STEPS centre

Climate change in East Africa

Environmental change and maize innovation pathways in Kenya

Focusing on dryland Kenya and on maize, a socially and economically highly significant staple crop, this project will explore the dynamics of farming system change in areas affected by increased rainfall variability due to climate change.

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.

This project will explore the diverse ways that farmers (wealthy and poor, male and female) and national and global agricultural researchers frame and respond to emergent environmental challenges, whether through local crop, soil and water adaptations or engineering drought-resistant maize strains.

The project will address the interactions with human health, asking how maize-led land use changes have been shaped by and are shaping disease ecologies, whether through the emergence and spread of disease vectors or the impact of HIV/AIDS on household labour and gender relations.

Asking which innovation pathways are taken up and which are left aside, as shaped by political and institutional processes, the project will aim to open up consideration of alternative pathways that meet poorer farmers' Sustainability goals amidst complex and dynamic ecologies and livelihood systems.