Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0329/03295.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 33KB | 506 lines

$Unique_ID{COW03295}
$Pretitle{286}
$Title{Somalia
Chapter 3B.   Crop Production}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Donald P. Whitaker}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{production
fish
fishing
hectares
government
tons
plant
1970s
area
late}
$Date{1981}
$Log{Figure 9.*0329502.scf
President Mohamed Siad Barre*0329503.scf
}
Country:     Somalia
Book:        Somalia, A Country Study
Author:      Donald P. Whitaker
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1981

Chapter 3B.   Crop Production

     In the early 1980s it was estimated that fewer than 200,000 families were
engaged in sedentary cultivation. Of the approximately 700,000 hectares
devoted to crops, about four-fifths were located in the valleys of the Juba
and Shabeelle rivers, the areas immediately to the east and west of the
rivers, and the upland between them. The only other area of significant
settled farming was in the northwest, between Hargeysa and Booraama in Woqooyi
Galbeed Region. Of the total cultivated area, roughly 50,000 hectares, or 7 to
8 percent, was under controlled irrigation, including an estimated 35,000 to
38,000 hectares along the Shabeelle River and 12,000 to 14,000 hectares in the
Juba valley. Controlled irrigation in other parts of the country probably
totaled under 1,000 hectares. At the beginning of the 1980s ongoing irrigation
schemes were believed  to be adding 1,000 to 2,000 hectares a year to the
irrigated total.

     There is a substantial amount of additional irrigable land in the
Shabeelle valley, but the government has estimated that only another 50,000
hectares could be irrigated because of water flow conditions, and even this
total has been questioned by outside experts. The Shabeelle maintains a full
flow usually only about seven months a year, depending largely on the amount
of precipitation in the two rainy seasons. In the late 1970s parts of the
existing lower Shabeelle systems were reported already to experience an
occasional water shortage, although this was due in part to inefficient use of
available water. In contrast the water flow in the Juba was usually
year-round. In 1981 the government was seeking external funding for a major
multipurpose dam to be constructed near Baardheere on the middle Juba that
would have the potential to provide assured irrigation for an estimated
150,000 to 160,000 hectares. Actual development of irrigation under this
project, however, appeared unlikely at least until near the end of the 1980s,
according to government sources.

     The cultivation of irrigated market crops began in the early 1900s when
private interests established the country's first banana plantations. The
number of plantations gradually increased, and by independence over 200 were
in existence, all having controlled irrigation. Meanwhile commercial cropping
was extended to sugarcane, cotton, rice, sesame, groundnuts, and grapefruit.
Since independence the state has become a major factor in market crop
production. In the early 1960s the civilian government began the establishment
of state farms to ensure, it stated, proper utilization of new land in view of
the early stage of development of Somali peasant agriculture. The government
declared at the time that this step did not necessarily indicate the adoption
of a socialist system but that it was based essentially on pragmatic
considerations. This policy of establishing state farms was continued by the
military government in the belief also that they represented the best way to
increase agricultural output rapidly and at the same time reduce the need for
food imports.

     Most of the state farms of the 1960s involved the development of
irrigated land. During the 1970s the expansion of irrigation became even more
closely associated with the state farms and government-sponsored agricultural
cooperatives, and a significant concomitant was the state's assumption of
large areas of irrigable land from traditional cultivators under the right of
eminent domain. Through mid-1981 government policy on the extent of individual
smallholder participation in irrigated agriculture had not been clearly
defined, but continuing planned expansion of public sector and cooperative
irrigated farms in the 1980s carried the implication that further alienation
of land from traditional occupiers might be anticipated. It appeared that if
the trend were to continue, most of the best land along the Juba and Shabeelle
rivers would eventually be in the hands of the state or private plantations.

     Uncontrolled irrigation has long been used by cultivators taking
advantage of river floodwaters, and in 1981 an estimated 110,000 hectares were
farmed using traditional irrigation practices. The principal method was to
plant crops successively as the water receded from the floodplain. Ditches
were also used to divert the flowoff to adjacent fields. In some cases
channels were constructed leading from the river, but these were of value only
if the river rose sufficiently for the water to reach the fields.
Flood-irrigated cultivation was more intensive than for ordinary dryland
farming, and under favorable water supply conditions yields were reasonably
good, resulting in surpluses that produced cash income. The principal crop
grown under uncontrolled irrigation was maize, but beans, cotton, and
sugarcane were also raised.

     The most general form of cultivation is rainfed farming, practiced by
close to 700,000 cultivators in the late 1970s. Rainfed crop production
involves high risks because of the erratic nature of the rainy seasons, the
amount of rainfall, and the low technology of traditional cultivation. The
latter consists of clearing the land of bushes, shallow hoe preparation of
the soil, use of usually poor quality seeds, and later, inadequate weeding.
Seeds are sown unevenly and are widely dispersed, and this has helped to
reduce the drain on the soil and with reasonable rainfall has produced a
somewhat sparse but full crop. Land is readily available, and when yields
begin to decline, the cropped field is left in fallow up to about three
years. The principal dryland crop is sorghum, which is grown on about 55
percent of the cultivated land. Crops of lesser importance are pulses, maize,
millet, sesame, and occasionally groundnuts. One-third to one-half the land is
double-cropped-sorghum being planted by many farmers in both wet seasons. In
the main cultivated areas of the southwest farm families usually crop from
three to five hectares, about the maximum possible under the intensive labor
requirement of the traditional system. Comparatively few farmers have adopted
improved practices that include using animal power for plowing, better seeds,
crop diversification, and some pesticides. The government has undertaken to
improve agricultural services for the dryland farmer, but such services still
remained poorly developed in the early 1980s.

     Production estimates for staple crops, including sorghum, maize, beans,
and rice show that output stagnated during the 1970s except for rice, the
production of which increased substantially toward the end of the decade.
Oilseeds and cotton production also stagnated, and output of the two most
important industrial crops-sugarcane and bananas-declined, in the case of the
latter quite markedly (see table 9, Appendix). Estimates for 1980 showed
little change except for rice, which although increasing in volume, still
constituted only a small part of total grain production. Foreign observers
were of the opinion that an overall relative decline in output had occurred
because of the probably greater area devoted to crops as the sedentary
agricultural population increased in numbers during the decade through natural
growth and the addition of new settlers.

     Bananas, the principal commercial crop, are grown for the international
market on plantations situated almost entirely in an area near Shalanbood on
the lower Shabeelle River and a roughly equal area on the Juba River in
Jubbada Hoose Region. A small number of privately own