Socio-economic Constraints to Implementation of Land Management Interventions: The case study of Tanga Region -Tanzania

Abstract

Agricultural productivity in Tanzania has been declining over the years in spite of various technologies developed and deployed to the farmers to improve productivity but with little implementation. The research was carried in three wards in Tanga region to determine the extent to which farmers use the improved innovations developed by researchers and the possible constraints encountered during implementation of innovations. The innovations introduced in the study area were threshold weeding, rain harvesting and crop rotation. The methodology involved a cross-sectional research design with a sample size of 150 farmers. Structured questionnaire, focus group discussions, systematic physical observations, use of secondary data and consultations with key informants were the main methods of data collection. We found that a significant proportion (61%) of respondents did not successfully implement the developed innovations due to variety of reasons. Of these, household income, inadequate labour and education were significant factors (P<0.05) limiting farmers’ investment on some of the developed innovations. The low contribution of labour force by men in the household contributed to low implementation of the introduced innovations. Based on these findings, we recommended that: 1.Farmers should be encouraged to form credit groups such as ‘Savings and Credit Cooperative Society’ (SACCOS) (commonly used in East Africa) to enable them access loans. This will enable them purchase inputs or hire labour and eventually increase crop output as well as implement land management interventions. 2. Development of land management technologies should consider socio-economicfactors influencing the implementation and diffusion of technologies. 3. Farmers should be provided with practical-training at the field level through field farm school (FFS); this could increase their knowledge and improve their skills.

Key word: Social- economic constraints, implementation of land management technologies.