World Food Policy Volume 2, Number 1, Spring 2015 | Page 43

World Food Policy

of this study is to establish that these
improved production practices are highly
complementary to improve seed-fertilizer
technology.

The case of Mozambique: Table
1 compares the yields and production
practices across rain-fed and irrigated
areas in Mozambique (Kajisa and
Payongayong 2011a; 2011b). Thirty-three
villages in nine districts in Zambezia and
Sofara provinces in the Central region are
chosen as representative of rain-fed areas
in this country, whereas the Chokwe
irrigation scheme in the southern region
is chosen as the irrigated study site. As in
other countries in SSA, the irrigated area
accounts for a small proportion of paddy
area in this country. Furthermore, MVs
are seldom adopted, chemical fertilizer is
not used, and animal and tractor use is nil
in rain-fed areas. Under such conditions,
the rice yield is very low and unstable
with the average being a mere 1.1 ton/ha,
which is consistent with our expectations.
The yield per hectare is not very high in
the Chokwe irrigation scheme either,
mainly because the irrigation facilities are
not well maintained. In fact, the top 20%
of farmers, who receive adequate water,
adopt MVs, and apply fertilizer, achieve a
rate as high as 3.9 tons per hectare (ton/
ha). Note that popular MVs are old MVs
developed in Nigeria (ITA312) in the late
1970s by crossing Asian MVs and African
local varieties.7 This clearly shows that
there has been no attempt to transfer new
Asian-type varieties to Mozambique. The
yield could be higher if more modern

improved MVs had been disseminated in
Chokwe.

The case of Tanzania: The case
of Tanzania is more revealing (Table 2).
The three major rice-growing districts
with distinctly different production
environments were chosen for this study.
First, the average yield in rain-fed areas
ranges from 1.6 ton/ha in the Shinyanga
region to 2.0 ton/ha in the Morogoro
region, which is much higher than in
rain-fed areas in Mozambique. This
relatively high yield in rain-fed areas in
Tanzania can be attributed, at least partly,
to some adoption of MVs, some chemical
fertilizer application, and the adoption
of some improved production practices.
Second, the yields are considerably higher
in irrigated areas. The adoption rate of
MVs is very high in the Morogoro region,
whereas chemical fertilizer use is high in
the Morogoro and Mbeya regions. Note
that there is no tradition of rice production
in Tanzania, so even “traditional varieties”
are imported improved varieties from
abroad. This would explain why the yield
is as high as 4.6 ton/ha under irrigated
conditions in the Shinyanga region, even
though the adoption rate of MVs is very
low. Third, the adoption rates of bunding
and leveling are close to 100% in irrigated
areas, which seem to help explain the
considerably high yields in irrigated
areas in Tanzania. Thus, it is clear that a
combination of improved seeds, improved
production practices, and irrigation leads
to significantly high yields, resulting in a
“mini” Green Revolution in this country.

7

To our surprise, C4, which was developed in the early 1960s by the University of the Philippines, Los
Banos, was adopted in 22% of the paddy fields in Chokwe.

42