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  • From: Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [permaculture] How Millions of Farmers are Advancing Agriculture For Themselves
  • Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2015 02:25:35 -0400

How Millions of Farmers are Advancing Agriculture For Themselves
December 3, 2012 (Un)Sustainable Farming
<http://www.independentsciencenews.org/sections/un-sustainable-farming/>,
Commentaries <http://www.independentsciencenews.org/sections/commentaries/> 14
Comments

by Jonathan Latham

http://www.independentsciencenews.org/un-sustainable-farming/how-millions-of-farmers-are-advancing-agriculture-for-themselves/

The world record yield for paddy rice production is not held by an
agricultural research station or by a large-scale farmer from the United
States, but by Sumant Kumar who has a farm of just two hectares in
Darveshpura village in the state of Bihar in Northern India. His record
yield
<http://independentsciencenews.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/India-Bihar-Paddy-Record-Yield-SRI.pdf>
of 22.4 tons per hectare, from a one-acre plot, was achieved with what is
known as the System of Rice Intensification <http://sri.ciifad.cornell.edu>
(SRI). To put his achievement in perspective, the average paddy yield
worldwide is about 4 tons per hectare. Even with the use of fertilizer,
average yields are usually not more than 8 tons.

Sumant Kumar’s success was not a fluke. Four of his neighbors, using SRI
methods, and all for the first time, matched or exceeded the previous world
record from China, 19 tons per hectare. Moreover, they used only modest
amounts of inorganic fertilizer and did not need chemical crop protection.

SRI-grown Rice in China

Using SRI methods, smallholding farmers in many countries are starting to
get higher yields and greater productivity from their land, labor, seeds,
water and capital, with their crops showing more resilience to the hazards
of climate change (Thakur et al 2009; Zhao et al 2009).

These productivity gains have been achieved simply by changing the ways
that farmers manage their plants, soil, water and nutrients.

The effect is to get crop plants to grow larger, healthier, longer-lived
root systems, accompanied by increases in the abundance, diversity and
activity of soil organisms. These organisms constitute a beneficial
microbiome for plants that enhances their growth and health in ways similar
to how the human microbiome benefits *Homo sapiens*.

That altered management practices can induce more productive, resilient
phenotypes from existing rice plant genotypes has been seen in over 50
countries <http://sri.ciifad.cornell.edu/countries/index.html>. The reasons
for this improvement are not all known, but there is a growing literature
<http://sri.ciifad.cornell.edu/research/index.html> that helps account for
the improvements observed in yield and health for rice crops using SRI.

The ideas and practices that constitute SRI were developed inductively in
Madagascar some 30 years ago for rice. They are now being adapted to
improve the productivity of a wide variety of other crops, starting with
wheat, finger millet and sugarcane. Producing more output with fewer
external inputs may sound improbable, but it derives from a shift in
emphasis from improving plant genetic potential via plant breeding, to
providing optimal environments for crop growth.

The adaptation of SRI experience and principles to other crops is being
referred to generically as the System of Crop Intensification (SCI),
encompassing variants for wheat (SWI), maize (SMI), finger millet (SFMI),
sugarcane (SSI), mustard (rapeseed/canola)(another SMI), teff (STI),
legumes such as pigeon peas, lentils and soya beans, and vegetables such as
tomatoes, chillies and eggplant.

That similar results are seen across such a range of plants suggests some
generic processes may be involved, and these practices are not only good
for growing rice. This suggests to Prof. Norman Uphoff and colleagues
within the SRI network that more attention should be given to the
contributions that are made to agricultural production by the soil biota,
both in the plants’ rhizospheres but also as symbiotic endophytes within
the plants themselves (Uphoff et al. 2012).

The evidence reported below has drawn heavily, with permission, from a
report that Dr. Uphoff prepared on the extension of SRI to other crops
(Uphoff 2012). Much more research and evaluation needs to be done on this
progression to satisfy both scientists and practitioners. But this gives an
idea of what kinds of advances in agricultural knowledge and practice
appear to be emerging.

