Project Detail

Preventing land degradation caused by cultivation of cassava in Xuat Hoa Commune, Lac Son District, Hoa Binh Province

In Vietnam, cassava is one of the most crucial agricultural plants and is vital for food security of the upland people. For many decades, manioc has been sold easily in the markets for household use. Nowadays, it is raw material source in starch processing plants for domestic demand and export.
Cassava is a traditional plant of ethnic people in Hoa Binh province. Nowadays, manioc is used not only for feeding but also taking an important position in growing of commodity economy. Harvest productivity is up to 15-20 tons/ha with new seed KM-94. Hoa Binh has some advantages to develop cassava plant such as: land budget, traditional experience, human resources and consumer market. There are 16 community hamlets of Muong ethnic group in Xuat Hoa commune, Lac Son district where cassava is connected with livelihood and income. However, there are some disadvantages that Hoa Binh (in general) and Xuat Hoa, Lac Son (in specific) have to deal with:
- Cassava plant has low degree of coverage so the nutritional wash out and land erosion require more and more efforts in soil preparation.
- Decline in soil fertility because of intensive cultivation of cassava.
- The progressive science and technology has not been applied synchronously (planting ? harvesting roots and preserving).
- Lack of good cassava seed.
Farmers, managers, technicians, factory directors and bankers are interested extremely in how to produce cassava sustainably.
Goals of the project
Common goal: to contribute to sustainable use of land resources and cultivation of cassava, to promote cassava commodity production, to eliminate hunger and reduce poverty and to improve the life quality of ethnic people in highlands in Hoa Binh province.
Specific goals:
- Building two sustainable presentation models of cassava in Xuat Hoa commune, Lac Son district, Hoa Binh province.
- Promoting sustainable cassava production by summing up and disseminating the lessons learnt of project?s models. Building up the community?s capacity in market approach. Setting up the relationship between the organizations related to producing and consuming cassava.
Main activities of the project:
- Building sustainable models for producing cassava by combining agri-silvicultural method (cassava ? keo) in silvicultural land with scale 20ha and productivity of fresh manioc 25 tons/ha (increase 20% in comparison with it before the project).
- Building a restoring fertility model of soil specializing in cassava cultivation by intensive farming and interpose cultivation that are successful with 20ha scale and 30tons/ha fresh cassava productivity (increasing 20% in comparison with before the project implementing) and average profits from cassava reaching to 7millions VND/ha/year (raising 35% in comparison with before the project implementing)
- Holding up dialogs among partners (businessmen, bankers, national and local authorities and farmers) to establish partner relationship to back up farmers in producing and consuming cassava.
- Building and supporting technology for groups of sustainable cassava cultivation.
- Holding workshops to evaluate results and share experience.
- Printing and diffusing the technical documents.

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Project Snapshot

Grantee:

Union of Science and Technology Associations of Hoa Binh Province

Country:

Viet nam

Area Of Work:

Land Degradation

Operational Phase:

OP4 - Y1 (Jul 07-Jun08)

Grant Amount:

US$ 50,000.00

Co-Financing Cash:

US$ 10,000.00

Co-Financing in-Kind:

US$ 29,329.34

Project Number:

VN/SGP/OP4/CORE/08/001

Start Date:

6/2008

End Date:

6/2011

Status:

Satisfactorily Completed

Project Characteristics and Results

Capacity - Building Component

- 1 training on techniques of cassava cultivation intercropped with soybeans for 16 households - 2 technical trainings on cassava cultivation intercropped with Acacia tree - 2 trainings for peer teachers in Lac Son and Tan Lac districts. They were the staff of centre for agricultural development in two districts.

Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples

Huong Nhuong district had 8 villages of the Muong people. They remained the traditional custom and practices but faced with many difficulties in livelihood and land degradation.

Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods

The natural area of Huong Nhuong district (Lac Son commune, Hoa Binh province) was 1188,43ha, in which 384,07 ha of agricultural land, 504,72 ha of forestry land, 250,2 ha of perennial land, 14,56ha of aquacultural land, 32,3 ha of pond The district had 743 households with 3495 people, in which the Muong people accounted 96% and the king accounted 4%. The number of people in the labour age was 1514 people. Huong Nhuong was the poor district with the poor rate of 23% (in 2010) People lived on cultivation in the mountainous area for long time with the main products like cassava, corn, rice and bean. In Huong Nhuong district, cassava was the main traditional tree for the Muong people. Cassava was the income source to increase life standard, and livelihood for the farmer. In 2008, Huong Nhuong district would cultivate cassava in 140 ha area with productivity of 18 tons/ha. KM 94 cassava variety accounted 98% of the area for cassava. Due to cassava cultivation for many years, the soil was not improved so the fertility of soil for cassava cultivation decreased quickly The project choose Huong Nhuong district because following reasons: + Huong Nhuong district had 8 villages of the Muong people. They remained the traditional custom and practices but faced with many difficulties in livelihood and land degradation. + Huong Nhuong district considered cassava as connection with livelihood and now the income resource. Cassava can be sold well in the market with the price of 900 ? 2.000 ®/kg. + It was shown that the people here developed a variety of cassava production methods such as cassava production in the fruit garden like longan, litchi; intensive cassava cultivation in the dry plain, foot-hill, terraces; cassava cultivation in the forestry land (150 slope) mixed with Acacia mangium; cassava mixed corn in the sloping land

