.

  • SRI can contribute to providing income earning opportunities. Seasonal labour use and social relations shape impact.

Abstract

CONTEXT

Increasing numbers of young people enter Sub-Saharan Africa's labour markets each year while industrial jobs only grow slowly. As 62% of Sub-Saharan Africans work in agriculture and as the rural population will continue to rise, agriculture will need to provide additional income- earning opportunities. In this context agricultural technologies should be promoted that can increase food production to answer rising demand and generate decent income-earning opportunities. The System of Rice Intensification (SRI) is widely promoted in West Africa and could address these needs – but recent findings from Asia present negative social impacts on workers.

OBJECTIVE

This paper explores the mechanisms that shape adoption patterns and impacts of SRI in different (West African) contexts through a labour lens.

METHODS

Our innovative theoretical framework integrates analytical and empirical categories from Farming Systems research and agrarian political economy. The mixed methods approach combines: (1) quantitative analysis of existing survey data from 857 agricultural households in Ghana, Benin and Mali; and (2) qualitative analysis of an in-depth case study in the Oti Region of Ghana.

RESULTS AND CONCLUSION

SRI increases yield and profitability in West African rice farming, especially when locally adapted. Farmers adjust SRI to fit lowland rice farming, where water cannot be controlled and to address labour constraints. Additional labour for transplanting (instead of broadcasting) – coinciding with an existing labour bottleneck – constrains SRI adoption. SRI is mainly practised by marginal and accumulating farmers and to a lesser extent by medium farmers. Accumulating farmers invest in agriculture, farm profit-oriented and overcome labour constraints by hiring. Thus, they can practise SRI on larger scale and their absolute benefits are higher. Nevertheless, they rely on hired labour to do so, which strengthens workers' bargaining position. Consequently, SRI benefits all: accumulating farmers who employ as well as marginal farmers and hired labourers. Contrary to findings from Asia, SRI seems to be relatively pro-poor in West Africa.

SIGNIFICANCE

While seasonal labour use remains a key constraint to technology adoption, labour intensive technologies can also contribute to increasing income-earning opportunities. The social outcomes of technological change will be shaped by both the existing agricultural practices and the social relations in which a new technology is adopted. Our theoretical framework can inform further research and the application of existing evidence to new contexts.

Introduction

Employment is a key challenge facing Sub-Saharan Africa, including rural areas. Between 2015 and 2030 375 million youth will enter the labour market in a context of limited growth of industrial jobs (Meagher, 2016; Losch, 2016). At the same time, social differentiation and commodification make it increasingly difficult to acquire the land, livestock and trees, necessary to build a livelihood in farming (Turner, 1999; Amanor, 2010). As 62% of people in Sub-Saharan Africa work in agriculture (Filmer and Fox, 2014) and the rural population will continue to grow in absolute terms, agricultural development projects will need to carefully consider their employment effects (Losch, 2016).

In this context, we assess the employment effects of an alternative rice farming technique, the system of rice intensification (SRI). According to Styger and Jenkins (2014) SRI's key principles are early and healthy plant establishment, minimizing competition between plants, increasing soil fertility and avoiding flooding and water stress. These can be achieved through adaptable practices (see Table 3): Alternate wetting and drying (to avoid flooding and water stress) induces aerobic soil conditions to enhance root growth, soil microbial activity, and thus nutrient uptake (Uphoff, 2003). Transplanting young seedlings (for early and healthy plant establishment) enhances tillering capacity to over 80 instead of 8–13 tillers (Uphoff, 2003; Stoop et al., 2002; Mishra et al., 2006). While wide spacing (for minimized competition) and non-flooding provides ideal conditions for weed growth (Moser and Barrett, 2003b; Stoop et al., 2002), planting in widely spaced square patterns enables the use of mechanical weeders (Noltze, 2012). These mechanical weeders enhance soil aeration (Uphoff, 2003). Given its low-input nature, it is an affordable technique that frequently outperforms conventional farmers practices (Berkhout et al., 2015).

SRI has increasingly gained relevance in West Africa: It is widely promoted receiving government support in Benin, Togo, Mali and Senegal (Styger and Jenkins, 2014; SRI-Rice, 2016). The West Africa Agriculture Productivity Program (WAAPP), supported by the World Bank under the institutional umbrella of ECOWAS, claims to have achieved SRI adoption by over 50,000 farmers in 13 countries (Styger and Traóre, 2008). The ‘Green Innovation Centres for the Agriculture and Food Sector’ have trained ca. 25.000 farmers on SRI in 3 countries (Fett, 2019). Furthermore, in respect to transplanting SRI guidelines (seedlings younger than 21 days, carefully handling seedlings, wide spacing with at least 20×20cm and 1–3 seedlings per hill) have become mainstream recommendations in West Africa (see e.g. Rice transplanting, 2012; JIRCAS, 2012).

