The Changing Social Production and Consequences of Land Quality Variation in Rural Africa

土壤肥力本来就低，土地退化，这被视为半干旱非洲改善粮食安全和农村发展的主要障碍。 土壤肥力参数在多个尺度（田地、农场、村庄、流域、地区、区域）上差异很大，这不仅是固有的，而且是由于非洲农民有意采取的养分收获和转移战略。 土壤肥力管理的分析一直占主导地位的养分平衡的方法，这通常突出了徒劳的持续生产没有无机肥料，并通过社会历史的方法，认为长期持久的种植制度，尽管肥力限制。 本研究项目将解决这两种方法的局限性。 政治生态研究土地质量的变化及其对社会作用的影响，土地所发挥的社会转移，资源冲突和生计战略证明将进行两个对比的研究领域，每个被描述为“端点”的严重土壤退化。 一项个案研究将在尼日尔的法卡拉地区进行;另一项将在肯尼亚的西部省进行。 这将是一个空间明确的土壤肥力变化的研究，考虑到社会边界，影响人类管理的影响和土壤肥力变化的反应，仔细考虑空间和时间尺度的分析。 研究人员将采用多种方法，包括地理信息系统，系统的定量和定性调查，民族志访谈，实地历史，土壤分析和参与观察，以探讨土壤质量变化对（1）农民实施的农业战略的影响;（2）不同社会群体对土地的评价方式;（3）农户间的土地流转和所有权分化。这项政治生态学研究将在比以往通常所做的更精细的空间和时间尺度上研究环境变化。通过记录不断变化的土地和肥力投资的社会空间分布，调查人员将评估标准“可持续性”评估的尺度敏感性，并在社区和家庭一级处理土地质量变化的社会作用。 特别令人感兴趣的是土地质量变化对村庄一级持续存在的社会分化的社会影响、土地冲突的性质、为确保土地权而进行的社会投资以及与土地转让有关的决定（继承、贷款、抵押等）。 通过认真参与土壤质量变化，这项研究将有助于土地利用集约化，土壤肥力转变和土地保有权文献的新的理解。 它还将有助于重新思考土地质量在热带非洲农村发展中的作用。 这项研究将促进边缘化社区参与推进与土地退化和贫困有关的科学研究议程，并将与两个国际农业研究中心（尼日尔的国际牲畜研究所和肯尼亚的热带土壤生物学和肥力研究所）密切合作进行，这两个中心与西非和东非的决策者有着密切的联系。 定期的研讨会，演讲和反馈会议将促进研究结果，因为他们展开到国际，国家（肯尼亚和肯尼亚），和北美的研究伙伴组织。 在项目结束时，还将以适当的形式向参与社区介绍和验证研究结果。 科学论文将向美国和非洲的学术界人士和自然资源管理决策者宣传研究成果，以提高目前关于非洲农业中土地退化和贫困问题的讨论的科学质量。

Inherently low soil fertility and land degradation are seen as major impediments for improving food security and rural development in semi-arid Africa. Soil fertility parameters vary significantly at multiple scales (field, farm, village, watershed, district, region), not only inherently but because of deliberate nutrient harvesting and transfer strategies by African farmers. Analyses of soil fertility management have been dominated by nutrient balance approaches, which generally highlight the futility of sustained production without inorganic fertilizers, and by social historical approaches that argue for the long-term persistence of cropping systems despite fertility constraints. This research project will address the limitations of both approaches. Political ecological research on land quality variation and its changing influence on the social role played by land as evidenced in social transfers, resource conflicts, and livelihood strategies will be conducted in two contrasting study areas that have each been described as "endpoints" of serious soil impoverishment. One case study will occur in the Fakara region of Niger; the other will be conducted in Western Province of Kenya. This will be a spatially explicit study of soil fertility variation that considers the social boundaries that affect human management's effects on and reaction to soil fertility variation, with careful consideration of spatial and temporal scales of analysis. The investigators will employ multiple methods, including GIS, systematic quantitative and qualitative surveys, ethnographic interviews, field histories, soil analyses, and participant observation to explore the implications of soil quality variation on (1) agricultural strategies practiced by farmers; (2) the ways in which different social groups value land; and (3) land transfers and ownership differentiation among rural households.This political ecological study will investigate environmental change at finer spatial and temporal scales than has commonly been performed previously. By documenting the changing sociospatial distribution of fields and fertility investments, the investigators will evaluate the scale sensitivity of standard "sustainability" assessments and address the changing social role of land quality variation at the level of the community and household. Of particular interest are the social implications of land quality variation for persistence of social differentiation at the village level, the nature of land conflicts, the social investments for securing rights to land, and decisions related to transfers of land (inheritance, loaning, pledging, etc.). By seriously engaging with soil quality variation, this study will contribute new understandings to the land-use intensification, soil-fertility transition, and land tenure literatures. It also will contribute to a rethinking of the role of land quality in rural development in tropical Africa. The study will promote the participation of marginalized communities in advancing the scientific research agenda relating to land degradation and poverty and will be conducted in close cooperation with two international agricultural research centers (the International Livestock Research Institute in Niger and the Tropical Soil Biology and Fertility Institute in Kenya) with strong connections to decision makers in West and East Africa. Periodic seminars, presentations, and feedback sessions will promote the research findings as they unfold to the international, national (Kenyan and Nigerien), and North American research partner organizations. Research results will also be presented and validated with the participating communities in appropriate formats at the end of the project. Scientific papers will promote the research findings to the academic audience and natural resource management policy makers in the United States and Africa in order to improve the quality of science in the on-going discussions of land degradation and poverty in African agriculture.