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Focus on East Africa
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Farming systems
The East Africa region is characterized by three main mountain farming systems.
In the Highland Perennial System, perennial crops grown mostly in the sub-humid and humid highlands of Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda support high densities of rural mountain population, currently totalling around 16 million. Population pressure has resulted in intense land use on very small landholdings (below 1 ha per family on average, with over half cultivating less than 0.5 ha). Farm size continues to decline, and soil fertility is being lost rapidly. Coping mechanisms that involve intensifying land use also result in low return to labour, leading to further increases in the prevalence and severity of poverty and hunger, which are already high.
The Highland Temperate Mixed System supports a rural population of 19 million, mostly located between 1800m and 3000m in the Ethiopian Highlands. Population density is high and increasing, with the result that landholdings are becoming smaller, and the system less and less sustainable. In addition, variability in the length of the growing period results in serious crop failures in some years. Poverty is moderate to extensive.
The Maize Mixed System is the most important mountain food production system in eastern and southern Africa, extending across plateaus and highlands between 800 and 1500 m from Kenya to South Africa, and providing a livelihood for around 15 million rural mountain people. Population density is quite high and average landholdings is below 2 ha. Socio-economic diversification is considerable and vulnerability mainly linked to drought, market volatility and a high incidence of HIV-AIDS. Chronic poverty has been moderate, but is increasing.
Promising mountain products
In 2005, the FAO Mountain Products Programme funded a study for the Prioritization and Preliminary analysis of Strategic Sub-sectors in Kenya, which was carried out by CAB International Africa Regional Centre. Using a methodology for the Promotion of Comercially Viable Soulutions to Subsector and Business Constraints, developed by Action for Enterprise, the specialty coffee, macadamia and honey sub-sectors were selected, an analysis of constraints or bottlenecks along the supply chains carried out and suggestions for intervention made.
Field projects
The Mountain Products Programme, in collaboration with CAB International Africa Regional Centre, is currently preparing project proposals for support to the specialty coffee, macadamia and honey in the Mount Kenya region. Identified donors include the FAO Technical Cooperation Programme.
The Programme, in collaboration with the Community-based Enterprise Development Programme of the FAO Forest Policy and Information Division and the Mgahinga and Bwindi Impenetrable Forest Conservation Trust (MBIFCT), is supporting the development of the Buhoma Village Walk Enterprise in Uganda.
The definitions of farming systems in mountain areas are adapted from 'Towards a GIS-based analysis of mountain environments and populations' (FAO, 2003). Read more
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Uganda Coffee Development Authority
