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Towards bamboo agroforestry development in Ghana: evaluation of crop performance, soil properties and economic benefit

OAR@ICRISAT

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Relation http://oar.icrisat.org/11554/
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10457-020-00493-7
doi:10.1007/s10457-020-00493-7
 
Title Towards bamboo agroforestry development in Ghana: evaluation of crop performance, soil properties and economic benefit
 
Creator Akoto, D S
Partey, S T
Denich, M
Kwaku, M
Borgemeister, C
Schmitt, C B
 
Subject Ghana
Sustainable Agriculture
Crop Yield
Soil Science
Agriculture-Farming, Production, Technology, Economics
Food Security
 
Description In the quest to promote bamboo agroforestry
in the dry semi-deciduous forest zone of
Ghana, we evaluated changes in soil properties, crop
productivity and the economic potential of a bamboobased
intercropping system. The intercropping system
was established from 3-months old sympodial
bamboo (Bambusa balcooa) seedlings planted at a
5 m95 m spacing and intercropped with maize,
cassava or cowpea. Separate monocropping fields for
maize, cassava, cowpea and bamboo were set up
adjacent to the intercropped field. In both the
intercropping and monocropping fields, plots were
with fertilizer treatments and without. The experiment
was laid out in a split plot design with four
replicates and studied over three years. Economic
analysis was conducted using the financial benefit-cost ratio method. The results showed that regardless
of fertilizer treatments, bamboo agroforestry and
monocropped fields had comparable effects on soil
properties and crop productivity within two years of
establishment. In the third year, however, bamboo
agroforestry had significantly (p\0.05) higher soil
moisture, pH and crop productivity levels. An
intercropping advantage over monocropping was
evident for all crops with respective partial land
equivalent ratios for fertilized and non-fertilized
intercropped systems as follows: cowpea (1.37 and
1.54), maize (1.38 and 1.36), and cassava (1.12 and
1.19). The economic evaluation also indicated
marginal profitability of bamboo intercropping over
monocropping systems. From the results obtained,
there are clear indications that where bamboo is a
prioritized woody perennial, integrated systems with
crops may be encouraged.
 
Publisher Springer
 
Date 2020-04
 
Type Article
PeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/11554/1/s10457-020-00493-7.pdf
Akoto, D S and Partey, S T and Denich, M and Kwaku, M and Borgemeister, C and Schmitt, C B (2020) Towards bamboo agroforestry development in Ghana: evaluation of crop performance, soil properties and economic benefit. Agroforestry Systems (TSI). ISSN 0167-4366