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80,947,000 Yen (FY2000; 38,265,000 Yen)
In aiming at developing the "life-size scale" technology for farmers to cope with the desertification and soil degradation, agricultural and soil conservation measures practicing by farmers in the Sahel, Sudan and Guinea savanna zones of Burkina Faso were analyzed. The changes in the farmers' behavior in the past 15 years and the socio-economic and the natural factors behind these changes were elucidated. The results obtained through intensive multi-diciplinal studies are as follows: (1) The analytical methods of satelite remote sensing data were developed to estimate the desertification and the land use pattern, distinguishing cultivated or farrow lands at the village level. (2) New technologies such as animal traction and fertilizer use increased in the Sudan and Guinea zones, while no substantial change occurred in the Sahel zone. (3) Recent banishment of temporal migration of Burkinabe to Ivory Coast through the kinship network may cause in increasing the farmers' vulnerability in the Sudan zone. (4) Nutrient cycling in the ecosystem of these regions cannot be expected to increase crop productivity, therefore, the input such as chemical fertilizers and/or animal manure is indispensable. (5) The parcage system (collecting and spreading cattle feces) employed at agro-nomadic region in the Sahel was shown to be effective to increase the soil fertility. (6) Multiple thin layers of finer particles existing in the surface top layer of sandy soil of the Sahel are self-protecting against wind erosion. The indigenous "no-tillage" weeding practices with push-hoe ("gouro") minimizes the destruction of these thin layers. (7) These findings, with the elucidation of the function of organic matter in soil, may contribute to the development of farmer acceptable technology to restore soil degradation and desertification.
Desertification, Husehold Economy, Soil Degradation, Sub-Saharan West Africa, Traditional Farming Practices