While SRI is often presented as “fundamentally ‘pro-poor.’” (Africare, Oxfam America, and WWF-ICRISAT Project, 2010; Moser and Barrett, 2003b), recent research from Asia shows that SRI adopters are not typically the poorest rural households (Taylor and Bhasme, 2019) and that SRI can negatively impact poor agricultural workers including women (Hansda, 2016; Gathorne-Hardy et al., 2016; Senthilkumar et al., 2008). Yet, although changes in the labour process are central to SRI, its impacts on hired labourers, remain understudied.

The study assesses the promotion of SRI in Benin, Ghana and Mali through the ‘Green Innovation Centres for the Agriculture and Food Sector’; i.e. we assess SRI's effectiveness in real farms that use a farmer-adapted SRI, instead of SRI's efficacy (its potential under ideal conditions where all SRI principles are fully implemented). We address the following research questions in the context of West Africa focussing on lowland rice production systems:

  • 1.

    How do class relations and farming systems affect SRI adoption?

  • 2.

    What are the impacts of SRI on farm level?

  • 3.

    What are the impacts of SRI on society level, especially on the labour market?

The study uses an innovative theoretical framework that combines analytical and empirical categories from Farming Systems research and agrarian political economy and is suitable to assess how existing agricultural practices and social relations shape adoption patterns and impacts of SRI in different contexts. While adoption studies usually see labour mainly as a constraint (Tripp and Longley, 2006), in contexts of overcrowded labour markets increased labour use can contribute to increasing income-earning opportunities (Pretty et al., 2011; Losch, 2016). Using the lens of labour relations enables us to assess the social impact of technological change beyond the farm.

As the literature on SRI concentrates heavily on irrigated farming in Asia (see SRI-Rice, 2021) and this is (to our knowledge) the first socio-economic study of SRI in West-Africa beyond farmer field trials, the research enables comparisons of results across contexts – a key theme of our discussion section.

Section snippets

Theoretical framework

This paper adopts an agrarian systems perspective which reconciles concepts and insights from two key fields in agricultural and rural research: Farming systems research and agrarian political economy (Bainville, 2017; Cochet, 2012). Farming systems research seeks to understand farming practices and constraints of (resource-poor) farmers, with a focus on potential interventions (Chambers and Ghildyal, 1985; Collinson, 2000). Agrarian political economy investigates the “social relations and

Methods

The study used mixed methods based on an observational approach. In contrast to experimental designs like randomised control trials which follow strictly pre-defined protocols (Olsen, 2019), these data reflect the adaptations farmers make to integrate SRI into their farm system (see Glover, 2011). Furthermore, we combine quantitative analysis (i.e. statistical hypothesis testing) with qualitative fieldwork (i.e. collection of unstructured interview data, in which emerging patterns are

Qualitative results

Visiting rice fields in the Oti region, we saw two alternative technologies to SRI. Firstly, transplanting ‘scatteredly’, where seedlings are transplanted without trying to achieve a specific planting pattern or uniform distance between plants. Many farmers who have adopted SRI describe this change as shifting from transplanting ‘scatteredly’ to transplanting ‘in lines’. However, when it comes to intensity of adoption, the relevant counterfactual is broadcasting, i.e. spreading seeds onto the

Discussion

Given, there are no comparable socio-economic studies on SRI in West-Africa (see SRI-Rice, 2021), the discussion follows a two-step approach. For each research question we first check whether our findings can be plausibly generalized to West-Africa. Then we discuss the findings against existing evidence obtained in Asian contexts.7

Conclusion

In the context of the African employment challenge, we have assessed the potential of a labour-intensive agricultural technology, namely SRI, to contribute to employment creation based on an innovative theoretical framework. In West African rice farming SRI increases yields and profitability and can be beneficial for both marginal and accumulating farmers, although in different ways and at different scale of gains. Marginal farmers can better utilize their little land through SRI and increase

Declaration of Competing Interest

The research was undertaken in the context of a consultancy for the German Corporation for International Cooperation GmbH (GIZ), that is implementing SRI projects in the study region. Sarah Graf has also been an intern at GIZ.

Acknowledgements

The research was undertaken in the context of an assignment by the Green Innovation Centres for the Agriculture and Food Sector (GIZ) commissioned by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The Green Innovation Centres supported the research through provision of a household dataset, funding for fieldwork and logistics, but did not interfere in the research process. We are especially grateful to Stefan Fett and Ralf Barthelmes wo eagerly supported this project, and

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