More than 200 million people living in dryland regions of Sub-Saharan Africa make their living from agriculture. Most are exposed to weather shocks, especially drought, that can decimate their incomes, destroy their assets, and plunge them into a poverty trap from which it is diffi cult to emerge. Their lack of resilience in the face of these shocks can be attributed in large part to the poor performance of agriculture on which their livelihood depends. Opportunities exist to improve the fortunes of farming households in the drylands. Improved farming technologies that can increase and stabilize the production of millet, sorghum, maize, and other leading staples are available. Irrigation is technically and economically feasible in some areas and offers additional opportunities to increase and stabilize crop production, especially small-scale irrigation, which tends to be more affordable and easier to manage. Yet many of these opportunities have not been exploited on a large scale, for reasons that include lack of farmer knowledge, nonavailability of inputs, unfavorable price incentives, high levels of production risk, and high cost. Future production growth in drylands agriculture is expected to come mainly from raising yields and increasing the number of crop rotations on land that is already being cultivated (intensifi cation), rather than from bringing new land into cultivation (extensifi cation). Controlling for rainfall, average yields in rainfed cropping systems in Sub-Saharan Africa are still much lower than yields in rainfed cropping systems in other regions, suggesting that there is considerable scope to intensify production in these systems. Furthermore, unlike in other regions, production of low-value cereals under irrigation is generally not economic in Sub-Saharan Africa unless the cereals can be grown in rotation with one or more high-value cash crops. The long-run strategy for drylands agriculture, therefore, must be to promote production of staples in rainfed systems and production of high-value cereals (for example, rice), horticultural cops, and industrial crops in irrigated systems. Based on a detailed review of currently available technologies, Improved Crop Productivity for Africa’s Drylands argues that improving the productivity and stability of agriculture in the drylands has the potential to make a signifi cant contribution to reducing vulnerability and increasing resilience. At the same time, it is important to keep in mind that in an environment characterized by limited agro-climatic potential and subject to repeated shocks, farming on small land holdings may not generate suffi cient income to bring people out of poverty.

D ryland regions in Sub-Saharan Africa are home to one-half of the region’s population and three-quarters of its poor. Poor both in natural resources and in assets and income, the inhabitants of drylands are highly vulnerable to droughts and other shocks. Despite a long history of interventions by governments, development agencies, and civil society organizations, there have been no sustained large-scale successes toward improving the resilience of drylands dwellers. Improved Agricultural Water Management for Africa’s Drylands describes the extent to which agricultural water management interventions in dryland regions of Sub-Saharan Africa can enhance the resilience and improve the well-being of the people living in those regions, proposes what can realistically be done to promote improved agricultural water management, and sets out how stakeholders can make those improvements. After reviewing the current status of irrigation and agricultural water management in the drylands, the authors discuss technical, economic, and institutional challenges to expanding irrigation. A model developed at the International Food Policy Research Institute is used to project the potential for irrigation development in the Sahel Region and the Horn of Africa. The modeling results show that irrigation development in the drylands can reduce vulnerability and improve the resilience of hundreds of thousands of farming households, but rainfed agriculture will continue to dominate for the foreseeable future. Fortunately, many soil and water conservation practices that can improve the productivity and ensure the sustainability of rainfed cropping systems are available. The purpose of this book is to demonstrate the potentially highly benefi cial role of water and water management in drylands agriculture in association with agronomic improvements, market growth, and infrastructure development, and to assess the technological and socioeconomic conditions and institutional policy frameworks that can remove barriers to adoption and allow wide-scale take-up of improved agricultural water management in the dryland regions of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Tree-based production systems have enormous potential to reduce vulnerability and increase the resilience of households living in dryland regions of Sub-Saharan Africa. Trees are key providers of biomass, which is critical for many livelihood needs. Wood from trees is the leading source of energy in many dryland countries and is an important construction material. Foliage and pods from trees and shrubs are the most important source of feed for camels and goats, which are the dominant livestock species in the more arid parts of the drylands. Trees and shrubs offer enhanced sources of the organic matter needed to improve the structure and raise the fertility of soils used for agriculture. Many parts of trees provide different medicinal products for people. And fruits and vegetable foliage harvested from trees are important seasonal food sources for people living in drylands, and for sale. The benefi ts from trees take on added value when one considers that they are relatively impervious to many of the shocks that affect other production systems, especially livestock keeping and agriculture. Trees, with their deep rooting systems, maintain their standing value and offer some production even in drought years. They are therefore a good buffer against climatic risk and are a critical element in a diversifi cation strategy designed to maintain levels of consumption and income in good times and bad. In addition, their value can be tapped when it is most needed: wood from trees can be harvested throughout the year, and many annual tree products are harvested at times different from the times when annual crops are harvested. Tree-Based Production Systems for Africa’s Drylands identifi es some of the most promising investment opportunities at the level of tree-based systems, species (products), and well-defi ned management practices for accelerating rural economic growth in the drylands.

