Caractérisation Socio-Économique des Systèmes de Culture à Base d’igname dans Trois Zones Agro-Écologiques pour une Gestion Durable des Terres au Bénin

Abstract

In Benin, yam is an important food crop. Nowadays, intensification of this food crop face several constraints as lack of virgin land and fertile soil. The present study aims to characterize yam cropping systems in the centre, north-eastern and north-western of Benin that deal with deforestation and the soil degradation due to extensive yam production. Socio-economic characteristics of the yam producers, and the types of cropping system were assessed from 351 yam producers (114 in the centre, 121 in the North-East European Scientific Journal April 2019 edition Vol.15, No.12 ISSN: 1857 – 7881 (Print) e - ISSN 1857- 7431 214 and 116 in the North-West) using an open end questionnaire. The respondents were identified with the assistance of the local extension service. The results show that the areas allocated to yam production are 1.20 ± 0.08 ha, 0.91 ± 0.06 ha and 0.80 ± 0.05 ha per producer in the Centre, North-East and North West respectively. Extensive yam production and slash-and-burn clearing generally remain the common practice for yam production in the Centre with high pressure on the lowland areas (76.9% of the respondent). In the NorthEast these cropping systems are less practiced in favor of crop rotation (76.9% of those surveyed). The average yam yields were 9.90 ± 0.25 T ha -1 in the Centre, 9.74 ± 0.36 T ha -1 in the North-East, and 9.64 ± 0.30 T ha -1 in the North-West. The analysis of variance showed non-significant difference (p> 0.05) in yam yields regarding the socio-cultural groups. Rational mineral and organic manure supply, cattle parking system in field and crop rotation with leguminous crops were explored for intensive yam production strategy which will contribute to reduce pressure on natural resources and soil fertility maintenance in the study area