*Origins and Principles*
Deriving from empirical work started in the 1960s in Madagascar by a French
priest, Fr. Henri de Laulanié, S.J., the System of Rice Intensification
(SRI) has shown remarkable capacity to raise smallholders’ rice
productivity under a wide variety of conditions around the world: from
tropical rainforest regions of Indonesia, to mountainous regions in
northeastern Afghanistan, to fertile river basins in India and Pakistan, to
arid conditions of Timbuktu on the edge of the Sahara Desert in Mali. SRI
methods have proved adaptable to a wide range of agroecological settings.

With SRI management, paddy yields are usually increased by 50-100%, but
sometimes by even more, even up to the super-yields of Sumant Kumar and his
neighbors. Requirements for seed are greatly reduced (by 80-90%), as are
those for irrigation water (by 25-50%). Little or no inorganic fertilizer
is required if sufficient organic matter can be provided to the soil, and
there is little if any need for agrochemical crop protection against pests
and diseases. SRI plants are also generally healthier and better able to
resist such stresses as well as drought, extremes of temperature, flooding,
and storm damage.

SRI methodology is based on four main principles that interact in
synergistic ways:

- Establish healthy plants early and carefully, nurturing their root
potential.
- Reduce plant populations, giving each plant more room to grow above
and below ground and room to capture sunlight and obtain nutrients.
- Enrich the soil with organic matter, keeping it well-aerated to
support better growth of roots and more aerobic soil biota.
- Apply water purposefully in ways that favor plant-root and
soil-microbial growth, avoiding flooded (anaerobic) soil conditions.

These principles are translated into a number of irrigated rice cultivation
practices which under most smallholder farmers’ conditions are the
following:

- Plant young seedlings carefully and singly, giving them wider spacing
usually in a square pattern, so that both roots and canopy have ample room
to spread.
- Keep the soil moist but not inundated. Provide sufficient water for
plant roots and beneficial soil organisms to grow, but not so much as to
suffocate or suppress either, e.g., through alternate wetting and drying,
or through small but regular applications.
- Add as much compost, mulch or other organic matter to the soil as
possible, ‘feeding the soil’ so that the soil can, in turn, ‘feed the
plant.’
- Control weeds with mechanical methods that can incorporate weeds while
breaking up the soil’s surface. This actively aerates the root zone as a
beneficial by-product of weed control. This practice can promote root
growth and the abundance of beneficial soil organisms, adding to yield.

The cumulative result of these practices is to induce the growth of more
productive and healthier plants (phenotypes) from any given variety
(genotype).

Variants of SRI practices suitable for upland regions have been developed
by farmers where there are no irrigation facilities, so SRI is not just for
irrigated rice production any more. In both settings, crops can be
productive with less irrigation water or rainfall because taking up SRI
recommendations enhances the capacity of soil systems to absorb and provide
water (‘green water’). SRI practices initially developed to benefit
small-scale rice growers are being adapted now for larger-scale production,
with methods such as direct-seeding instead of transplanting, and with the
mechanization of some labor-intensive operations such as weeding (Sharif
2011).

*From the System of Rice Intensification to the System of Crop
Intensification*
Once the principles of SRI became understood by farmers and they had
mastered its practices for rice, farmers began extending SRI ideas and
methods to other crops. NGOs and some scientists have also become
interested in and supportive of this extrapolation, so a novel process of
innovation has ensued. Some results of this process are summarized here.

The following information is not a research report. The comparisons below
are not experiment station data but rather results that have come from
farmers’ fields in Asia and Africa. The measurements of yields reported
here probably have some margin of error. But the differences seen are so
large and are so often repeated that they are certainly significant
agronomically. The results in the following sections are comparisons with
farmers’ current practices, showing how much more production farmers in
developing countries could be achieving from their presently available
resources.

