抄録
In the face of the formidable challenges posed by climate change, there is growing concern that the goal of food security for all must be pursued in a climate-resilient and environmentally sustainable manner. Conservation agriculture (CA) has been drawing increasing recognition as a climate-smart farming system that addresses the interconnected challenges of food security and climate change. Drawing from a case study of smallholder CA practices conducted in four different areas in eastern and southern provinces of Rwanda, this paper discusses key constraints to the adoption and scaling-up of CA as perceived by smallholder farmers in these areas. These constraints range from those stemming from farmers’ limited access to agricultural resources and services necessary for productive CA, to those posed by the government’s programme for agricultural intensification and commercialisation that considerably limits farmers’ choices with regard to the farming system and methods they may adopt. This paper proposes the allocation of considerable resources to address resource and service-related constraints suffered by smallholder farmers. It also calls for attention to be paid to the limitations caused by government policies. Together, these proposals encourage continuous effort to be made in policymaking and implementation to give smallholder farmers more space and increased support for experimenting, adopting, and expanding a farming system with greater productivity and climate resilience.
