Effect of agricultural intensification practices on livelihood outcomes among smallholder farmers in Makueni and Nyando Sub-Counties, Kenya

Abstract

Developing countries, Kenya included are mostly affected by food problems and poverty as a result of high dependence on agriculture. Agriculture in Kenya is dominated by smallholder farmers, whose production is hampered by climate variability, declining land sizes and low agricultural technologies. Agricultural intensification is aimed at solving the problem of low agricultural productivity and poverty through increasing farm output per unit land area. However it is still not clear the effects of agricultural intensification on smallholder livelihood outcomes. This study therefore analyzed the effect of socioeconomic and institutional characteristics on the level of agricultural intensification, as well as the role of agricultural intensification on smallholders’ livelihood outcomes (proxied by progress out of poverty and food security status). The study is based on data collected from a sample of 320 smallholder households from two Sub-counties of Kenya, Makueni and Nyando. Principle Component Analysis (PCA) was first used to group agricultural intensification practices into clusters. The result reveal that all farmers in both sub-counties use agricultural intensification practices and 56% of farmers used 5 level of agricultural intensification practices while 31%, 8%, 3% and 1% of farmers’ used 4, 3, 2 and 1 levels of agricultural intensification practices respectively. Poisson regression and Multivariate Tobit Model were used in the subsequent analysis. The Poisson regression results showed that the level of agricultural intensification is significantly influenced by the gender of the household head 28%, land tenure 41%, land slope, 8% off-farm employment 26%, distance to the market, group diversity 6%, and proportion of land cultivated. The Multivariate Tobit results indicated that age of the household head, household size, proportion of land cultivated, number of trainings, group diversity, location and level of agricultural intensification significantly influenced households’ food security status during the good and bad months as well as their poverty status. The study recommended on the need for smallholder farmers to form and join many groups which promote social networks thus reduce information asymmetry and improves their bargaining and borrowing power. It also suggested on the need for policy geared towards training and extension which is generation specific that can easily be incorporated by both the old and the young farmers. Through these, there will be increase in the level of agricultural intensification used by smallholder f