Research & Publications

Agroforestry is increasingly recognized as a sustainable agricultural land use system with potential to sequester carbon, create and repair habitats, enhance biodiversity and offer environmental and socio-economic benefits, including improved
agricultural productivity.

It is widely recognised that transforming our food systems into more climate-smart and
sustainable practices is essential for achieving beneficial outcomes for both people and nature.

Malawi’s vulnerability to climate change and declining soil fertility underscores the
need for climate-smart, soil-conserving agricultural practices. In Malawi, the deep bed
farming (DBF) system offers promising solutions for smallholder farmers facing these
challenges. This study evaluated the effectiveness of DBF in improving soil and water
conservation and maize productivity in Malawi.

In the context of increasing NGO interest in the capacity of conservation agriculture methods to support sustainable agriculture across sub-Saharan Africa, this paper explores the experiences of farmers (n = 111) adopting the Tiyeni NGO’s deep-bed farming (DBF) system in northern Malawi.

Wetlands play a critical role throughout sub-Saharan Africa in providing a range of ecosystem services that support and sustain people’s livelihoods – both through their direct contribution of provisioning services such as agriculture, water and livestock fodder, and through the regulating and supporting services that underpin these (MA 2005; Wood et al. 2013; Dixon 2018).