The curriculum covers cross section of production/agronomic technologies of various crops in Malawi.” In total, four participants noted using written lessons to educate farmer about a topic. Leaflets were the most commonly used written materials and include information and images about a particular technology or production process. Participants noted that leaflets, pamphlets, and posters were often placed in community meeting spots or supply warehouses to increase the visibility of messages among farmers. Two participants noted communicating messages through print media including newspaper. A representative from a farmer’s organization mentioned disseminating messages through a quarterly newsletter stating, “we have a printed newsletter that comes out quarterly where we write a lot of training materials, capturing success stories, and also taking some profiles of farmers. This motivates other farmers to follow those things that have changed the lives of their fellow farmers.” This newsletter is distributed to farmers during Group Action Committee meetings and is sometimes accompanied by oral anecdotes from the farmers profiled in that quarter. It is also worth noting that several participants mentioned developing written materials to use during in-person farmer trainings. Therefore, written materials complement trainings in some instances. The most common strategies recommended to farmers include being climate-informed and good agriculture practices . Being climate-informed was the most common strategy recommended to farmers by participant organizations.
While some participants explained that their organizations would share climate and weather information with farmers as part of their delivery of EAS,square black flower bucket wholesale others mentioned developing specific program content to inform farmers about climate changes. Several participants noted that they receive frequent weather forecasts from DMCCS and then are able to share information about expected temperature and precipitation conditions with the farmers they serve. One approach mentioned by an international NGO participant was related to climate-informed programming for farmers. Through this approach, farmers will analyze historic weather patterns and make their conclusions from the data. When referencing good agriculture practices participants described providing information about agronomic practices, specific characteristics of certain maize varieties, proper land preparation methods, appropriate fertilizer applications given soil types and crop requirements, and increasing crop productivity through sustainable intensification. Water conservation practices were also common and encompassed activities including watershed management, water harvesting, constructing dams, swales, and gullies, pit planting, contouring, and winter irrigation farming to supplement rainfed agricultural production systems. Participants explained that focusing on an entire watershed allows farmers to understand downstream impacts to waterways and promotes the conservation of an entire waterway with a focus on reducing sources of pollution and limiting water withdrawals during times of drought. Similarly, a Malawi NGO participant explained that dams, swales, and gullies allow farmers to raise water levels in times of drought to prevent widespread crop loss due to a lack of water. In some cases, farmers are encouraged to plow their fields along contours and are encouraged to practice ‘continuous contouring’ where they dig various holes along the contour to harvest water.
Another participant from the government explained the strategies that their organization recommends to farmers stating, “we want them to do water harvesting methodologies like pit planting, mulching to cover the ground, and conserving the land by constructing contour ridges so that the soil moisture is maintained.” Several participants also mentioned the connection between water and soil conservation explaining how the two practices often complement one another. Soil management practices were commonly referenced by participants in addition to water conservation strategies and included themes relating to conservation agriculture, minimum or no-till agriculture, cover crops, mulching, manure from livestock waste, and composting. Participants explained that the goal of these strategies was to reduce topsoil erosion and improve soil fertility and moisture content in order to increase production and become less reliant on chemical fertilizers. Conservation agriculture included a variety of strategies including mulching fields to conserve soil and water, practicing minimum tillage agriculture, implementing cover crops, leaving crop residues on a field after harvest, and doing crop rotations. One participant from a farmer organization noted, “for conservation agriculture, we have observed that there are different players in the implementation of conservation agriculture and these players have different information and the approaches are also different.” The participant added that the difference in approaches for conservation agriculture sometimes confused farmers and ultimately led to the lack of adoption of any of the specified methods. A government representative stated, “we also conduct demonstrations on different types of manure making or we demonstrate how to make compost manure using different methods. After the demonstration activity, farmers also do it in their homes.
That’s how we disseminate the information.” Several participants also mentioned teaching farmers to use animal waste from their livestock as manure and produce scraps from home gardens as compost for their fields. Use of improved maize varieties was also recommended as a climate adaptation strategy. Improved seed varieties described by most participants included those that were hybrid, drought tolerant, early maturing or short-duration, and fortified. A noticeable difference in opinion was expressed by one Malawi NGO participant who commented that the local, traditional maize varieties performed better than new hybrid maize varieties and did not view new varieties as improved. Some participants encouraged farmers to create separate plots or zones for diversified production systems while others recommended growing maize alongside other vegetables in a single plot. Several participants noted that diversification was also seen as a nutrition strategy because growing multiple crops and raising livestock could help to increase the consumption of a variety of vegetables. Similarly, four participants noted that diversification could help to increase the income of a farmer in case of extreme weather events or other crop failure. Tree planting or agroforestry was another recommended practice for farmers. Agroforestry practices described by participants included tree regeneration, growing fruit trees, maintaining old and new growth forests, establishing village forests, and not clearing or burning the land. Several participants mentioned that their organizations encourage farmers to grow trees or establish village forests as a group in order to share the responsibility of taking care of the trees and sharing the rewards of trees that bear fruit. The final category of strategies recommended to farmers was related to reducing instances of crop pests. However, this strategy was not commonly referenced and was only mentioned by four participants. Participants who mentioned this strategy referenced fall army worm which has devastated maize crops throughout the country and root rot. A variety of strategies to reduce pests and disease were recommended including pesticides or “crop protection products” as chemical controls, physical controls, biological controls, and understanding the life cycle of pests and diseases in order to tailor strategies to the appropriate stage. There was a noticeable difference in the strategies recommended by different types of organizations to address climate change as seen in the table below.While all private sector participants referenced improved seeds, soil management,plastic square flower bucket and water conservation strategies to address climate change, all international NGO participants soil management, water conservation, and climate-informed strategies. Farmer organizations all referenced good agriculture practices and climate-informed strategies while 100% of Malawi NGO participants referenced all strategies except reducing pests, soil management practices, and improved seeds. Finally, the percent of government participants referencing strategies ranged from 80% for good agriculture practices and being climate informed to 0% for reducing instances of pests. To address some of these challenges, several participants mentioned a need for policyholders to continue coordinating messages and farmers served to ensure all regions are effectively reached and information is not duplicated. Disaster was an additional challenge mentioned by 42% of participants.