This innovative management of many crops, referred to under the broad
heading of System of Crop Intensification (SCI), is also sometimes aptly
referred to in India as the ‘System of *Root* Intensification,’ another
meaning for the acronym SRI.

The changes introduced with SCI practice are driven by the four SRI
principles noted above. The first three principles are usually followed
fairly closely. The fourth principle (reduced water application) is
relevant for irrigated production such as for wheat, sugarcane and some
other crops. It has less relevance under rainfed conditions where farmers
have less control over water applications to their crops. Maintaining
sufficient but never excessive soil moisture such as with water-harvesting
methods and applications corresponds to the fourth SRI principle.

Agriculture in the 21st century must be practiced differently from the
previous century; land and water resources are becoming relatively scarcer,
of poorer quality, or less reliable. Climatic conditions are in many places
becoming more adverse, especially for smallholding farmers. More than ever,
they need cropping practices that are more ‘climate-proof.’ By promoting
better root growth and more abundant life in the soil, SCI offers millions
of insecure, disadvantaged households better opportunities.

*Wheat (Triticum)*
The extension of SRI practices to wheat, the next most important cereal
crop after rice, was fairly quickly seized upon by farmers and researchers
in India, Ethiopia, Mali and Nepal. SWI was first tested in 2008 by
the People’s
Science Institute <http://peoplesscienceinstitute.org/#> (PSI) which works
with farmers in Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand states. Yield estimates
showed a 91% increase for unirrigated SWI plots over usual methods in
rainfed areas, and a 82% increase for irrigated SWI. This has encouraged an
expansion of SWI in these two states.

The most rapid growth and most dramatic results have been in Bihar state of
India, where 415 farmers, mostly women, tried SWI methods in 2008/09, with
yields averaging 3.6 tons/ha, compared with 1.6 tons/ha using usual
practices. The next year, 15,808 farmers used SWI with average yields of
4.6 tons/ha. In the past year, 2011/12, the SWI area in Bihar was reported
to be 183,063 hectares, with average yields of 5.1 tons/ha. With SWI
management, net income per acre from wheat has been calculated by the NGO
PRADAN <http://www.pradan.net/> to rise from Rs. 6,984 to Rs. 17,581, with
costs reduced while yields increased. This expansion has been done under
the auspices of the Bihar Rural Livelihood Promotion Society
<http://brlp.in/>, supported by the International Development Association
(IDA) of the World Bank.

About the same time, farmers in northern Ethiopia started on-farm trials of
SWI, assisted by the Institute for Sustainable Development
<http://www.isd.org.et/home2.php> (ISD), supported by a grant from Oxfam
America. Seven farmers in 2009 averaged 5.45 tons/ha with SWI methods, the
highest reaching 10 tons/ha. There was a larger set of on-farm trials in
South Wollo in 2010. SWI yields averaged 4.7 tons/ha with compost and 4.9
tons/ha with inorganic nitrogen (urea) and phosphorus (DAP). The 4%
increase in yield was not enough to justify the cost of purchasing and
applying fertilizer. The control plots averaged wheat yields of 1.8 tons/ha.

In 2008-09, farmer trials with SWI methods were started in the Timbuktu
region of Mali, where it was learned that transplanting young seedlings was
not as effective as direct seeding, while SRI spacing of 25cm x 25cm proved
to be too great. Still, obtaining a 10% higher yield with a 94% reduction
in seed (10 kg/ha vs. 170 kg/ha), a 40% reduction in labor, and a 30%
reduction in water requirements encouraged farmers to continue with their
experiments.

In 2009/10, the NGO Africare <http://www.africare.org/> undertook
systematic replicated trials in Timbuktu, evaluating a number of different
methods of crop establishment, including direct seeding in spacing
combinations from 10 to 20 cm, line sowing, transplanting of seedlings, and
control plots, all on farmers’ fields. Compared to the control average
(2.25 tons/ha), the SWI transplanting method and 15×15 cm direct seeding
gave the greatest yield response, 5.4 tons/ha, an increase of 140%.

