BACKGROUND
Nabji is a small dryland village and with limited land resources,
farmers face every-day challenge of feeding themselves and
their families. The problem escalates as more farmers try
to eke out a living from the land that only shrinks and degrades
continuously. Being dry land farming, soil erosion is the
main contributory factor in declining productivity, which
is a consequence of how farmers use their land and not a primary
problem by itself.
OBJECTIVE
• To minimize surface soil run-off by using locally
available resources (maize stalks on contour lines)
METHOD
• Numbers of known technologies to control surface soil
run-off were offered to the farmers, including terracing,
hedgerows, maize trash lines and stonewalls.
• Of all farmers preferred maize trash lines to control
surface soil run-off.
• Contour lines are laid out using an A-frame.
• Maize stalks were collected and kept on the contour
lines.
• Farmers were trained on how to make and use an A-frame
for determining contour lines
RESULT
• Within a year, there was quite an amount of topsoil
accumulated behind the trash line
• Impressed by the held-back soil and the differences
in maize growth and yield in the fields with and without them,
other farmers started trash lining their fields.
• After three years, the height of the bunds raised
by soil accumulated behind the trash lines was 1 meter.
• The number of farmers practising trash lines has risen
from one in 1998 to 12, and approximate area coverage is nearly
five acres by 2001
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