TITLE:
Integrated Soil Fertility Management: Impact of Mucuna and Tithonia Biomass on Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum L.) Performance in Smallholder Farming Systems
AUTHORS:
Christopher Ngosong, Priscilla M. Mfombep, Akeme C. Njume, Aaron S. Tening
KEYWORDS:
Integrated Soil Fertility Management, Mucuna, Tithonia, Mineral Fertilizer, Tomato
JOURNAL NAME:
Agricultural Sciences,
Vol.6 No.10,
October
22,
2015
ABSTRACT: Many views, paradigms and concepts have been advocated in recent decades on soil fertility and soil conservation across the globe in order to provide sustainable solutions to the rising food and nutrition insecurity while preserving the natural resource base. Meanwhile, food and nutrition security in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is mainly achieved through smallholder farming systems that are characterized by poor and declining soil fertility, which often leads to low crop yields and low income. Hence, a field trial was established to evaluate the impact of integrated soil fertility management (ISFM) practices on tomato yield and the farm-scale income in smallholder farming systems. The ISFM trial comprised a control with no input, mineral fertilizer, and organic treatments comprising sole Mucuna and Tithonia biomasses as well as their combination (Mucuna + Tithonia). Generally, tomato performance was better with organic plant biomass amendments, with significantly higher (P Mucuna + Tithonia and sole Tithonia, followed by sole Mucuna and mineral fertilizer compared to the control. Meanwhile in comparison to the control, Mucuna + Tithonia and sole Tithonia recorded 3.5 and 3.4 t ha-1 more yield, respectively, which was about twice the additional yield for sole Mucuna and mineral fertilizer with 1.8 and 1.5 t ha-1, respectively (Tukey’s HSD, P Mucuna + Tithonia and sole Tithonia, followed by sole Mucuna and mineral fertilizer, as compared to the control (Tukey’s HSD, P P P Mucuna + Tithonia biomass materials or their sole applications as basal mulch to improve tomato production. Thus, these organic amendments could be an alternative and sustainable integrated soil fertility management strategy to boost tomato production and farm-scale income without jeopardizing the sustainability of the environment. However, this requires more efforts to adapt the different ISFM techniques to the specific needs of smallholder farmers, coupled with effective dissemination strategies that facilitate knowledge transfer and technology adoption.