Speaker
Description
Current food production systems all over the world face numerous challenges. Particularly smallholder farming in sub-Saharan Africa is in substantial need of sustainable solutions. Yet, the adoption of already existing sustainable agricultural practices such as agroforestry often re-mains low. This paper aims to deepen the understanding of smallholders’ decision-making pro-cesses for agroforestry adoption. Using the example of a CIFOR-ICRAF agroforestry project (Fruit Tree Portfolios), we examine the associated influences of ambition and livelihood aspira-tions on adoption and assess the impact of agroforestry on household well-being. We conduct several statistical analyses, including a logistic regression on the influence of ambitions and aspi-rations on adoption, and a linear regression with endogenous treatment effects and propensity score matching to assess the impact of adoption on well-being. The analyses are based on a pri-mary data set collected from rural Kenyan households that participated in the project in 2021.
We confirm the inverted U-shaped relationship between ambition and the willingness to take pro-active steps, in this case the adoption of agroforestry, and emphasize its relevance for decision-making processes. In addition, livelihood aspirations towards off- or on-farm activities promoted the likelihood of adoption. Due to the versatility of integrating fruit trees into farms, they can serve both market- and food security-oriented purposes and thus supporting livelihoods in mul-tiple ways. This is confirmed by the positive results of adoption on household well-being in terms of food security and household income. In summary, the inclusion of cognitive factors such as ambition and livelihood aspirations can help explain the adoption decisions of small-holder households and support inclusive and customized project designs. In the long term, these findings could have the potential to ensure that development interventions are adopted more suc-cessfully.
