Farmer strategies for adapting to climate change in Niger

Good morning, listeners.

Good morning, everyone. Today we are going to talk about the changing weather, about climate change.

That’s right. And one of the safest predictions we can make about climate change is that, by now, every African farmer is familiar with the idea!

(LAUGHTER) Yes, they are! And they have probably seen the evidence that the climate is changing all around them. Climate change is an everyday reality in Niger. Farmers already see more very hot days and very warm nights, and the average annual temperature in Niger rose 0.43 °C, or almost half a degree, between 1988 and 2006.

Well, today we are going to talk about how the Nigerien climate is predicted to change because of climate change over the next 30 years and beyond. And we are going to present some farming methods that could help Nigerien farmers adapt to this changing climate.

We already know that, like other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Niger is highly vulnerable to climate change. The climate is already quite variable, and the country lacks the capacity to easily cope with or adapt to climate change. Niger is strongly dependent on crop farming and raising livestock, which are dependent on suitable weather. Also, land degradation and desertification are already major challenges to agricultural production, so climate change will only add to these stresses.

To explore these issues, a German organization called the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research conducted some scientific research that asked two questions: First, how is the Nigerien climate likely to change over the next 30 years and beyond? And second, how can Nigerien farmers change their farming practices to best adapt to the new weather patterns, while at the same time ensuring they have enough food and enough income to support their families?

Those are two very important questions. You said the scientists looked at how the Nigerien weather will change. So, according to the study, what impact will climate change have on the weather in Niger over the next 30 years?

It is predicted that the weather will change in the several ways: There will be higher temperatures, more extreme temperature events, an increase in annual rainfall and in the frequency of extreme rainfall events, and changes in the availability of surface water. The changing climate will affect crop yields, as well as the suitability of particular areas for growing specific crops.

Let’s start with temperature. How will the temperature change in Niger over the next 30 years?

Average temperatures in Niger are expected to rise between 1.3 and 1.9 degrees in Niger by 2050.

And what about rainfall?

The average annual rainfall is also predicted to increase—as well as the number of extreme weather events in all parts of the country.

What do you mean by “extreme weather events”?

Extreme weather events are unexpected, unusual, severe, or unseasonal weather. In Niger, this would include heavy precipitation that may cause flooding. Heavy precipitation events are predicted to increase in intensity and frequency in all parts of Niger by 2050. But, like every other prediction, what actually happens will depend on how much action is taken across the globe in the near future to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving climate change.

Ok. You said that the average temperature is expected to rise by 1.3 to 1.9 degrees by 2050. Will that make a big difference? I am not sure I would notice if the average day was one or two degrees hotter. Will it make any difference to farmers?

Actually, 1.3 to 1.9 degrees can make a great deal of difference. This amount of extra heat could, for example, reduce crop yields, though not all crops will be affected in the same way. In fact, in Niger, yields for some crops could rise, at least until 2050.

Ok, so it sounds like by 2050, the weather will be hotter on average, we’ll have more days and nights with extreme heat, and there will be increased rainfall. How will this increased rainfall affect farmers?

Farmers in Niger depend strongly on rainfall and surface water. The amount of river flow is expected to increase across the country, including in the Niger River and in the Dallo Bosso valley. Flow is predicted to increase throughout the year for the Niger River, especially in October and November. For the Dallo Bosso valley, river flow is predicted to increase during August and September.

The scientists from the Potsdam Institute predict that, because of these changes, some areas of the country will become more suitable for growing sorghum, and that sorghum yields will increase until 2050 and beyond.

Only a small part of Niger is currently suitable for growing maize. This is predicted to stay the same, though in southern areas like Zinder and Maradi, maize production is predicted to increase until 2050, then decrease.

Production of millet is predicted to expand northwards, making Tahoua region more suitable for growing millet.

Finally, about 10% of the country is well-suited to growing cowpea. This is not expected to change, but there will be regional variation. For example, suitability will decrease in the Zinder region and increase in the Tahoua and Tillabery regions.

I’m glad it’s not all bad news for Nigerien farmers.

You mentioned that the scientific study looked at what kinds of practices Nigerien farmers can use to adapt to these changes in the climate. What practices did the scientists identify as being the most useful for adapting to climate change?

There are many farming practices that have the potential to help farmers adapt to climate change. But the scientists identified four kinds of practices that look particularly promising for Nigerien farmers.

These are:agroforestry, and especially farmer managed natural regeneration of trees, integrated soil fertility management or ISFM, irrigation for counter-season agriculture, and improved fodder and feed management for livestock. I should add one other point: When farmers use combinations of these strategies, they will likely be more successful.

You mean, for example, adopting both agroforestry practices and irrigation? Or improvements to fodder and feed and integrated soil fertility?

Exactly.

Ok. So let’s start with agroforestry and farmer managed natural regeneration of trees. First, what do you mean by “agroforestry”?

Agroforestry involves interactions in a farmer’s field between agricultural crops and trees. In Niger, agroforestry is mostly practiced in the form of Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration or FMNR. FMNR is a kind of agroforestry that, instead of planting tree seedlings in farmland, involves farmers identifying wild trees and shrubs that are already growing in farmland and actively protecting them so that they continue to grow.

