Technological interventions to address the problem of poor productivity of smallholder agricultural systems must be designed to target socially diverse and spatially heterogeneous farms and farming systems. This paper proposes a categorisation of household diversity based on a functional typology of livelihood strategies, and analyses the influence of such diversity on current soil fertility status and spatial variability on a sample of 250 randomly selected farms from six districts of Kenya and Uganda. In spite of the agro-ecological and socio-economic diversity observed across the region (e.g. 4 months year-1 of food self-sufficiency in Vihiga, Kenya vs. 10 in Tororo, Uganda) consistent patterns of variability were also observed. For example, all the households with less than 3 months year-1 of food self-sufficiency had a land:labour ratio (LLR)  1 produced enough food to cover their diet for at least 5 months. Households with LLRÂ
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2009.10.001Altmetric score:
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Publication year
2010
Authors
Tittonell, P.; Muriuki, A.; Shepherd, K.; Mugendi, D.; Kaizzi, K.; Okeyo, J.; Verchot, L.; Coe, R.; Vanlauwe, B.
Language
English
Keywords
livelihoods, farming systems, infrared radiation, soil nutrients, soil fertility, spectroscopy, small scale farming
Geographic
Kenya, Uganda
