Tropentag 2019 - Student blog - GIZ session

Agroforestry as a means of ensuring poverty alleviation and contributing to food security

De-Registered User — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 22:44:26 +0000

Agroforestry has the potential to provide numerous benefits including; maintenance of soil fertility, reduction of soil erosion, conservation of water, carbon capture, biodiversity conservation, poverty reduction and contribution to food security - this is according to Mr. Martin Juvanov of GIZ. He was speaking during the GIZ session at Tropentag 2011 on the topic “agricultural research for development of sustainable land use based on agroforestry systems in semi arid areas in Bolivia”. He started by explaining that land degradation and impact of climate change is a major challenge in Bolivia. He also referred to more frequent and more intense natural desasters like water scacity, drought in semi-arid regions, increase of hailstorms, flush floods, lanslides in highlands, increasing food insecurity, higher temperatures, and shorter growing season for farmers as major indicators of climate change impacts in Bolivia. Technical and structural challenge Mr. Juvanov also discussed some technical and structural challenges facing people in Bolivia as; 1. Non-sustainble use of natural resources 2. Reduction of productivity 3. Increasing of poverty among people 4. Insufficient exchange/flow of information and knowledge and 5. Inssuficient intersectional cordination Set up of GIZ technical cooperation in Bolivia He gave an overview of the work and involvment of GIZ in Bolivia citing their major roles as; 1. Implementation of national sector programmes

As fragile ecosystems in resource poor context continue to Increase, how can we achieve sustainable management?

De-Registered User — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 21:03:17 +0000

The talk entitled “sustainable management of resources in agriculture in a fragile and resource poor context” was presented by Jutta Schmiz who works with GIZ on a sector project aimed at sustainable management of resources and agriculture. She started her talk by explaining that fragile ecosystems are either caused by nature or by human interference and that this usually affect ecosystems, making them unable to achieve their basic functions properly. She also noted that agriculture is not only a part of the solution but can also be part of the problem. According to her, agriculture can contribute to the solution but if done in the wrong way (using bad farming practices), it also increases the fragility of the ecosystem. The speaker noted that fragility is not only attributable to resources but that even countries can be in fragile conditions. She explained that nations or states can be said to be fragile when there are weak institutions which fail to provide basic services to the population and this is mostly in developing countries. Such fragile nations may experience problems such as; low water availability, soil infertility and unavailability of other resources needed for agriculture and healthy livelihoods. Global challenges in Agriculture According to Jutta Schmiz, agriculture faces numerous challenges which may slightly vary in different parts of the world. She mentioned some common ones as; 1. Rapidly growing population 2. Changing diets especially with more meat requirements

Tanja Pickardt of GIZ speaks on the issue of land acquisition and leases in developing countries

De-Registered User — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 07:52:55 +0000

Full involvement of local people is very necessary to ensure proper management of land for the benefit of local people, this is according to Tanja Pickardt. She was speaking during the GIZ session at Tropentag 2011 on the topic “participation of the local population in the context of large-scale land acquisitions and leases” . She indicated that large scale land accusition is a big issue in most parts of the world especially in developing countries adding that the figures of land sales went up from 50 million hectares (published by the World Bank in 2010) to 80 million hectares (published by IFP in 2011). On a broader picture, she noted that 227 million hectares of land has been sold or leased since 2001 based on media releases and case study research. According to Tanja, the focus of large scale land investment is in Sub-sahara Africa mostly for biofuel, food crop cultivation, industrial crops and livetock, as well as game farm and forestry. Opportunities for large scale land investment According to the speaker, it is generally agreed that investments in agriculture and rural development are urgently needed in developing countries but governments often do not allocate the needed resources to this sector. This means that private sector involvement is necessary but under what circumstances can private sector involvement help to realize oppportunities and to contribute to improve the living conditions of the local people? She mentioned some of the possible opportunities of land investment as;

GIZ underscores the need for using Conventions to support Sustainable Land Management in fragile systems

De-Registered User — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 16:03:33 +0000

Introduction by Dr. Stefan Schmitz: In introducing the session, he said that the talk is focussed on marginality, fragility, uncertainty, instability, food security and rural development. Crisis at the horn of Africa but also experiences from all over the world are major issues of worry and of priority to GIZ. He stated that various aspects of national key sectors come together (e.g cultural, political, environmental etc) and need attention by development agencies. Do all these dimentions of fragility interlink or are they independent? We should link evidence base, research base, scientific base etc., with political situations which is what GIZ is doing. Anneke Trux then spoke on the topic “How can UNCCD and other UN Conventions support and enable sustainable land management in fragile systems?” She started by answering the questions; What is a convention? and What does a convention regulate? She explained that a convention is a treaty among different countries, is an internatinoal legal framework, and that even though it is not a law, partners agree to the terms and aims. A convention regulates strategies, obligations, aims and objectives. She emphasized that since conventions are not laws, the commitment of parties is a major obstacle for implementation.