With FMNR, trees can be protected in land where farmers raise annual crops, and also where they graze and feed livestock. Trees provide many products that can benefit farmers and that they can use or sell at local markets, including fruits, nuts, timber, and firewood. Trees also reduce heat stress for crops and livestock that are sensitive to high temperatures. They also act as wind breaks, and help reduce soil erosion from winds and floods.

If farmers adopt agroforestry in Niger, the predicted result is that yields of sorghum, millet, and cowpeas will rise, especially in areas where less fertilizer is applied.

Are there any challenges to adopting agroforestry, especially FMNR, in Niger?

Well, it’s important that trees don’t shade crops too much. Also, there could be competition for land between agroforestry and other uses, such as grazing. Farmers can best avoid those concerns by good planning and by working with herders to establish livestock corridors.

Another challenge is that there is a gap of several years between the time that farmers start to implement agroforestry and the time they receive a financial return from them. Some farmers may find it difficult to wait that long.

But practicing FMNR is not costly because it requires almost no external inputs. Agroforestry is cheap and easy to establish, has multiple benefits, and it’s been progressing for decades in Niger, so there’s great interest and great potential for expanding it across the country.

Thanks. The second of the four adaptation practices you mentioned was Integrated Soil Fertility Management, or ISFM. What exactly is ISFM?

ISFM is a set of farming practices that are designed to improve soil fertility and to stop soil degradation and depletion of nutrients. It includes various kinds of practices, along with the knowledge of how to adapt these kinds of practices to local conditions, even down to the plot level, while maintaining or improving yields.

It’s really important to conserve water and soil in Niger for several reasons. In Niger, farmingincreasingly relies on cultivating marginal or even degraded land because of rapid population growth and the limited availability of fertile land. Water and wind erosion, nutrient depletion, salinization, and soil crusting all currently degrade soils. And the lack of soil moisture limits crop production in many places.

To summarize the benefits of ISFM practices, we could say that it is designed to achieve four aims: 1) to maximize the capture of rainwater and decrease surface runoff, 2) to reduce water and wind erosion, 3) to manage limited organic resources, and 4) to strategically apply mineral fertilizers.

Can you give some examples of ISFM practices that can be used in Niger?

Of course. The list of common ISFM practices in Niger includes tassa, also known as zaï, half-moons, stone bunds, grass strips, and mulching.

Thanks. Can you start by explaining what tassa and half-moons are?

Tassa is a traditional water harvesting method in which farmers dig small planting pits that are 20-30 cm in diameter and 20-25 cm deep, with about one metre apart between each pit. Half-moons are crescent-shaped pits about two metres in diameter and 15-20 cm deep, with a distance of about eight metres between each half-moon.

Both of these traditional planting pits accumulate and retain water, increasing soil moisture so that farmers can plant crops in the pits. Farmers often add millet straw, cattle manure, or compost manure to the pits. By doing so, they help rehabilitate degraded soil not only by increasing soil moisture but also by improving soil nutrients. This improves the yields of crops grown in tassa and half-moons. In Niger, millet is the most common crop grown in tassa and half-moon pits, though some farmers grow a mixture of millet and sorghum.

Ok. Can you please describe what stone bunds are and how they can help Nigerien farmers adapt to climate change?

Stone bunds are also called stone lines, and are often combined with tassa along the contour of a slope to increase the amount of water that infiltrates into the soil, and to reduce soil erosion and siltation of tassa. Stone bunds involve piling stones closely together along contour lines. Farmers start by removing 10-15 cm of soil from the line where they will build the stone bunds. The bunds are 20-30 cm high off the ground. The distance between stone bunds ranges from 20 to 50 cm, depending on the slope of the land.

Stone bunds work best when vegetation is grown between them, such as grass, live hedges, or trees, and when organic manure or mulch is also applied in this area. Using stone bunds and this kind of vegetation can reduce soil temperatures and protect soil from wind erosion. Growing grass between stone lines further increases infiltration and helps fertile soil to accumulate behind the bunds.

Stone bunds can last for more than 20 years. Over time, sediment builds up behind the lines, creating terraces.

Do these practices actually work? Do these increase yields?

Yes. The Potsdam Institute predicts that using tassa could improve sorghum yields by up to 1500%, especially in southern Niger. That’s why they identified it as such a promising strategy for adapting to climate change. Here’s another example: In an eight-year project in Tahoua, almost 6,000 hectares of severely degraded land was restored to productivity with ISFM practices.

ISFM helps farmers become more resilient against drought and related food shortages. This is really important in Niger, where the rapidly increasing population is putting pressure on the limited land available for farming.

Do these structures require a lot of work to build and maintain?

It takes farmers less than half a day per hectare to both plan contour bunds and receive training on them once a year. And they need maintenance only every second year. It took six days in the first year of creating contour bunds to collect the pebbles and stones to build them, and two days in following years. Tassa holes must be rebuilt every year. For the whole process of land preparation and digging tassa pits, farmers need between five and six days per year per hectare. So if a farmers built tassa holes on two hectares, it would take 10-12 days per year.

