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Improving Productivity of an Upland Rice and Maize System: Farmer Cropping Choices or Researcher Cropping Pattern Trapezoids?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 October 2008

Sam Fujisaka
Affiliation:
Agricultural Anthropologist, Social Sciences Division, International Rice Research Institute, PO Box 933, Manila, Philippines

Summary

Cropping systems research to improve the productivity of an acid upland rice and maize-based farming system is described and evaluations by co-operating farmers are presented. Farmers rejected introduced patterns. The cropping choices of non-cooperating farmers are described in terms of cost–benefits and the reasons underlying their decisions. An approach that combines an understanding of farmers' systems in order to conduct focused research on the weak points of such systems, together with an evaluation of farmer technology and adaptation, may be more effective than researcher-designed, farmer-implemented cropping pattern trials.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1991

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References

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