Travis W. Reynolds

Environmental impacts and constraints associated with the production of major food crops in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia

Many environmental factors constrain the production of major food crops in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. At the same time, these food production systems themselves have a range of negative impacts on the environment. In this paper we review the published literature and assess the depth of recent research (since 2000) on crop x environment interactions for rice, maize, sorghum/millets, sweetpotato/yam and cassava in these two regions. We summarize current understandings of the environmental impacts of crop production systems prior to crop production, during production and post-production, and emphasize how those initial environmental impacts become new and more severe environmental constraints to crop yields. Pre-production environmental interactions relate to agricultural expansion or intensification, and include soil degradation and erosion, the loss of wild biodiversity, loss of food crop genetic diversity and climate change. Those during crop production include soil nutrient depletion, water depletion, soil and water contamination, and pest resistance/outbreaks and the emergence of new pests and diseases. Post-harvest environmental interactions relate to the effects of crop residue disposal, as well as crop storage and processing. We find the depth of recent publications on environmental impacts is very uneven across crops and regions. Most information is available for rice in South Asia and maize in Sub-Saharan Africa where these crops are widely grown and have large environmental impacts, often relating to soil nutrient and water management. Relatively few new studies have been reported for sorghum/millets, sweetpotato/yam or cassava, despite their importance for food security on large areas of marginal farmland in Sub-Saharan Africa – however, there is mounting evidence that even these low-input crops, once thought to be environmentally benign, are contributing to cycles of environmental degradation that threaten current and future food production. A concluding overview of the emerging range of published good practices for smallholder farmers highlights many opportunities to better manage crop x environment interactions and reduce environmental impacts from these crops in developing countries.

Husband and Wife Perspectives on Farm Household Decision-making Authority and Evidence on Intra-household Accord in Rural Tanzania

Highlights • We use surveys of husbands and wives in Tanzania to explore rural household decision-making.• We find perceptions of household decision-making authority differ depending on the spouse asked.• Factors associated with a wife’s authority include age, education, health, children, and labor hours.• The allocation of intra-household authority also varies across thirteen different decision questions.• A lack of “intra-household accord” over authority may be a barrier to empowerment efforts.

Sacred natural sites as mensurative fragmentation experiments in long-inhabited multifunctional landscapes

&NA; Well‐controlled landscape experiments have played key roles in advancing fragmentation science, but such experiments are costly and may not be possible in many ecosystems – including the long‐inhabited landscapes typical of many developing countries. In such contexts observational studies of pre‐existing forest patches may offer valuable insights, but these bring other challenges including the non‐random location of patches, the heterogeneous matrix between patches, and patch‐specific management practices that may influence forest community composition. This paper argues that sacred natural sites might provide a middle ground between experimental and observational studies, allowing for more rigorous mensurative fragmentation experiments in long‐inhabited multi‐functional landscapes. To illustrate this potential, we analyze the drivers of productivity in ‘church forests’ across northern Ethiopia. These forest patches conserved by followers of the Ethiopian Orthodox church provide ample variation in area, edge, and surrounding matrix characteristics. Church forests also provide variation in long‐term forest community composition, elevation and rainfall. Finally, unlike most observational studies, church forests offer a relatively stable institutional structure, including longstanding religious norms, allowing researchers to control for some heterogeneity in human influences. By combining remotely sensed data on church forest patches (n = 2558) with field data on church forest tree species composition (n = 27) and social survey data on church forest management practices (n = 145 respondents in 6 church communities) we show how ecological and anthropogenic factors influence church forest productivity. Like experimental patches, church forest productivity increases with size and decreases with amount of edge; productivity also increases with rainfall and increased tree species diversity within a given patch. But there is also evidence that church forest productivity and species composition are both affected by human management rooted in longstanding religious norms. Findings highlight how studies in sacred natural sites systems might help understand relationships between forest productivity, species diversity, and human management in long‐fragmented landscapes.

Variability in Cross-Domain Risk Perception among Smallholder Farmers in Mali by Gender and Other Demographic and Attitudinal Characteristics: Variability in Cross-Domain Risk Perception

Abstract Previous research has shown that men and women, on average, have different risk attitudes and may therefore see different value propositions in response to new opportunities. We use data from smallholder farm households in Mali to test whether risk perceptions differ by gender and across domains. We model this potential association across six risks (work injury, extreme weather, community relationships, debt, lack of buyers, and conflict) while controlling for demographic and attitudinal characteristics. Factor analysis highlights extreme weather and conflict as eliciting the most distinct patterns of participant response. Regression analysis for Mali as a whole reveals an association between gender and risk perception, with women expressing more concern except in the extreme weather domain; however, the association with gender is largely absent when models control for geographic region. We also find lower risk perception associated with an individualistic and/or fatalistic worldview, a risk‐tolerant outlook, and optimism about the future, while education, better health, a social orientation, self‐efficacy, and access to information are generally associated with more frequent worry—with some inconsistency. Income, wealth, and time poverty exhibit complex associations with perception of risk. Understanding whether and how mens and womens risk preferences differ, and identifying other dominant predictors such as geographic region and worldview, could help development organizations to shape risk mitigation interventions to increase the likelihood of adoption, and to avoid inadvertently making certain subpopulations worse off by increasing the potential for negative outcomes.

Relating Seasonal Hunger and Prevention and Coping Strategies: A Panel Analysis of Malawian Farm Households

Abstract Relative to chronic hunger, seasonal hunger in rural and urban areas of Africa is poorly understood. This paper examines the extent and potential correlates of seasonal hunger in Malawi using panel data from 2011–2013. We find that both urban and rural households report seasonal hunger in the pre-harvest months. Certain strategies to smooth consumption, including crop storage and livestock ownership, are associated with fewer months of hunger. In addition, we find that Malawian households that experience seasonal hunger harvest their crops earlier than average – a short-term coping mechanism that can reduce the crop’s yield and nutritional value, possibly perpetuating hunger.

Relative Effectiveness of Bilateral and Multilateral Aid on Development Outcomes

Aid donors are interested in understanding whether allocating aid via bilateral or multilateral channels might be more effective for achieving development goals. We review 45 papers that empirically test the associations between bilateral and multilateral aid flows and various development outcomes including gross domestic product growth, governance indicators, human development indicators and levels of non-aid investment flows. Findings suggest that differences between countries and regions, time periods, aid objectives, and individual donor organizations all may influence the effectiveness of aid delivered bilaterally and multilaterally. We find, however, no consistent evidence that either bilateral or multilateral aid is more effective overall.