A watershed approach to managing rainfed agriculture in the semiarid region of southern Mali: integrated research on water and land use
Soil and water conservation (SWC) practices like that of erosion control and soil fertility measures were commonly practiced in the semiarid region of southern Mali since the 1980s. The SWC practices were mainly meant to increase water availability in the subsurface, reduce farm water runoff and gully formation and improve nutrient content of the soil, thereby increasing crop yield. Despite such efforts to promote at scale SWC practices, the landscape of southern Mali is still affected by high rates of runoff and soil erosion and low crop yield in farmers’ fields. Data are lacking on previous beneficial SWC practices that could be adapted for wider application. In this paper, a watershed approach to managing rainfed agriculture is presented to show potential benefits of SWC practices at field and watershed scales. The approach included (1) community participation in establishing and monitoring new sets of hydro-meteorological monitoring stations and field experiments; (2) studying the dynamics and consumptive water uses of different land uses over time; and (3) evaluating the biophysical and economic advantages of SWC practices
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Journal Article biblioteca |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Springer
2019-10
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/92496 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-018-0144-9 |
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