Climate change making its impact on crop production

Milton Ocen, a cabbage farmer in Otuke District. Smallholder farmers like him will be hardest hit by climate change but concerted efforts from all stakeholders including support from government will enable agricultural production withstand the effects. Photo by FARAHANI MUKISA.

For the past decade, John Ndiiwa has been growing rice on a five-acre piece of land in Lumbuye wetland, Kaliro District. For this father of six, the yields were good; up to 10 bags per acre. From the proceeds, he was able to buy more land and pay for his children’s education. But for three years now, Ndiiwa hardly gets five bags from the same size of land, and he plants one season in a year instead of two. “I now plant rice once in a year and leave the field for my cattle to graze,” he says.

His maize and banana fields are also experiencing the same decline. Such circumstances have led to other farmers in Kaliro to abandon farming and try their luck in riding boda bodas, seek jobs of cutting sugar cane for nearby factories or move to nearby towns for manual work.

Threat to livelihoods
But the tale of weather changes affecting crop productivity is not limited to Ndiiwa or farmers in Kaliro District. Olivia Muwanga, who owns coffee plantation in Masaka, says some of the coffee trees dried up between March and April due to prolonged drought. At times, disease attacks them resulting into poor yields.

A common disease is coffee rust, which causes the trees to become thin and unproductive. Even the few berries that manage to grow do not ripe well. Statistics from Uganda Coffee Development Authority (UCDA) indicates that 3.5 million people depend on coffee for income. Any attack on the cash crop threatens livelihoods and consumption.

In fact, the 2013 National Water Resources Assessment by ministry of Water and Environment, warns that changing weather, mainly rising temperatures, could reduce, by 85 per cent, the land used for growing Robusta coffee.
Put the other way, if temperatures rise by two degress Centigrade, only 15 per cent of the land will be viable for Robusta coffee. This would have serious consequences as coffee is a major export crop. This, coupled with low prices, makes farming unattractive amidst few alternative options.

Affect crop yields
Scientists warn that weather changes, if not checked, will continue to hurt the agriculture sector, which employs most Ugandans. Dr Everline Komutunga, a senior researcher at National Agricultural Research Organisation (Naro), says climate change has been visible for a while although not much attention has been given to it.
The weather changes manifests in floods, prolonged droughts, temperature increases. When prolonged droughts happen, crops wither. Excessive rainfall may lead to floods which destroys crops. High tenmperatures may give rise pest outbreaks.

Dr Komutunga adds that crop production and productivity are declining as a result. Weather variations affects agricultural production through its effects on the rainfall timing, intensity and variability and shifts in temperatures and carbon dioxide concentrations.

Moisture deficit during the growing season and increase in temperatures affects the crop flowering or budding. In some instances, this may lead to reduced crop yields, which may lead to food and water shortages.
Former Agriculture minister, Dr Victoria Ssekitoleko, attributes the declining crops productivity to “doing same things over the years” and employing unskilled extension workers.

“For agriculture to thrive, extension workers should be knowledgeable. They should be able to analyse soil nutrients that are lacking, utilise the zoning of crops, appropriate time for planting and when to apply fertilisers,” says Dr Ssekitoleko, noting that such attributes are lacking among extension workers. “As farmers are looking for qualified extension advisers, the qualified ones are looking for other jobs.”

Utilise research output
Julius Mukunda, coordinator of Civil Society Budget Advocacy Group (CSBAG), recently rallied farmers against proposed taxes on farm inputs in the 2014/2015 financial year. He urged the government to encourage farmers to utilise output of research done by Naro. He adds that currently, research output is not being fully utilised.
The soils are now unproductive due to over tiling and need to be supported through fertiliser use.

Ugandan farmers use an average of one kilogramme of fertilisers per hectare annually. But through the National Fertiliser Sub-Sector Strategy (NFS), the government is advocating for increased use to boost food production.
Dr Francis Epetait, the shadow minister for Agriculture, says government’s indecisiveness to act on fake seeds and agricultural chemicals is among other things to blame why agriculture is not flourishing.

Uganda, like other countries in the world, is experiencing climate change, meaning most traditional seeds do not grow properly without fertilisers use but most inputs farmers buy are counterfeit. “We should brace for more health spending because of poor feeding and unhealthy food. Even the production we have is by God’s mercy, we would be hungry as a country now,” he says.

Epetait urges that without increasing the budget for agriculture and acting tough on counterfeit inputs.
Amid changing weather, where there is either droughts or heavy rains that destroy harvests, it will be disastrous as there will a scramble for the few resources available.

But Jacob Wangolo, MP Bunyole West in Butaleja District, proposes that government directly support farmers through Saccos and cooperatives with improved seeds and capital. This will help them increase crop productivity rather than an increase in allocation for agriculture in the national budget.

This will result into food security and poverty alleviation as most farmers will able to benefit directly.
Okasai Opolot, commissioner for crop production in ministry of Agriculture, says although some crops have been affected by climate change, the ministry has devised mitigation means to increase productivity.

Despite a small budget of about three per cent of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the ministry has distributed 3,400 metric tonnes of seeds, established 3,000 demonstration plots to train farmers and procured of 2,000 ox-ploughs. The efforts, he explains, have yielded fruits in increasing productivity.

Multi-sectoral approach
In addition, the ministry trained and deployed of 280 extension workers and distributed of 424,466 units of pesticides, 375 metric tonnes of fertilisers, among others. “Overall, there have been nine per cent increase in production earning Shs85b in exports in 2013/2014. There are 15 medium- and over 500 small-scale millers in rice producing areas,” Opolot points out.

He notes that if government had adhered to the Maputo Declaration that requires African governments to dedicate 10 per cent of the national budget to agriculture, then the country would produce more both for consumption and export.

To mitigate the effects of climate change on agriculture, Eng. Richard Cong, commissioner, Water for Production, Ministry of Water and Environment, reveals that there is a multi-sectorial approach as the ministry scales up irrigation.

In areas which experience droughts, there are dams like Kakinga and Bwanalaki in Sembabule, Mubuku in Kasese, Doho in Butaleja, and Agolo in Kitgum which are operational. More than 20 others across the country are under feasibility study. “Agriculture starts with water and ends with water. We are constructing all those dams to store water to boost agriculture,” he emphasises.

The National Water Resources Assessment report revealed that only 10,000 hectares and another 53,350 hectares are informally irrigated mainly for rice and sugarcane. This means that few areas are currently under irrigation.
In recent past, precisely in 1999, 2000, 2004 and 2005, Uganda got a taste of the effects of climate change when there were long droughts which affected crop yields and other live stocks dependent on water like fish, cattle among others.

Pushed back to poverty
Annunciata Hakuza, senior economist in ministry of Agriculture quoting a 2012 report on climate change by Office of the Prime Minister, said the climate change started becoming an issue from 1994.

More than four million people have been directly affected by climate change either through droughts, mudslides, floods and heavy rainfall or lightning. She adds that more than Shs10b was spent during the Bududa disaster alone, meaning, if other disasters strike, the economy may be constrained.

The World Bank has warned that millions of people, mainly in the underdeveloped countries are likely to be pushed back into poverty as a result of climate change.

Droughts, floods, rises in sea levels and severe storms are predicted along with increasing global temperatures, will create hardships amongst the poor communities in their quest to access food and clean water.

Projections done by UN Development Programme estimates that by 2030, 80 per cent of Ugandans will still be living in rural areas underwriting the need for sustainable agriculture.