Background 

Land degradation and water challenges threaten sub-Saharan Africa's agricultural productivity and food security.

Research objective 

This study evaluates land degradation trends, the adoption of sustainable land and water management (SLWM) practices, and their impacts on crop yields among smallholder farmers in four sub-Saharan African countries: Tanzania,Malawi, Uganda, and Ethiopia.

Methods 

This study uses from the Living Standards Measurement Study–Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA)-World Bank data and a high dimensional fixed effects model to control for time-invariant unobserved and time-varying observed household and plot-level confounders.

Results (or expected results) 

The results indicate that while many households experienced land degradation and water problems, SLWM adoption has decreased over the past ten years. The study finds that household socioeconomic characteristics, extension services and social networks, plot-level farm characteristics (i.e., soil types, soil fertility, slope, plot tenure, and farm size), land degradation, and climate-related variables, influence smallholder farmers’ adoption of SLWM practices. Further, the adoption of SLWM practices leads to significant increases in crop yields for most practices and countries, particularly when compared to other degraded plots planted with the major crop in each country.

Conclusion

These findings highlight the need for targeted interventions to improve access to extension services and secure land tenure systems to enhance the adoption of SLWM practices. Further research is needed to identify effective strategies for promoting the adoption of SLWM practices and understand the challenges to their implementation. These results have important implications for policymakers and development practitioners seeking to improve the region's agricultural productivity and food security.