Notable Community Participation

The project focused on community involvement. In the process of surveying and designing, project had a consulting meeting on the most pressing issues and solutions to solve the problems in cassava cultivation of the people. In implementing process, the project facilitated community participation in all training activities, training, technical assistance and financial resources to build the demonstration model. Traditional knowledge and experience of community was objected to be focus during building models. Community ownership and acquisition of project achievements was done. The project focused on the involvement of the local government where the project was implemented to ensure the success and promote the sustainability of the project

Project Results

Project Results
I. Results of implementing agro-forestry models
A, Acacia planting Results
Acacia planted in the model after 1 month, and then inventory of survival rate was carried out. The survival rate of Acacia Mangium planted in the model was 99.8%. The growth of Acacia in the model was 68.0% higher in diameter and 66.7% higher in height than normal growing acacia in community.
Acacia would be harvested in next 5-6 years, when it could be underestimated the actual value of the current model but the growing of acacia now was from 64-68% faster in diameter and height compared to Acacia control plant in households participating in the project.

B, Results of cassava planting
* In 2009, the growth of cassava in the model as follows: 24 (70.6%) good, 07 (20.6%) medium and 03 (8.8%) poor. Actual yield of cassava in the agro-forestry model is 26.8 tons / ha, the yield of cassava in the control area of 18.1 tons / ha
In agro-forestry model, cassava area per hectares was 6800m2, cassava actual production was 18.2 tons / ha
* In 2010, there were 8 households planting cassava intercropped with few 2 year -old acacia trees. Actual yield of cassava in the model was 5.2 tons / ha, the yield of cassava in the control area of 6.8 tons / ha. The reason was that the 2 year old acacia trees in the model grew better in terms of diameter, height and canopy diameter and covered the light for cassava, resulting in lower-cassava yield in the model.
In 2012, there were 20 households planting cassava intercropped with acacia with the area of 10 ha, 16 households planting cassava intercropped with soybean with eight hectares

* Income from cassava harvest
Agro-forestry model was 14.918 million VND / ha, income from cassava in the model was 2.1 times higher compared to the project design. But the income increase was due to the fact that cassava price in 2009 was higher than the price in project design.
C, Cassava intercropped soybean results
In 2009, 0.1 ha of soybean type DT 22 was planted and the yield was 400 kg / ha. The reason for low yield compared with DT 22 soybean varieties grown in soil fertility restoring model was due to land slope> 80 and dryland lead to low productivity
II. Results of model to restore soil fertility for cassava planting
A, cassava crop results
* In 2009, 35 households (15.8 ha) participated in the recovery model of fertile soil. Real cassava yield was 42.7 tons / ha while the yield of cassava in the control area was 19.7 tons / ha.

* In 2010, 41 households (20.0 ha) participated in the model to restore fertility for cassava. Actual yield in the soil fertility recovery model was 38.5 tons / ha while the yield in the control area was 20.7 tons / ha.
Soil fertility restoring model: obtained 75,455,500 d / ha, compared with the control area reached 37.26 million dong, so the amount in the model was VND 38,195,500 higher (49.3%)
Cassava yield in the model within 2 years (2009-2010) reached average of 40.6 tons / ha, 35.5% higher than the designed yield (yield of cassava in the project design was 30 tons / ha) and 101.4% higher compared to control area.
*Monitoring and assess results of the productivity of cassava in an area intercropped with soybean and area without soybean.
Cassava yield in the area intercropped with soybean was from 8.5 to 9.9% higher than the control area, about 9.2% at average.

B, Results of the cassava intercropping with soybean model
* In spring crop of 2009, the project test in 4 soybean varieties (DT 12, DT 22, DT84 and DT 26) in an area of 1.2 ha. The average yield of soybean DT26, DT84 was 40 - 50% compared to the yield of two soybean DT12 and DT22

* Spring 2010 spring crop, the project planted 2 soybean varieties of DT2, DT22 on 4.1 ha area. DT12 soybean average yield was 10% higher than DT22 . Soybean yield in household with good growth was 2.25 times higher than in households with poor soybean growth.
In 2010, households involved in the model planted both DT12 and DT22 soybean varieties so the expert group considered an average yield of two soybean varieties as the overall yield of soybean grown in the model: 1100 kg / ha.
The average yield in 2012 was 1,200 kg / ha. Soybean yield reached 816 kg/ha when intercropped with cassava. Economic efficiency of the intercropping model after deducted cost was 11.32 million VND / ha.

C, Results planting trees to prevent erosion
Total length of trees in the design is 6.200m in 29 participating households. Length of trees made: 5239 m (84.5%). Living tree length: 4112.6m (66.3% compared with the design). The average length of trees for 1 ha in 8-100 slope was 500 m, the first year can be harvested 6 times / year. Each harvest had an average amount of 2 kg/m (4kg/m2). Total organic fertilizer obtained from the first year: 6,000 kg
III. Environmental restoration results when cassava cultivation
Results of restoring soil fertility of cassava:
Planting trees on slopes for cassava cultivation after one year helped reduce soil erosion runoff from 25-50%, equivalent to about 14 tons dry soil/ha/6 months (May to October).
Environmental restoration results in cassava cultivation were most evident: project restored 4.3 hectares of cassava land which had been in desertification at Chum village.

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