Farming systems research for crop diversification in Cambodia and Australia

• Cambodia Agricultural Research and Development Institute, Cambodia

Rice is the staple crop in Cambodia, with little else grown. More than 90 per cent of agricultural cropping land is sown to rice. Crop diversification is minimal, even in upland agro-ecological systems that do not suit rice. Government policy is designed to encourage diversification with CARDI taking a lead in placing emphasis on diversified cropping. There are, however, still substantial barriers to diversification. The main is a lack of familiarity with upland crops. This includes extension workers and researchers as well as farmers, whose knowledge of non-rice crops is limited, creating a perception of higher risk for planting non-rice crops. A wet monsoonal season does not guarantee predictable rainfall, this unpredictability adding to the perception of risk. As a result market infrastructure for non-rice crops is lacking.

Crop diversification is also an issue at the centre of a policy push from NSW Agriculture, who want to hasten change from cereal crops production, in parts of the state. The adoption of more sustainable tillage practices is a central theme of this push.

The overall objective is to help reduce poverty and contribute to food security at household and national levels through the development of techniques and opportunities for the production of non-rice upland crops in Cambodia. In Australia the focus is on overcoming the constraints to crop diversification and adoption of sustainable practice in broad acre cropping enterprises in the sub-tropical slopes and plains agro-ecological region of northern Australia.

In Cambodia the project will focus on provinces with the potential for expansion of upland rice crops. The research process will involve discussion with farmers, validation of local knowledge, documentation of case studies and agronomic field experiments (Cambodia). Problems and research questions will be identified in partnership with farmer and community groups in Cambodia with support from the Department of Agricultural Extension through links with the AusAID funded Cambodia Australia Agricultural Extension Project. Farmers attitudes to the focus crops (soybean, mungbean, peanut, cowpea, maize and sesame) will be surveyed and benchmarked at commencement of the project. It is planned to monitor fields of a range of crops each year. Experiments in Cambodia are likely to include: variety evaluation with respect to matching phenology to sowing opportunities; nutrition and legume nitrogen fixation; weed management and possibly tillage to minimise soil water loss during seedbed preparation. A comparative analysis report/workshop in conjunction with extension collaborators will also be carried out in both countries in each of the four years. In the final year of the project it is planned to convene a major workshop in Phnom Penh on non-rice upland farming systems for Cambodia.

In Australia, impediments to diversification and constraints to farm decision making will be identified. Whole farm models will be utilised and farm case studies will be prepared for situations where crop diversification has been successful in each region. The focus crops in Australia will be chickpea, faba bean and canola. Tools will be developed for climate risk analysis of alternative crop sequences. No field experimentation will be conducted in Australia, but related field experimentation will be undertaken in companion projects, or in ongoing work by NSW Agriculture. In both countries the project will be fully integrated within existing extension programs.