Is this amount of time and labour economic for farmers?

Using ISFM practices like this does not cost a lot of money. When you add together the labour and time, the income from increased yields means that farmers start seeing a profit in the second year.

Great. Let’s talk about the third adaptation measure you mentioned: off-season irrigation.

In off- or dry season irrigation, farmers leave plots to rest for a couple of weeks at the end of the rainy season and then plant irrigated off-season crops such as onions, tomatoes, and chili peppers. The water for irrigation comes from wells, ponds, and boreholes. This strategy helps farmers avoid food shortages and diversify their diets in this part of the year.

Low-cost irrigation systems that don’t require much maintenance can be adopted wherever

water resources are available.

Are there any challenges to adopting off-season irrigated farming?

Water resources are scarce, and it’s important to avoid over-exploiting them, in part to prevent further decreasing groundwater levels. It is also critical to establish effective and trusted ways of dealing with conflicts between downstream and upstream users.

Also, it may take 20-25 years for farmers to recoup the investments they make in off-season irrigated farming.

That is a big challenge. You said that improved management of livestock fodder and feed was a fourth approach that could help Nigerien farmers adapt to climate change. What kinds of improvements to feed and fodder management are you talking about?

There are a few types of improvements that are promising, and one is new varieties of fodder species. For example, a trial of a new sorghum variety called Fadda increased fodder yields in different regions of Niger by 10-80%, with larger increases in the north, while yields almost doubled in Agadez.

Another approach is to cultivate alfalfa. Alfalfa can provide fodder during the dry season when irrigated, so it’s a better alternative for pastoralists than constantly searching for enough forage at this time of year. Producers can also sell surplus alfalfa to generate income, or even use alfalfa in stall feeding, then sell stall-fed animals.

But alfalfa has many other types of benefits. Especially when grown on a large scale, it increases vegetative cover, which helps protect and rehabilitate degraded soil.

Another benefit is that women and youth are generally more involved in supporting their families and earning through fodder production and management than men. So cultivating alfalfa, for example by creating alfalfa fodder banks, can provide employment for women and youth.

Compared to other forage crops, alfalfa is an inexpensive source of protein and a good source of several other important nutrients. It is easily digested by cattle, is high-yielding, and is relatively drought-tolerant because of its deep roots. Alfalfa also fixes nitrogen, making it important in crop rotation.

Cultivating alfalfa as well as new fodder varieties seems like a promising adaptation to climate change. What are the challenges to expanding alfalfa production?

Alfalfa is easy to grow, but requires irrigation. So access to irrigation facilities or irrigated plots is required for alfalfa production. But, even when farmers are able to access irrigated plots, many can’t afford to rent them—or to install irrigation systems on their own land. Also, as mentioned above, it’s important to avoid conflicts over how scarce water resources are used. This means, for example, that fodder production must be carefully planned to avoid conflicts with irrigation for staple crops.

One other challenge is that it is not easy or cheap in Nigerto package and transport fodder crops. However, a recent project developed an innovative manual hay press that reduces the cost of packaging and transportation. Further work on creating low-cost and low-maintenance equipment for producing and storing fodder would improve this situation.

Expanding alfalfa production could also lead to an increased number of animals, which would boost the greenhouse gas emissions that worsen climate change.

Finally, women and youth lack access to and control over resources related to fodder and feed production. Women typically get access to land only through marriage. When they don’t own the land they cultivate, they are generally excluded from decision-making. Increasing women’s rights and their participation in decision-making could improve how they benefit from the fodder value chain, and how it can help them adapt to climate change.

But despite these challenges, growing new fodder varieties and producing alfalfa fodder has great potential for increasing farmers’ ability to adapt to climate change. And, like ISFM practices, farmers don’t have to wait long for their investment to pay off. Farmers can start reaping financial benefits in the second year of growing fodder crops such as alfalfa.

Thanks. You’ve given us a lot of think about. If I can summarize, first you talked about how the climate in Niger is predicted to change over the next 30 years, until 2050, and beyond. You said that we’d have higher temperatures, increased rainfall, and more frequent extreme temperature and rainfall events. And then you talked about what farmers could do to best adapt to these changes in temperature and rainfall. You said that there are four kinds of practices that show the most promise for helping Nigerien farmers adapt to climate change: agroforestry practices, and in particular farmer-managed natural generation, integrated soil fertility management or ISFM, off-season irrigated farming, and improved feed and fodder management.

Yes, these are the conclusions of the scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. These are the expected changes to the climate and the recommended practices for farmers.

But of course, it’s always best for farmers to talk to local and regional experts if they want to protect trees in their fields or use tassa pits—or grow off-season irrigated crops, or cultivate new fodder crops. The exact recommendations that work best for individual farmers will depend on where they live and their exact situation.

Nevertheless, no matter where you live, these are recommendations that farmers should consider seriously—and consider soon.

Thanks so much for this. We’ll be back next week with more from [name of program]. I’ll talk to you then.

Goodbye until next week.