SWI evaluations were also done in 2010 in the Far Western region of Nepal
by the NGO Mercy Corps <http://www.mercycorps.org/>, under the EU-FAO Food
Facility Programme. The control level of yield was 3.4 tons/ ha using local
practices with a local variety. Growing a modern variety with local
practices added 10% to yield (3.74 tons/ha); however, using SWI practices
the same modern variety raised yield by 91%, reaching a yield of 6.5
tons/ha.

*Mustard (Rapeseed/Canola)*
Farmers in Bihar state of India have recently begun adapting SRI methods
for growing mustard (aka rapeseed or canola). In 2009-10, 7 women farmers
in Gaya district working with PRADAN and the government’s ATMA agency
started applying SRI practices to their mustard crop. This gave them an
average grain yield of 3 tons/ha, three times their usual 1 t/ha.

The following year, 283 women farmers who used SMI methods averaged 3.25
tons/ha. In 2011-12, 1,636 farmers practiced SMI with an average yield of
3.5 tons/ha. Those who used all of the practices as recommended averaged 4
tons/ha, and one reached a yield of 4.92 tons/ha as measured by government
technicians. With SMI, farmers’ costs of production were reduced by half,
from Rs. 50 per kg of grain to just Rs. 25 per kilogram.

*Sugarcane (Saccarum officinarum)*
Shortly after they began using SRI methods in 2004, farmers in Andhra
Pradesh state of India began also adapting these ideas and practices to
their sugarcane production. Some farmers got as much as three times more
yield, cutting their planting materials by 80-90%, and introducing much
wider spacing of plants, using more compost and mulch to enhance soil
organic matter (and control weeds), with sparing use of irrigation water
and much reduced use of chemical fertilizers and agrochemical sprays.

By 2009, there had been enough testing, demonstration and modification of
these initial practices, e.g., cutting out the buds from cane stalks and
planting them in soil or other rooting material to produce healthy
seedlings that could be transplanted with very wide spacing, that the joint
Dialogue Project on Food, Water and Environment of the World Wide Fund for
Nature (WWF) and the International Crop Research Institute for the
Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in Hyderabad launched a ‘sustainable sugarcane
initiative’ (SSI). The project published a manual that described and
explained the suite of methods derived from SRI experience that could raise
cane yields by 30% or more, with reduced requirements for both water and
chemical fertilizer.

The director of the Dialogue Project, Dr. Biksham Gujja together with other
SRI and SSI colleagues established a pro bono company AgSRI
<http://www.agsri.com/index.html>in 2010 to disseminate knowledge and
practice of these ecologically-friendly innovations among farmers in India
and beyond.

The first international activity of AgSRI has been to share information on
SSI with sugar growers on the Camilo Cienfuegos production cooperative in
Bahia Honda, Cuba. A senior sugar agronomist, Lauro Fanjùl from the
Ministry of Sugar, when visiting the cooperative to inspect its SSI crop,
was amazed at the size, vigor and color of the canes, noting that they were
‘still growing.’

*Finger Millet (Eleusine coracana)*
Some of the first examples of SCI came from farmers in several states of
India who had either applied SRI ideas to finger millet (ragi in local
languages), or by their own observations and experimentation devised a more
productive cropping system for finger millet that utilized SRI principles.

The NGO Green Foundation <http://www.greenconserve.com/> in Bangalore in
the early ’00s learned that farmers in Haveri district of Karnataka State
had devised a system for growing ragi that they call Guli Vidhana (square
planting). Young seedlings are planted in a square grid, 2 per hill, spaced
18 inches (45 cm) apart, with organic fertilization. One implement they use
stimulates greater tillering and root growth when it is pulled across the
field in different directions; and another breaks up the topsoil while
weeding between and across rows. In contrast with conventional methods,
which yield around 1.25 to 2 tons/ha, with up to 3.25 tons using fertilizer
inputs, Guli Vidhana methods yield 4.5 to 5 tons/ha, with a maximum yield
so far of 6.25 tons.

