In Uganda, food production has grown at a slower pace, 2 percent, than the growth in population, 3.2 percent. The low production and productivity of the agriculture sector and its associated impact on poverty is of great concern to policy makers. Uganda Bureau of Statistic (UBOS) estimates that 80 percent of the rural poor, especially women and the youth who form the bulk of rural agriculture employment, are vulnerable to food shortages.
To mitigate food shortfalls, Uganda currently imports some of its food requirement such as rice, which is quickly becoming a staple food. As such, Uganda’s demand for rice far exceeds the supply. However, the continued importation of rice is partially responsible for foreign exchange outflow, which negatively affect Uganda’s trade balance. Past studies such as Kasirye (2013) suggest that the poor performance of the agricultural sector is largely due to persistence of poor farming practices and low technology adoption in the form of improved seeds and fertilizer application. Indeed for our case, rice farmers have been found to practice poor farming methods such as seed broadcasting, inefficient water usage with no use of bands and canals, poor spacing and poor post-harvest handling.
Given the above, in 2008 the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) intervened to address the impact of rice shortage on the economy and households by providing training, to lowland rice farmers in Eastern Uganda, on better farming practices and the use of resilient and high yielding rice varieties such as NERICA. The expected outcome of the JICA intervention is a sustainable rice production that will in turn improve on Uganda’s food security. However, it is not clear whether a ‘’one-time’’ training could have lasting impact on the application of better farming practices, and if so, what factors facilitates this sustained impact? In addition, the JICA project was implemented in ethnically diverse districts with high incidences of land conflict, largely explained by variation in land tenure institutions between the migrant and the host community, which could affect farming practices.
It is on this background that the Economic Policy Research Centre (EPRC) and JICA is implementing the second wave of data collection (in September/October, 2015) in Bugiri, Mayuge, Pallisa and Bukedea districts of Uganda to support the unlocking of three main issues: The long term impact of training interventions on agriculture performance; the effect of agriculture extension on better farming practices; and impact of land tenure, ethnic diversity and internal migrations on farmer groups, and hence adoption of better farming practices. Thereafter, the evidence generated, if strong and significant, could form a basis for scaling up interventions to improve rice production and productivity in sub-Sahara Africa.