Regional analysis of maize-based land use systems for early warning applications

Conventional analytical crop growth models cannot handle actual Land Use Systems because of massive data needs, algorithm complexity and prohibitive error propagation. It is possible however to describe rigidly simplified 'Production Situations' representing Land Use Systems with annual row crops and minimal environmental constraints. The simplest Production Situation imaginable is a Land Use System in which all constraints that can be eliminated by a farmer are indeed (assumed to be) eliminated. Crop growth and yield are then entirely conditioned by crop physiology and weather conditions, notably by the temperature and radiation during the crop cycle. The calculated production level is not the actual production but the production potential.In many countries, water availability to the crop is the main constraint to crop production. The biophysical production potential model has therefore been extended with a water budget routine that matches actual water use with the crop's requirement in order to calculate the "water-limited production potential". In this configuration, crop physiology, temperature, radiation and water availability condition the calculated level of crop (potential) production. This thesis discusses the use of satellite-derived rainfall data for regional analysis of water-limited yield potentials.Monitoring and crop yield forecasting for early warning applications require insight in farmers' reality. Often, a score of environmental and socio-economic constraints reduce on-farm production to a level that lags far behind the theoretical production potential. This thesis explores farmers' insights, in an attempt to identify the causes and structure of the "yield gap" between potential (reference) production levels and production levels realized on-farm.So far, actual production could only be established through field measurements. This thesis presents a methodology for estimating regional levels of actual crop production. The difference between remotely sensed canopy temperature and ambient temperature is used to estimate the degree of stomata closure of the crop. Introducing this Remote Sensing based degree of stomata closure in calculations of assimilatory activity permits to calculate the actual rate of crop growth over regions.Repeated measurements during the crop cycle allow monitoring of the sufficiency of actual management practices. Introducing estimated or forecast weather data in crop growth calculations for the remainder of the crop cycle permits to make repeated estimates of anticipated crop production and to timely signal a need for remedial action

Traditional leadership and its future role in local governance

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A summary of some recent cases of interest to the African continent

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The right of access to land and its implementation in Southern Africa: A comparative study of South Africa and Zimbabwe land reform laws and programmes

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A critical assessment of land redistribution policy in the light of the Grootboom judgment

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Investing in on-farm and post-harvest resilience to climate change in smallholder value chains: Lessons from Rwanda

This study assessed intermediate results of an investment intended to support climate change adaptation and resilience-building among farmers’ cooperatives in Rwanda. The assessment was based on a purposive sampling survey of farmers’ perspectives conducted in sites in 10 programme intervention districts of the country’s 30 districts. Assessed interventions included the enhancing of farmer-access, quality and utilization of climate information services; onfarm participatory trials of climate-smart crop and forage varieties; and climate-smart harvest and post-harvest support for infrastructural development at “HUBs” for shared post-harvest storage and marketing. Interventions included the capacity development among farmers’ organizations to access funding from commercial lending for integrating climate-smart features in warehouse construction and in other post-harvest infrastructure. Demonstration infrastructures were also constructed by a funding arrangement between the programme, local government structures and farmers’ organizations. Farmers’ perspectives indicated appreciation of the value of and need for the (yet to be available) weather information. Farmers understood weather information that includes seasonal advisories to be of higher quality than daily weather forecasts. Farmer-scientist participatory on-farm trials were successful in identifying potato and maize varieties that met both climate-resilience and other farmer-defined criteria. However, the applied method for forage trails did not indicate satisfactory yield levels, nor did it generate farmer confidence. The assessment revealed resounding farmers’ approval for climate-smart infrastructure demonstrations. Misgivings were, however, indicated by farmers and their organizational leaders on the efficiency and effectiveness of the capacity development mechanism for commercial lending access to finance climate-smart requirements

Access to lifesaving medical resources for African countries: COVID-19 testing and response, ethics, and politics

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has revealed how strikingly unprepared the world is for a pandemic and how easily viruses spread in our interconnected world. A governance crisis is unfolding alongside the pandemic as health officials around the world compete for access to scarce medical supplies. As governments of African countries, and those in low-income and middle-income countries around the world, seek to avoid potentially catastrophic epidemics and learn from what has worked in other countries, testing and other medical resources are of concern. With accelerating spread, funding is urgently needed. Yet even where there is enough money, many African health authorities are unable to obtain the supplies needed as geopolitically powerful countries mobilise economic, political, and strategic power to procure stocks for their populations. We have seen this before. In the AIDS pandemic lifesaving diagnostics and drugs came to many African countries long after they were available in Europe and North America. In 2020, this situation can be avoided. Although health system weakness remains acute in many places, investments by national governments, the African Union, and international initiatives to tackle AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, polio, and post-Ebola global health security have built important public health capacities. Global leaders have an ethical obligation to avoid needless loss of life due to the foreseeable prospect of slow and inadequate access to supplies in Africa