Experimental Agriculture Influence of the diversity in farms growing coffee on the use of recommended coffee management practices in Uganda

Many smallholder farm systems in Uganda produce coffee as an important cash crop. Yet coffee yields are poor. To increase farmers' production, a range of agronomic practices have been recommended by national and international agencies, but the adoption potential of recommendations differ between farm systems. To understand the differences in adoption potential of recommended coffee management practices in Uganda, we provide a typology of farm systems with coffee, assess the diversity between the farm types, and evaluate the current use of existing management recommendations for each farm type. Through factor analysis and cluster analysis of farms producing coffee, we identified five farm types: large coffee farms, farms with offfarm activities, coffee-dependent farms, diversified farms, and banana-coffee farms. The farm types are based on differences in size, and in the relative contributions of coffee, banana and off-farm labour to total household income. They also differ in the availability of the resources labour, land and cash, in coffee production and revenue, and in current use of most recommended practices. Qualitative analysis indicates that farm types have different constraints and opportunities to adopt recommendations. Our results highlight that an analysis of different farm systems with coffee production, a level beyond the 'coffee farmer community' as a homogenous entity, is important in order to understand the scope for success or failure of recommended practices. Powered by Editorial Manager® and ProduXion Manager® from Aries Systems Corporation 1 Short title: Diversity in farm systems with coffee in Uganda 1 2 Full title: Influence of the diversity in farms growing coffee on the use of recommended coffee management 3 practices in Uganda 4 5 6 Authors: Ghislaine Bongers, Luuk Fleskens, Gerrie van de Ven, David Mukasa, Ken Giller and Piet van Asten 7 8 a International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, P.O. Box 7878, Kampala, Uganda 9 b Plant Production Systems Group, Wageningen University, 6700 AK, Box 430, Wageningen, The Netherlands 10 c Sustainable Research Institute, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, United Kingdom 11 d Soil Physics and Land Management Group, Wageningen University, 6700 AA, Box 47, Wageningen, The 12 Netherlands 13 14 Corresponding author: Ghislaine Bongers, ghislainebongers@gmail.com/ g.bongers@cgiar.org 15 16 Summary 17 Many smallholder farm systems in Uganda produce coffee as an important cash crop. Yet coffee yields are poor. To 18 increase farmers' production, a range of agronomic practices have been recommended by national and international 19 agencies, but the adoption potential of recommendations differ between farm systems. To understand the differences 20 in adoption potential of recommended coffee management practices in Uganda, we provide a typology of farm 21 systems with coffee, assess the diversity between the farm types, and evaluate the current use of existing 22 management recommendations for each farm type. Through factor analysis and cluster analysis of farms producing 23 coffee, we identified five farm types: large coffee farms, farms with off-farm activities, coffee-dependent farms, 24 diversified farms, and banana-coffee farms. The farm types are based on differences in size, and in the relative 25 contributions of coffee, banana and off-farm labour to total household income. They also differ in the availability of 26 the resources labour, land and cash, in coffee production and revenue, and in current use of most recommended 27 practices. Qualitative analysis indicates that farm types have different constraints and opportunities to adopt 28 recommendations. Our results highlight that an analysis of different farm systems with coffee production, a level 29 beyond the 'coffee farmer community' as a homogenous entity, is important in order to understand the scope for 30 success or failure of recommended practices. 31 32 Key-words: typology, agricultural development, adoption potential, farm systems 33 34 Manuscript Click here to download Manuscript: Manuscript Experimental Agriculture Bongers et al.doc

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