Climate-Resilient Banana Production in Uganda

project summary

Banana is a economically very significant crop in Uganda, yet productivity on smallholder farms is low and has even declined further in recent years due to several factors, including climate-change induced water stress, pests and diseases and low soil fertility. To ensure banana market demands can be met and to ensure sustainability of food security for millions of farmers, it is crucial to enhance the resilience of the banana cropping systems to future environmental conditions.
An interdisciplinary team from research institutions, academia and the private sector in Uganda and Denmark will, together with relevant stakeholders, develop a range of nature-based solutions that integrate natural principles into the agricultural management to protect, sustainably manage and restore the banana agroecosystems, benefiting farmers and biodiversity simultaneously. The proposed solutions include the selection and use of resilient banana cultivars, low-cost but effective irrigation technologies, integration of nitrogen-fixing intercrops and agroforestry trees as well as locally available organic soil amendments. Furthermore, the potential for integrating microbial products to control diseases (biological control), to enhance nutrient availability and to protect the plants against abiotic stresses (biostimulants) will be evaluated. The acceptability of the new production methods among farmers, as well as their willingness to pay for them, will also be part of the project. Particular attention will be paid to the gender dimensions of the banana production systems, where women do most of the farm labour, but are frequently excluded from innovations and development.
To achieve these objectives, we will adopt a multidisciplinary approach including surveys, screenhouse experiments and on-station field experiments. Field trials in farmers’ fields in banana-producing regions of western and central Uganda will increase the impact of the project. In collaboration with professors and senior researchers in Uganda and Denmark, six PhD and two MSc candidates will be enrolled. The resulting insights will be made directly available to the relevant stakeholders through a wide range of dissemination activities, including feedback workshops and farmer training programmes.