In Jharkhand state of India in 2005, farmers working with the NGO PRADAN
began experimenting with SRI methods for their rainfed finger millet. Usual
yields there were 750 kg to 1 ton/ha with traditional broadcasting
practices. Yields with transplanted SFMI have averaged 3-4 tons/ha. Costs
of production per kg of grain are reduced by 60% with SFMI management, from
Rs. 34.00 to Rs. 13.50. In Ethiopia, one farmer using her own version of
SRI practices for finger millet is reported by the Institute for
Sustainable Development to have obtained a yield of 7.6 tons/ha.

*Maize (Zea mays)*
Growing maize using SRI concepts and methods has not been experimented with
very much yet; but in northern India the People’s Science Institute in
Dehradun has worked with smallholders in Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh
states to improve their maize production with adapted SRI practices.

No transplanting is involved, and no irrigation. Farmers are planting 1-2
seeds per hill with square spacing of 30×30 cm, having added compost and
other organic matter to the soil, and then doing three soil-aerating
weedings. Some varieties they have found performing best at 30×50 cm
spacing. The number of farmers practicing this kind of SCI went from 183 in
2009 on 10.34 hectares of land, to 582 farmers on 63.61 ha in 2010. With
these alternative methods, the average yields have been 3.5 tons/hectare.
This is 75% more than their yields with conventional management, which have
averaged 2 tons/hectare.

Because maize is such an important food crop for many millions of
food-insecure households, getting more production from their limited land
resources, with their present varieties or with improved ones, should be a
priority.

*Turmeric (Curcuma longa)*
Farmers in Thambal village, Salem district in Tamil Nadu state of India
were the first to establish an SRI Farmers Association in their country, as
far as is known. Their appreciation for SRI methods led them to begin
experimentation with the extension of these ideas to their off-season
production of turmeric, a rhizome crop that gives farmers a good income
when sold for use as a spice in Indian cooking.

With this methodology, planting material is reduced by more than 80%, by
using much smaller rhizome portions to start seedlings. These are
transplanted with wider spacing (30×40 cm instead of 30×30 cm), and organic
means of fertilization are used (green manure plus vermicompost,
Trichoderma, Pseudomonas, and a biofertilizer mixture known as EM,
Effective Microorganisms, developed in Japan by T. Higa). Water
requirements are cut by two-thirds. With yields 25% higher and with lower
costs of production, farmers’ net income from their turmeric crop can be
effectively doubled.

*Tef (Eragrostis tef)*
Adaptations of SRI ideas for the increased production of tef, the most
important cereal grain for Ethiopians, started in 2008-09 under the
direction of Dr. Tareke Berhe, at the time director of the Sasakawa Africa
Association’s <http://www.saa-safe.org/> regional rice program, based in
Addis Ababa. Having grown up in a household which raised tef, and then
written theses on tef for his M.Sc. (Washington State University) and Ph.D.
(University of Nebraska), Berhe was thoroughly knowledgeable, both
practically and theoretically, with this crop.

Typical yields for tef grown with traditional practices, based on
broadcasting, are about 1 ton/ha. The seed of tef is tiny — even smaller
than mustard seed, about 2500 seeds making only 1 gram — so growing and
transplanting tef seedlings seemed far-fetched. But Berhe found that
transplanting young seedlings at 20×20 cm spacing with organic and
inorganic fertilization gave yields of 3 to 5 tons/ha. With small
amendments of micronutrients (Zn, Cu, Mg, Mn), these yields could be almost
doubled again. Such potential within the tef genome, responding to good
soil conditions and wider spacing, had not been seen before. Berhe is
calling these alternative production methods the System of Tef
Intensification (STI).

