Herbicide use in Africa could quadruple yields

Date:05-18-2011

Only 3% to 5% of African farmers use herbicides regularly, according to a report by the CropLife Research Institute, a division of the CropLife Foundation. Subsequently, African farmers produce some of the poorest yields in the world.

The regular use of herbicides could bolster yields of rice fourfold for rice, and maize yield could rise up to 800%, according to Bill Kuckuck, CEO of the CropLife Foundation.

"Improving weed control is critical to improving crop yields and the lives of women in Africa,” Kuckuck said during a presentation at the FCI Trade Summit in Nairobi.

Women do the majority of hand weeding at small shareholder farms in Africa at a cost of about 60 hours per hectare. About 50% to 70% of the labor needed to maintain a small shareholder farm is spent weeding, wasting valuable labor resources that could be spent applying fertilizers or other agronomic practices that could optimize yields.Additionally, farmers often skip necessary fertility treatments as well to avoid feeding weeds, thereby perpetuating low yields.

Ultimately, the judicious use of herbicides on small shareholder farms could product an additional 30 million tonnes of crops per year and alleviate the workload of 135 million women in Africa.