Sustainable Agricultural Intensification in Four Tanzanian Villages—A View from the Ground and the Sky

Agnes Andersson Djurfeldt, Ola Hall, Aida Isinika, Elibariki Msuya () and Genesis Tambang Yengoh
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Agnes Andersson Djurfeldt: Department of Human Geography, Lund University, Sölvegatan 12, 223 62 Lund, Sweden
Ola Hall: Department of Human Geography, Lund University, Sölvegatan 12, 223 62 Lund, Sweden
Aida Isinika: Institute of Continuing Education (ICE), Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro P.O. Box 3044, Tanzania
Genesis Tambang Yengoh: Centre for Sustainability Science, Lund University, 221 00 Lund, Sweden

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 20, 1-20

Abstract: Agricultural intensification based on smallholders is among many economists viewed as a necessary developmental path to ensure food security and poverty reduction in sub-Saharan Africa. Increasingly, a one-sided focus on raising productivity in cereals has been questioned on environmental grounds, with the concept of sustainable agricultural intensification (SAI) emerging from the natural sciences as a way of advancing environmental and social needs simultaneously. SAI approaches have, however, been criticized for being both conceptually and methodologically vague. This study combines socioeconomic survey data with remotely sensed land productivity data and qualitative data from four villages in Tanzania. By triangulating and comparing data collected through ground level surveys and ground-truthing with remote sensing data, we find that this combination of methods is capable of resolving some of the theoretical and methodological vagueness found in SAI approaches. The results show the problems of relying on only one type of data when studying sustainable agricultural intensification and indicate the poor environmental outcomes of cereal monocropping, even when social outcomes may be forthcoming. We identify land use practices that can be considered both socially and environmentally sustainable. Theoretically, we contribute to a further problematization of the SAI concept.

Keywords: sustainable agricultural intensification; smallholder agriculture; Tanzania; interdisciplinary approaches; GIS; agricultural productivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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