ALM UNDP

Summary:

This project is intending to develop with small scale farmers, appropriate manure out of oilcake of Jatropha curcas in order to:

a) enhance millet productivity;

b) reduce soil moisture stress and

c) better control soil temperature variation. For this purpose participatory approach is adopted to compare the effects of two fertilizers and 5 methods of fertilizer application. Measurements on soil moisture and soil temperature variation are carried out and millet agronomic parameters as well.

This research project use participatory approach to mitigate small scale farmers´ vulnerability to climate change through application of press cake of Jatropha as fertilizer in millet production. Experiments are carried out on completely randomized experimental plots including 6 treatments. The treatment T0 is assigned to plots without fertilizer, T1and T5 are plots with 100kg/ha NPK (15, 15, 15) applied in broad casting and 60kg NPK applied using the micro-dosing method respectively. The treatments T2, T3 and T4 were assigned to the plots with 10 tons/ha, 5 tons/ha and 2.5 tons/ha of Jatropha oilcake fertilizer respectively. Each treatment has 4 replicates in total there is 24 elementary plots of 104 m2 (13m*8m) each, separated by an alley of 1.6 m by 0.8 m and an alley of 2 m between the blocks. Each elementary plot has 7 lines of seedlings and each line will have 7 holes. The measures of different agronomical parameters are done on 4 central lines of each elementary plot. 10 model farmers have been selected for the implementation of the same experiments on field conditions. They have been divided in 3 groups: - the group 1 : number of farmers = 3; surface of the field = 0.5 ha divided in 0.25ha were we applied the treatment T2 and 0.5 ha in T1 . - the group 2: number of farmers = 4; surface of the field = 1ha divided in four sub-fields of 0.25ha. The treatments in this group of farmers included T0, T3, T4 and T1; - the group 3: number of farmers = 3, surface of the field o.75 ha divided in 3 sub – fields of 0.25 ha. The treatments for this group are: T5, T2 and T0 Data collection on station and on farmers´ field is done every week and it concerns millet agronomic parameters: millet height, number of tillers. Data on the biomass and crop yield is collected only after harvest. Data on soil moisture and soil temperature variation over the vegetation period was recorded by online an online soil screening device: POGO soil sensor and it concerned the layers 0-20 cm, 20-40 cm and 40 - 60 cm.