The Capacity of On-farm Research in Reducing Poverty: Experiences from Twenty Seven Projects in Tanzania

Abstract

Poverty can be categorized into income poverty and non-income poverty. At the smallscale farmers level income poverty results from low productivity of agricultural enterprises. hence low sales of products. On the other hand, non income poverty encompasses a wide range of live phenomena, including level of education, poor survival strategies, poor nutritional status. lack of clean and safe drinking water, poor social wellbeing, vulnerability , etc. In 2000/01 about 62% of households in Tanzania succumbed to income poverty. While the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) was silent on research as one of the strategic approaches to reduce poverty in Tanzania, a study was conducted between 2001 and 2004 by Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA) in collaboration with the Agricultural Sector Lead Ministries (ASLMs) to evaluate the effectiveness of onfarm research and development (R&D) approaches in bringing about poverty reduction amongst the smallholder farmers in the country. The study was based on 27 projects under Tanzania Agricultural Research Project Phase II (TARPII) managed by SUA (TARPII-SUA) conducted in the Eastern and Southern Highlands Zones of country. By responding to a questionnaire, smallholder farmers evaluated technologies introduced through research. Results have shown that smallholder farmers' poverty could be significantly reduced by inb'oducing appropriate technologies. Thus. on average, participating farmers observed reductions in income poverty by the period of this study. It is concluded that introduction of technologies through on-farm research increases technology adoption and reduces income poverty.

Keywords: On-farm research, income poverty, poverty reduction, and technology transfer

Tanzania J.Agric.Sc. (2007) Vol. 8 No.2, 103 -114