IFPRI Report

Volume 20, Number 2
July 1998

Research Perspectives

Strategies for the Development of Fragile Areas of Sub-Saharan Africa

Land degradation is advancing at an alarming rate in Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly desertification in dryland areas, soil erosion and deforestation in hillside areas, and loss of soil fertility in many cropped areas. The degradation of fragile drylands and hillsides is particularly worrisome because it is often irreversible or can only be reversed at high cost. While natural forces such as climate change, drought, floods, and geological processes contribute to land degradation, the most important contributing factor in Sub-Saharan Africa is human activity. Most experts believe that the key driving force is at the nexus of poverty, rapid population growth, and inadequate progress in increasing crop yields.

With poor economic growth and worsening social problems, the pressure on natural resources, particularly in fragile areas, seems destined to worsen. Migration to cities will provide some relief, but even so, population densities in many fragile areas are likely to increase during the next several decades. As governments and aid agencies confront the increasingly urgent need to develop fragile lands in Africa, they are under real pressure as to how to arrive at a workable consensus.

To address these issues and to develop pragmatic solutions for development in these fragile areas, an international conference on “Strategies for Poverty Alleviation and Sustainable Resource Management in the Fragile Lands of Sub-Saharan Africa” was held May 25–29, in Entebbe, Uganda. The conference was organized jointly by IFPRI, the National Agricultural Research Organization, Uganda (NARO), the Food and Agriculture Development Centre (ZEL) of the German Foundation for International Development (DSE), and the European Commission (EC).

The conference brought together about 50 participants from eight countries in Sub-Saharan Africa: Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Mali, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda, and from national, regional, and international research institutions and organizations working in the fields of agriculture, natural resource management, and policy formation.

The broad goal of the conference was to formulate strategies for sustainable resource management and poverty alleviation in fragile lands in Sub-Saharan Africa. The conference focused on the following objectives: developing common understanding of the issues and challenges in the development of fragile lands to improve food security and alleviate poverty; identifying the constraints on successful management of fragile lands, formulating recommendations for designing appropriate policies for fragile lands to meet the livelihood needs of people, while conserving and sustainably managing the natural resource base; and identifying follow-up activities for implementing the agreed-upon policies and strategies (for research, capacity strengthening, and investment).

The major recommendations of the conference indicate that a stable macroeconomic environment is a prerequisite for the development of fragile areas, together with liberalized exchange rates and trade policies. However, specific policies for fragile lands are necessary to better link them with markets and to enhance their capacity to compete. These policies include (1) improving roads and transport systems in fragile lands; (2) establishing appropriate legal and regulatory frameworks to strengthen input and output markets; (3) establishing policy and legal structures for land tenure security, leading to better management of natural resources and granting women the right to inherit land; (4) strengthening the capacity of environment management institutions to reclaim degraded lands, develop land-use plans, and implement community-based conservation measures; (5) reforming rural financial markets in fragile areas to encourage saving and the use of nontraditional forms of collateral; (6) assessing the problems of existing technological packages and their application by farmers, strengthening national agricultural research systems, and ensuring that research and extension are demand driven; and (7) developing infrastructure that promotes off-farm employment and better access to health, nutrition, and education facilities in fragile lands.