**10.5. Unavailability of cover crop seeds**

Even though some farmers now know the benefits of growing cover crops as an intercrop with their cereals or in a short fallow system, seeds of these cover crops are not easily availa‐ ble. Few of the cover crops which have been tested and found useful for soil fertility enhanc‐ ing materials are *Mucuna, Pueraria, Canavalia* and *Callopogonium species* but their seeds are scarce and difficult to find in Ghana. This makes it difficult for many farmers to adopt and use these materials to enhance the fertility of their soils. It has been observed that seeds of these cover crops are easily found when there is a project promoting them. For example when there was intensive promotion of *Mucuna* for weed suppression and soil fertility in the transition zone of Ghana, it was easy to get *Mucuna* seeds to buy because some farmers pro‐ duced the seeds for sale. Initially, the project motivated the farmers to produce the seeds by buying the seeds off from them during the project but when the project ended and seeds were not bought again, the farmers also stopped producing the seeds. This situation calls for the introduction of edible cover crops because if *Mucuna* were edible, farmers would have continued to produce the crop for food while maintaining the fertility of their soils.

Cover crops which are not edible as mentioned earlier are less attractive to farmers because they do not give immediate benefit to the farmer. The option of growing cover crops as short season fallows is more feasible in the transition zones where population is less dense with large farms but not in areas where there is pressure on land use and there is no fallow period permitted. Practicing no-till on bare soil with less than 10 % surface mulch as in the Savanna zone with rampant bush burning may result in reduced crop yields.

#### **10.6. Difficulties in getting appropriate equipment and tools**

The practice of some of the soil fertility enhancing technologies such as in Agro-forestry and CA require the use of some equipments, inputs and tools. It has been observed that the re‐ quired inputs such as glyphosate as used in CA land preparation are mostly not available at the appropriate time needed by farmers. At times where they are available the cost may be so high that the average farmer may not be able to afford. Agro-inputs distribution is there‐ fore described as being poor because the right inputs are always not available at the right time needed. Chemical fertilizers which are needed to generate biomass at the beginning of CA practice in the Savanna zone have their depots located in the regional capitals of the country making it almost impossible for most of the farmers who are in rural areas. One of the difficulties involved in the implementation CA and other technologies designed to en‐ hance crop yields may be lack of accessibility to inputs such as weedicides.

weeks after planting the crop, one finds a huge mass and diversity of weeds vigorously springing up thereby making the first weeding after planting very difficult and laborious since this is done by hand. At times the high infestation of weeds in such a system is due to

Rio (1992) estimated over 45 % as the annual yield loss of crops due to weed infestation in heavily infested fields. Other effects include waste of human energy in controlling weeds. It has been found that reducing tillage intensity alone as described in CA without adequately covering the soil as practiced by most farmers is one way of promoting weed infestation on their fields. In the situation whereby crops are planted haphazardly leaving some gaps, weeds quickly infest and occupy these areas making their control very difficult as this re‐

Even though some farmers now know the benefits of growing cover crops as an intercrop with their cereals or in a short fallow system, seeds of these cover crops are not easily availa‐ ble. Few of the cover crops which have been tested and found useful for soil fertility enhanc‐ ing materials are *Mucuna, Pueraria, Canavalia* and *Callopogonium species* but their seeds are scarce and difficult to find in Ghana. This makes it difficult for many farmers to adopt and use these materials to enhance the fertility of their soils. It has been observed that seeds of these cover crops are easily found when there is a project promoting them. For example when there was intensive promotion of *Mucuna* for weed suppression and soil fertility in the transition zone of Ghana, it was easy to get *Mucuna* seeds to buy because some farmers pro‐ duced the seeds for sale. Initially, the project motivated the farmers to produce the seeds by buying the seeds off from them during the project but when the project ended and seeds were not bought again, the farmers also stopped producing the seeds. This situation calls for the introduction of edible cover crops because if *Mucuna* were edible, farmers would have

continued to produce the crop for food while maintaining the fertility of their soils.

Savanna zone with rampant bush burning may result in reduced crop yields.

**10.6. Difficulties in getting appropriate equipment and tools**

Cover crops which are not edible as mentioned earlier are less attractive to farmers because they do not give immediate benefit to the farmer. The option of growing cover crops as short season fallows is more feasible in the transition zones where population is less dense with large farms but not in areas where there is pressure on land use and there is no fallow period permitted. Practicing no-till on bare soil with less than 10 % surface mulch as in the

The practice of some of the soil fertility enhancing technologies such as in Agro-forestry and CA require the use of some equipments, inputs and tools. It has been observed that the re‐ quired inputs such as glyphosate as used in CA land preparation are mostly not available at the appropriate time needed by farmers. At times where they are available the cost may be so high that the average farmer may not be able to afford. Agro-inputs distribution is there‐ fore described as being poor because the right inputs are always not available at the right

bad selection of weedicide, low doses of the chemical and poor spraying techniques.

quires weeding several times by hand hoe.