In 2010, with a grant from Oxfam America, Dr. Berhe conducted STI trials
and demonstrations at Debre Zeit Agricultural Research Center and Mekelle
University, major centers for agricultural research in Ethiopia. Their good
results gained acceptance for the new practices. He is now serving as an
advisor for tef to the Ethiopian government’s Agricultural Transformation
Agency (ATA), with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

This year, 7,000 farmers are using STI methods in an expanded trial, and
another 100,000 farmers are using less ‘intensified’ methods based on the
same SRI principles, not transplanting but having wider spacing of plants
with row seeding. As with other crops, tef is quite responsive to
management practices that do not crowd the plants together and that improve
the soil conditions for abundant root growth.

*Legumes: Pigeonpeas (Red Gram – Cajanus cajan), Lentils (Black Gram –
Vigna mungo), Mung Beans (Green Gram – Vigna radiata), Soya Beans (Glycine
max), Kidney Beans (Phaseolus vulgaris), Peas (Pisum sativum)*
That SRI principles and methods could be extended from rice to wheat,
finger millet, sugarcane, maize, and even tef was not so surprising, since
these are all monocotyledons, the grasses and grass-like plants whose
stalks and leaves grow from their base. That mustard would respond very
well to SRI management practices was unexpected, because it is a
dicotyledon, i.e., a flowering plant with its leaves growing from stems
rather than from the base of the plant. It is now being found that a number
of leguminous crops, also dicotyledons, can benefit from practices inspired
by SRI experience.

The Bihar Rural Livelihoods Support Program, Patna, has reported tripled
yield from mung bean (green gram) with SCI methods, raising production on
farmers’ fields from 625 kg/ha to 1.875 tons/ha. With adapted SRI
practices, the People’s Science Institute in Dehradun reports that small
farmers in Uttarakhand state of India are getting:

- 65% increase for lentils (black gram), up from 850 kg/ha to 1.4
tons/ha;
- 50% increase for soya bean, going from 2.2 to 3.3 tons/ha;
- 67% increase for kidney beans, going from 1.8 to 3.0 tons/ha;
- 42% increase for peas, going from 2.13 to 3.02 tons/ha.

No transplanting is involved, but the seeds are sown, 1-2 per hill, with
wide spacing – 20x30cm, 25x30cm, or 30×30 cm for most of these crops, and
as much as 15/20×30/45cm for peas. Two or more weedings are done,
preferably with soil aeration to enhance root growth.

Fertilization is organic, applying compost augmented by a trio of
indigenous organic fertilizers known locally as PAM (panchagavya, amritghol
and matkakhad). Panchagavya is a mixture of five products from cattle: ghee
(clarified butter), milk, curd (yoghurt), dung and urine, which
particularly appears to stimulate the growth of beneficial soil organisms.
Seeds are treated before planting with cow urine to make them more
resistant to pests and disease.

This production strategy can be considered ‘labor intensive’ but households
seeking to get maximum yield from the small areas of land available to them
find that the additional effort and care give net returns as well as more
security. The resulting crops are more robust, resistant both to pest and
disease damage and to adverse climatic conditions.

*Vegetables*
The extension of SRI concepts and practices to vegetables has been a
farmer-led innovation, and has progressed farthest in Bihar State of India.
The Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society (BRLPS), working under the
state government, with NGOs such as PRADAN leading the field operations and
having financial support from the IDA of the World Bank, has been promoting
and evaluating SCI efforts among women’s self-help groups to raise their
vegetable production.

Women farmers in Bihar have experimented with planting young seedlings
widely and carefully, placing them into dug pits that are back-filled with
loose soil and organic soil amendments such as vermicompost. Water is used
very precisely and carefully. While this system is labor-intensive, it
increases yields greatly and benefits particularly the very poorest
households. They have access to very little land and water, and they need
to use these resources with maximum productivity and little cash
expenditure.

