Climate change in East Africa
Environmental change and maize innovation pathways in Kenya
Maize as a window
Maize is an important staple crop in Kenya, socially, politically and economically. This project takes maize as a window through which to explore differential responses to climate change, market uncertainties and land use changes over time. It traces different types of innovation and response proposed by various actors – public agricultural research institutions, donors, development agencies, private companies and farmers.
The research explores how interventions and programmes of these various institutions address issues of sustainability - whether through crop improvement, seed or input supply, produce marketing support or other initiatives - in the face of these challenges. At issue is the way in which actors in different institutional and geographic locations understand and frame resilience, for example as a property of seeds, farming systems or broader livelihoods; and how these framing assumptions shape agendas and steer solutions, programme designs and resources in certain directions and not others.
Diverse pathways, multiple systems
The combined effects of climate, market and demographic changes and uncertainties vary between and within different agro-ecological zones of Kenya, in diverse and socially differentiated ways. The research explores pathways followed or envisaged by farmers (wealthy and poor, male and female), individually or as groups, in local crop, soil and water adaptations, for example; and the extent to which these strategies are, or might be integrated into national and international policy, research and development initiatives.
In doing so, the research seeks to highlight the multiple systems of innovation that coexist, overlap and sometimes conflict; how some systems come to ‘count’ more than others; and opportunities for (re)opening these processes for wider debate.
Explainer: why is maize so important?
- Drought resistance for staple crops is the holy grail of plant breeding in the developing world, particularly in Africa, where limited irrigation constrains agricultural growth. This challenge becomes even more acute with the prospect of greater variability in rainfall patterns as a result of environmental change.
- Environmental dynamics determining soil moisture thus have major impacts on agricultural incomes and food security in dryland farming areas, and are a key factor in influencing livelihoods and pathways into and out of poverty.
STEPS members working on this project
- John Thompson Convenor
- Sally Brooks Research Officer
- Erik Millstone Research Fellow
STEPS partners on this project
- African Centre for Technology Studies, Nairobi, Kenya (ACTS)
Serah Nderitu, ACTS - Centre for African Bio-Entrepreneurship, Nairobi, Kenya (CABE)
Hannington Odame Executive Director, CABE - Tegemeo Institute of Agricultural Policy and Development, Egerton University, Nairobi, Kenya
Betty Kibaara Research Fellow, Tegemeo Institute
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Related Research and events
- Addressing the Dynamics of Agri-Food Systems, by Ian Scoones and John Thompson, Environmental Science and Policy (pdf 377kb).
- STEPS Working Paper 11: GM Crops Made by Monsanto: the Corporate Shaping of GM Crops as a Technology for the Poor (pdf 447kb) by Dominic Glover
- STEPS briefing 4: Agri-food System Dynamics for Sustainability (pdf 273kb)
- Farmer First Revisited
- Salzberg Seminar. A "Green Revolution" in Africa: What Framework for Success? 3-7 May 2008
- Reframing Resilience The STEPS Centre's theme this year is resilience; engaging with resilience thinking and exploring practical implications for policy in agriculture, water, peri-urban dynamics, epidemics and regulation.
- Future Agricultures Consortium
- Veterinary Science, Transboundary Animal Diseases and Markets: the case of foot-and-mouth disease in southern Africa
- Avian 'flu: the politics and policy processes of a global response
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Farming family in Sakai, Kenya, diversifying from maize to horticulture / Sally Brooks |
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