Indigenous knowledge and African smallholder farmers

In my last blog post, I (briefly) touched upon the institutionalised nature of discriminatory policies which have been negatively affecting smallholder farms in South Africa. In this blog post, I want to explore the potential of smallholder farms across the continent of Africa as a solution to securing food security in an increasingly water-scarce world with an emphasis on the role of indigenous and localised agricultural and irrigation strategies.

Small holder farmers are defined as farmers with less than two hectares of land (Conway et al, 2019). According to Svrinivasan et al (2017: 138), ‘water withdrawals mainly for irrigation account for approximately 70% of the world’s freshwater use’. Water for agriculture is increasingly a scarce resource (Conway et al, 2019) which is largely due to the effects of climate change, for example below average rainfall and increased temperatures leading to prolonged droughts.  Vilakazi (2017) states that climate change is a critical phenomenon especially for rural smallholders as it is directly linked to food security. Access to water is a key challenge for smallholders many of whom are poor and rely on the support of family members – ‘household labour is the key to smallholder production’ (Conway et al, 2019). This of course has implications for members of the family who grow up with different aims in mind instead of working on their family farm creating all kinds of tensions. For example, in Ubisi et al’s (2019: 5) study into the role of Indigenous Knowledge Systems in Mpumalanga, South Africa, they state that the majority of ‘smallholders…. had completed primary education and gave farming as their source of livelihood’. Farming is a way of life and in many rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa, it is one of the only options of work.  

Conway et al’s (2019: 20) statement that ‘the farm usually consists of a family with long experience of the local environment and knowledge of what works and what does not’ resonated with me the most as it highlights the importance of local indigenous knowledge- that it is the farmers who are best equipped to respond to variabilities in the climate because of their long- term familiarity with the land. This directly contradicts the view that to be able to meet challenges posed by declines in freshwater resources there must be a certain level of technological innovation within the agricultural sector.  As a continent, Africa has a high level of vulnerability to climate change and so the role of indigenous knowledge and ‘local’ practices becomes important especially, in the case of food production.  

Generally studies have shown that African rural smallholders have ‘low adaptive capacity to climate change’ (Asare-Nuamah et al, 2019: 247) but recently, there has been a shift to a focus on how ‘indigenous knowledge has for generations assisted rural subsistence farmers to adapt to climate change and make daily decisions regarding agriculture’ (Basdew et al, 2017: 56). I want to give a few examples on how these strategies with a focus on irrigation techniques have been able to improve food security for smallholder farmers. Ubisi et al (2019) for example highlight how smallholders in Nkomazi use a range of climate indicators based on their indigenous knowledge to predict weather and climate which would inform their decisions regarding farming and the planting of crops. They noted that croaking frogs indicated instant rain whereas the appearance of the sparrow suggested that there would be rain during the day. Also, high temperatures between the months of September and December ‘signified heavy rain (Ubisi et al, 2019: 7). Observations such as these which are dependent on indigenous indicators and descriptions many more which are shown in Figure 1 allow farmers to prepare the land strategically for the next season. There is a level of sophistication, planning and an immense familiarity with the land and climate involved that we tend to overlook when it comes to more localised and indigenous practices. It may be worth noting that Ubisi et al’s (2019) findings which I touched upon very briefly correlated with the findings of Zuma-Netshiukhwi et al (2013) that dark clouds indicated heavy rainfall, and by research carried out that Risiro et al (2012) in Zimbabwe. In another region in South Africa, the Swayimane community ‘emphasised that indigenous knowledge has been used for generations’ ( Basdew et al, 2017: 65) making it reliable and trustworthy. Being able to predict seasons allows farmers to make plans according to the weather that is expected. 

  

Figure 1: Indigenous knowledge atmospheric climate indicators used by Nkomazi smallholder 

Source: Ubisi et al, 2019:8