Drylands are at the core of Africa’s development challenge. Drylands make up about 43 percent of the region’s land surface, account for about 75 percent of the area used for agriculture, and are home to about 50 percent of the population, including a disproportionate share of the poor. Due to complex interactions among many factors, vulnerability in drylands is high and rising, jeopardizing the long-term livelihood prospects for hundreds of millions of people. Climate change, which is expected to increase the frequency and severity of extreme weather events, will exacerbate this challenge. African governments and their partners in the international development community stand ready to tackle the challenges confronting drylands, but important questions remain unanswered about how the task should be undertaken. Do dryland environments contain enough resources to generate the food, jobs, and income needed to support sustainable livelihoods for a fast growing population? If not, can injections of external resources make up the deficit? Or is the carrying capacity of drylands so limited that outmigration should be encouraged? Based on analysis of current and projected future drivers of vulnerability and resilience, the report uses an original modeling framework to identify promising interventions, quantify their likely costs and benefits, and describe the policy trade-offs that will need to be addressed. By 2030, economic growth leading to structural change will allow some of the people living in drylands to transition to non-agriculture based livelihood strategies, reducing their vulnerability. Many others will continue to rely on livestock keeping and crop farming. For the latter group, a number of “best bet†? interventions have the potential to make a significant difference in reducing vulnerability and increasing resilience. This report evaluates the opportunities and challenges associated with these interventions, and it draws a number of conclusions that have important implications for policy making.

Integrated Landscape Approaches for Africa’s Drylands presents emerging fi ndings on the importance of moving beyond single-sector interventions to embrace integrated landscape management that takes into account the health of the ecosystems that support human livelihoods and contribute to the resilience of rural communities in Sub-Saharan African drylands. Integrated landscape management is particularly important for these drylands because people depend on production systems that are frequently disrupted by exogenous shocks such as drought. The ecological and economic evidence presented in this book shows that integrated landscape management can enhance efforts to invest in tree-based systems and improved livestock management and support productivity increases for rain-fed cropping. Integrated landscape management efforts have helped to coordinate the actions of multiple land users and other stakeholders, reduced confl icts, and improved overall governance of water, land, and other resources. Integrated landscape management is thus a useful approach to enhance the intensifi cation of dryland cropping systems and will, in many locations (but not always), result in multiple wins— including improved farm productivity, water benefi ts at the farm and landscape levels, carbon sequestration, biodiversity and other ecosystem services benefi ts, and higher climate resilience. Various policies and related interventions can be used to trigger and accelerate the scaling up of these benefi ts through integrated landscape management across Sub-Saharan African drylands to restore and increase household and ecological resilience. Policies are needed to develop the framework conditions necessary to both initiate new programs and modify and scale up existing restoration and resilience efforts. The book highlights policy options, covering six broad intervention areas: (1) Clarify land rights and responsibilities; (2) Encourage multistakeholder involvement and collective action; (3) Overcome institutional barriers to integrated landscape management; (4) Create conditions for adaptive planning and management; (5) Create mechanisms and supporting policies for sustainable and long-term fi nancing of integrated landscape management; and (6) Invest in a solid evidence base and knowledge-sharing platforms for integrated landscape management.

Sahelian West Africa has recovered from the disastrous droughts of the 1970s and 1980s. People have learned to adapt to risk and uncertainty in fragile dryland environments. They, as well as global change scientists, are worried about the impact of climate change on these West African drylands. What do the experiences of the last thirty years say about the preparedness for higher temperatures, lower rainfall, and even more variability? Detailed studies on Dryland West Africa as a whole, and on Burkina Faso, Mali and Northern Ghana in particular show an advanced coping behaviour and increased adaptation, but also major differences in vulnerability and coping potential. Climate change preparedness programmes have only just started and require more robust support, and more specific social targeting, for a population which is rapidly growing, even more rapidly urbanising, and further integrating in a globalised economy. This book is the first of its kind with a comprehensive analysis of climate change experiences in West African drylands, with attention for pathways of change and the diversity of adaptation options available. This book is of interest to scientists studying global and climate change, especially dealing with issues of adaptation. Social scientists, economists, geographers and policy makers concerned with West Africa should also read this book.

Crop production in the drought-prone tropics has been relatively neglected by research and development workers, largely due to its poor potential for commercial exploitation. Despite this, a considerable amount of information is available on this subject, but there have been few attempts to draw it together and to relate it to the needs of subsistence and small farmers, and to the particular set of constraints under which they labour.