Does Adoption of Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) Technologies Reduce Household Vulnerability to Poverty?

Abstract

Climate variability is one of the limiting factors to increasing per capita income and food production among smallholder farmers in Africa. This study investigated if the adoption of climate smart agriculture (CSA) technologies reduce household vulnerability to poverty by differentiating crop yields and income between adopters and non-adopters. This study used a mixed methods approach; both qualitative and quantitative techniques. A multi-stage stratified random sampling was applied, with 619 respondents interviewed in the districts of Nsanje and Balaka in southern Malawi during 2014-2015 cropping season. There was an increment of 26%, 37%, 9% and 26% in maize yield by farmers who adopted portfolio diversification, soil and water conservation, soil fertility improvement and irrigation and water harvesting technologies respectively. About 42% of the adopters had food throughout the year compared to 26% non-adopters. Adopters had 47%, 42%, 60% and 36% more in their crop revenues from portfolio diversification, soil and water conservation, soil fertility improvement and irrigation & water harvesting respectively, than their non-adopters counterparts. The study confirms the importance of agriculture technology adoption for increased household revenue and the need to take steps to reinforce existing adoption strategies.

Keywords:  Climate smart agriculture, effectiveness, smallholder farmers, Malawi.