22 Soil Fertility

**10.5. Unavailability of cover crop seeds**

The Food Crops Development Project (financed by the African Development Bank) imple‐ mented mostly in the forest and transition zones saw the supply of inputs to project clients by some major agro-input companies. According to Boahen et al., (2007) farmers use the project as collateral to gain access to the inputs for crop production. In that system the Project sent a request to the shop to provide a certain quantity of inputs, for which the farm‐ er pays later into a bank account created for this purpose. The Inputs and tools supplied to the farmers in this system ranged from pesticides and fertilizer to equipment and tools like knapsack sprayers, cutlasses and hoes. The above indicates that the implementation of any soil fertility enhancing technologies in Ghana by donors through projects is always success‐ ful but the systems breaks down immediately the project ends.

This calls for sustainability to be built into every project implemented to make sure that the farmers own and operate the system even after the project. Some of the suggestions given to introduce sustainability into such projects include:

Urging the farmers to form co-operatives where they can be registered and linked to finan‐ cial institutions such that even after the project, the farmers can get financial assistance from such Institutions

Secondly, training of farmers on both the process and the content of the project will be very important for the visibility of the project after it has been concluded.

The donors or project implementers should always look for their local partners and work with them. This will enable the activities of the project to continue through the efforts of the local partners after the duration of the project.

Farmers in the north of Ghana have expressed their gratitude for the introduction of CA and other related technologies as labour is scarce and some of these practices are ways of reduc‐ ing labour costs for crop production. Technologies such as no-till and direct seeding are practices demonstrated to the farmers of the north which are devoid of tilling the land either by hand hoe or tractors. Even though the introduction of these technologies are appropriate, the equipments and tools to go with these practices are not yet available for sale in Ghana except those used for the demonstrations. The planting of the crops in the mulch without these tools remains a challenge to the adoption of these technologies as farmers spend more time to get the seeds planted using dibblers and cutlasses. Implements like knife-rollers, rip‐ pers and no-till seeders are needed to facilitate planting in CA which are yet to be made available in the country. According to the farmers, planting is easier with dibblers or cutlass‐ es when the soil is bare but becomes more difficult if there is a high surface mulch as in CA and the crop is to be planted in rows.

Currently in Ghana, the most common practice available for medium- and large-scale farm‐ ers is the tractor-mounted disc plough and harrow which are imported and sold to either individuals or group of farmers. However, due to the fragile nature of the Savanna soils, these equipments have been observed to be responsible for the destruction of the soil struc‐ ture and increase soil erosion by running water during the rainy season. So far, the compo‐ nents of CA being demonstrated are targeting the small-scale farmers but if it is to be adopted by the medium and large-scale farmers, the availability of machines and equipment becomes very necessary. In order to expose the technologies to these category of farmers, there is the need to develop appropriate machinery, tools and other implements or at best adapt the existing ones, fabricate them and make them accessible to such farmers. This can be done by effectively training the local artisans and craft men/women to produce such equipments for the farmers. Even though most of these equipments are operated by tractors, if those to be produced are designed to be operated by bullocks and donkeys, it would at‐ tract many more farmers to adopt the practice.

to make farm operations safe. This is because the chemicals (insecticides) used in spraying to control the insects also drive the snakes and the scorpions out of the mulch. However, the farmers are of the view that the adoption of such technologies also increases cost of produc‐

Enhancing Soil Fertility for Cereal Crop Production Through Biological Practices and the Integration of Organic...

http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/53414

25

In the first place, in Ghana the number of extension agents of the Ministry of Food and Agri‐ culture (MoFA) responsible for agricultural extension services is very low. This makes it im‐ possible for them to have a large coverage of farmers within a specific time to effectively extend whatever new technology developed by Research. Also, the knowledge of these ex‐ tension agents in the various soil fertility restorations may be low compared to other subject areas. It has been realized from experience that the knowledge and lessons learnt from the past soil fertility enhancement project have not been made use of by the agents indicating

Until recently, MoFA was structured into departments such as crop and extension services departments and for soil fertility restoration technologies to be extended effectively for adoption, there is need to establish a unit to champion the activities of this subject which is

So far, areas with conservation Agriculture and its related practices have been traced to the existence of donor projects. The donors of all these projects have been in collaboration with MoFA with the activities carried out since the extension agents have been responsible for site and farmer selection. However, Boahen et al. (2007) reported that the number of farmers using these technologies reduced by an estimated 30% when the related projects ended. It was also found that the visits by extension agents to these project communities reduced from twice a week to once every two weeks since the project was no longer giving them fuel

For farmers to adopt the soil fertility regeneration and maintenance practices, its extension needs to be well co-ordinated and collaborated among major stakeholders in soil health. In that way, the numerous benefits of CA can be realized and appreciated by farmers, research‐ ers and extension staff of MoFA. So far, even though the activities of these projects have been carried out in collaboration with MoFA, data on the practice and adoption of these in‐ cluding CA are scanty. It has been observed that even where data exists, they may not be coherent or accurate. There are few success stories on some of the practices that can regener‐ ate and maintain soil fertility for crop production but these are not properly packaged for extension and for policy makers. Both donors and the implementers of CA in Ghana have therefore not been able to convince policy makers the benefits of these practices for support. This may explain why the Government still imports tractors with both disc ploughs and har‐ rows without considering the importation of equipment and tools used in CA. The adoption of CA and its related practices by farmers does not really depend on the availability of these

tion since they have to purchase insecticides to control these insects.

**10.9. Difficulties in promoting soil fertility enhancing technologies**

that they have not been trained in that line.

allowances and the associated cost of travel.

**10.10. Lack of adequate institutional support**

neither crops nor extension services.
