Year Published
- 2008 (0)
- (-) Remove 2009 filter 2009
- 2010 (1) Apply 2010 filter
- 2011 (1) Apply 2011 filter
- 2012 (0)
- 2013 (0)
- 2014 (0)
- (-) Remove 2015 filter 2015
- 2016 (0)
- 2017 (1) Apply 2017 filter
- 2018 (0)
- 2019 (0)
- 2020 (0)
- 2021 (0)
Research Topics
Populations
- Countries/Governments (1) Apply Countries/Governments filter
- Rural Populations (0)
- Smallholder Farmers (1) Apply Smallholder Farmers filter
- Women (0)
Types of Research
- Data Analysis (2) Apply Data Analysis filter
- (-) Remove Literature Review filter Literature Review
- Portfolio Review (0)
- Research Brief (0)
Geography
- (-) Remove East Africa Region and Selected Countries filter East Africa Region and Selected Countries
- Global (2) Apply Global filter
- South Asia Region and Selected Countries (1) Apply South Asia Region and Selected Countries filter
- Southern Africa Region and Selected Countries (3) Apply Southern Africa Region and Selected Countries filter
- Sub-Saharan Africa (3) Apply Sub-Saharan Africa filter
- West Africa Region and Selected Countries (3) Apply West Africa Region and Selected Countries filter
Dataset
- ASTI (0)
- FAOSTAT (1) Apply FAOSTAT filter
- Farmer First (0)
- LSMS & LSMS-ISA (0)
- Other Datasets (0)
Current search
- (-) Remove East Africa Region and Selected Countries filter East Africa Region and Selected Countries
- (-) Remove Household Well-Being & Equity filter Household Well-Being & Equity
- (-) Remove Political Economy & Governance filter Political Economy & Governance
- (-) Remove Agricultural Productivity, Yield, & Constraints filter Agricultural Productivity, Yield, & Constraints
- (-) Remove Food Security & Nutrition filter Food Security & Nutrition
- (-) Remove 2009 filter 2009
- (-) Remove Literature Review filter Literature Review
- (-) Remove 2015 filter 2015
Cereal yield variability is influenced by initial conditions such as suitability of the farming system for cereal cultivation, current production quantities and yields, and zone-specific potential yields limited by water availability. However, exogenous factors such as national policies, climate, and international market conditions also impact farm-level yields directly or provide incentives or disincentives for farmers to intensify production. We conduct a selective literature review of policy-related drivers of maize yields in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda and pair the findings with FAOSTAT data on yield and productivity. This report presents our cumulative findings along with contextual evidence of the hypothesized drivers behind maize yield trends over the past 20 years for the focus countries.
The Government of Kenya (GoK) has historically encouraged its farmers to use fertilizer by financing infrastructure and supporting fertilizer markets. From 1974 to 1984, the GoK provided a fertilizer importation monopoly to one firm, the Kenya Farmers Association. However, the GoK saw that this monopoly impeded fertilizer market development by prohibiting competing firms from entering the market and, in the latter half of the 1980s, encouraged other firms to enter the highly regulated fertilizer market. This report examines the state of fertilizer use in Kenya by reviewing and summarizing literature on recent fertilizer price increases, Kenya’s fertilizer usage trends and approaches, market forces, and the impact of government and non-government programs. We find that most studies of Kenya’s fertilizer market find it to be well functioning and generally competitive, and conclude that market reform has stimulated fertilizer use mainly by improving farmers’ access to the input through the expansion of private retail networks. Overall fertilizer consumption in Kenya has increased steadily since 1980, and fertilizer use among smallholders is among the highest in Sub-Saharan Africa. Yet fertilizer consumption is still limited, especially on cereal crops, and in areas where agroecological conditions create greater risks and lower returns to fertilizer use.