A recent article on using SRI methods with vegetables concluded: “It is
found that in SRI, SWI & SCI, the disease & pest infestations are less, use
of agro chemicals are lesser, requires less water, can sustain
water-stressed condition; with more application of organic matter, yields
in terms of grain, fodder & firewood are higher.” (from a background paper
<http://www.brlp.in/admin/Files/Concept%20Note%20on%20National%20Colloquium%20on%20SCI.pdf>prepared
for the National Colloquium on System of Crop Intensification (SCI), Patna,
India, March 2, 2011).

Trials in Ethiopia conducted by the NGO ISD have also shown good results.
Readers can learn more about how these ideas are being adapted for very
poor, water-stressed Ethiopian households in Tigray province here (Brochure
at:
http://www.isd.org.et/Publications/Planting%20with%20space%20brochure.pdf).

*Conclusion*
Philosophically, SRI can be understood as an integrated system of
plant-centered agriculture. Fr. Laulanié, who developed SRI thinking and
practice during his 34 years in Madagascar, in one of his last papers
commented that he did this by learning from the rice plant; the rice plant
is my teacher (mon maître) he wrote. Each of the component activities of
SRI has the goal of maximally providing whatever a plant is likely to need
in terms of space, light, air, water, and nutrients. It also creates
favorable conditions for the growth and prospering of beneficial soil
organisms in, on and around the plant. SRI thus presents us with the
question: if one can provide, in every way, the best possible environment
for plants to grow, what benefits and synergisms will we see?

Already, approximately 4-5 million farmers around the world are using SRI
methods with rice. The success of SRI methods can be attributed to many
factors. They are low risk, they don’t require farmers to have access to
any unfamiliar technologies, they save money on multiple inputs, while
higher yields earn them more. Most important is that farmers can readily
see the benefits for themselves.

SCI Yield Increases Reported

Consequently, many farmers are gaining confidence in their ability to get
‘more from less’ by modifying their crop management practices. They can
provide for their families’ food security, obtain surpluses, and avoid
indebtedness. In the process, they are enhancing the quality of their soil
resources and are buffering their crops against the temperature and
precipitation stresses of climate change.

Where this process will end, nobody knows. Almost invariably SRI results in
far greater yields, but some farmers go beyond others’ results to achieve
super-yields for reasons that are not fully clear. Although experience
increasingly points to the contributions of the plants’ microbiome, it also
suggests that the optimization process is still at the beginning.



*References*
Sharif A (2011). Technical adaptations for mechanized SRI production to
achieve water saving and increased profitability in Punjab, Pakistan. Paddy
and Water Environment 9: 111-119.
Thakur AK, Uphoff N and Antony E (2009) an assessment of physiological
effects of system of rice intensification (SRI) practices compared with
recommended rice cultivation practices in India. Experimental Agric. 46:
77-98.
Uphoff N (2012). Raising smallholder food crop yields with climate-smart
agricultural practices. Report accompanying presentation on ‘The System of
Rice Intensification (SRI) and Beyond: Coping with Climate Change,’ made at
World Bank, Washington, DC, October 10.
Uphoff N, Chi F, Dazzo FB , Rodriguez RJ (2012) Soil fertility as a
contingent rather than inherent characteristic: Considering the
contributions of crop-symbiotic soil biota. In Principles of Sustainable
Soil Systems in Agroecosystems,, eds. R. Lal and B. Stewart. Boca Raton FL:
Taylor & Francis, in press.
Zhao LM, Wu LH, Li Y, Lu X, Zhu DF and Uphoff, N (2009) Influence of the
system of rice intensification on rice yield and nitrogen and water use
efficiency with different N application rates. Experimental Agric. 45:
275–286.

Further Reading: What lies beyond ‘Modern Agriculture’
<http://www.bioscienceresource.org/cms/documents/TAA-Bunting-Lecture.pdf>
the Bunting lecture of 2007 given by Norman Uphoff at Reading University, UK



  • [permaculture] How Millions of Farmers are Advancing Agriculture For Themselves, Lawrence London, 03/24/2015

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