Landcare approach: enhancing partnership for sustainable upland development

Sustainable upland development is one of the focal issues in the Philippines where more than 18 million people live. This paper relates our experiences in participatory approach to develop technology and institutions for conservation farming and agroforestry practices conducted by the International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) in collaboration with the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) and A gencia Espanola Cooperacion Internacionale (AECI) in Claveria northern Mindanao Philippines. Contour hedgerow farming with leguminous trees had beenviewed as an important agroforestry technology to insure food security alleviate poverty and protect the environment. For several years we focused our efforts in assessing the management strategies to address key technical constraints of this system. We observed that adoption by farmers was low. We therefore refocused our efforts towards finding alternative systems that would address the technical and institutional issues of conservation farming. Landcare is a movement of farmer-led organisations supported by local government. Landcare believes that the key to effective natural resources management is partnership where local people local government and concerned agencies work together to address common issues and concerns. The organisations share knowledge about sustainable and profitable agriculture on sloping lands while conserving natural resources. Today the Landcare movement has grown to over 600 groups in Mindanao and in the Visayan islands. There are now over 8000 farmers involved in this movement. Our studies indicate that Landcare is an affordable undertaking at the local level. Local government units could begin with meager investment for training and facilitating group activities.

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