Participants mentioned both short- and long-term program addressing disaster depending on the frequency, intensity, and duration of events including both extreme weather events and public health crises such as Covid-19. Several participants noted that Covid-19 has limited profits from agricultural commodities and severely impacted market operations throughout the country. Issues related to farmer poverty were referenced by 42% of participants. Several participants explained that farmers sometimes cut down trees in order to sell firewood or provide fuel for their homes because it is a free resource that they can readily access. Additionally, poverty was referenced in relation to other issues relating to a lack of farmer equipment and gadgets like radio to receive information from extension providers. Finally, a lack of education among farmer populations was referenced as a challenge in providing effective information to address climate change. Several participants noted that the farmers they work with are often illiterate and are not able to read information that is written down or distributed through SMS. While this challenge was referenced by representatives from the government, farmer organizations, and the private sector, this challenge was not referenced by any NGOs.Other messages shared with farmers by participant organizations that were not explained as climate adaption strategies were categorized into the following themes: economic strategies, nutrition, public health and sanitation, and gender. Economic strategies referenced by participants included transforming value chains, building infrastructure for crop value addition, supporting market linkages, training farmers to develop business, marketing, and financial literacy skills, implementing villages savings, loan programs, cash transfers, mobile banking, and improving household livelihoods. One government participant noted, “when we train farmers on market-oriented agriculture and there are varies modules that are used, so that the farmers should be trained systematically on things like farming as a business or maybe creating their gross profit margins.” Agribusiness support was commonly referenced by participants as an economic strategy. Providing information about nutrition was another theme commonly referenced by participants when describing the activities and goals of their organizations. Nutrition was commonly referenced by participants in addition to other strategies such as diversified farming, post-harvest management, food safety, and nutrition sensitive agriculture which involves growing crops to maximize nutrition benefits. One participant noted that their organization encourages farmers to develop home gardens in order to build resilience to weather shocks through diversified production systems and increase the nutrition among members of a household. Public health and sanitation practices were referenced by one participant from each organization type. These strategies were aimed at supporting human and environmental health, addressing HIV/AIDS, building health and sanitation facilities to avoid disease outbreaks, providing emergency response during natural disasters, and delivering information about the ways to reduce the spread of Covid-19. Addressing gender issues was the final theme referenced by participants. As part of the household approach to address agriculture issues at the family level, organizations also address gender relations and gender inequity to ensure that women are also able to benefit from agricultural interventions that are implemented by extension providers. Nineteen participants from organizations providing extension services to farmers in Malawi participated in this research including three actors from the private sector, four actors from international NGOs, four actors from farmer organizations, three actors from Malawi NGOs, and five governmental actors. Participant organizations were involved in a wide range of activities focused around providing inputs to farmers, improving market linkages, farmer training, supporting food security outcomes, sustainable agricultural production, improving rural livelihoods, and capacity-building. According to interview participants, the annual number of clients served by each organization ranges from 350 – 4,200,000. The organizational structure of governmental organizations, international NGOs, and farmer organizations is very hierarchical while the structure of small private sector partners and Malawi NGOs is more cooperative and participatory. Five participants mentioned having advanced degrees and the majority of participants are the directors or managers of their organizations. Although 85 organizations were identified by participants as stakeholders in Malawi’s extension system, there appear to be a select number of organizations that develop messages and are considered experts on climate change adaptation practices. The organizations referenced as content developers by the greatest number of participants were DAES for agricultural messages and DMCCS for information related to climate and weather. Staff from DAES explained that they often receive agricultural messages and information about new technologies from CGIARS and DARS; both of whom were also referenced by several participants as content developers. Other common content developers include MoAIWD, the U.S. Government, NACDC. Several participants noted that new agricultural technologies are often first presented to Malawi’s extension providers during NACDC meetings and then customized to fit farmer needs by the committee’s members including representatives from government, NGOs, farmer organizations, research institutions, and the private sector.