BUILDING ON SUCCESSES IN AFRICAN AGRICULTURE

Maize Breeding in East and Southern Africa, 1900–2000 FOR FOOD, AGRICULTURE,
AND THE ENVIRONMENT
MELINDA SMALE AND T. S. JAYNE

FOCUS 12 • BRIEF 4 OF 10 • APRIL 2004

uring the first half of the 20th century, African farmers open-pollinated varieties. Some of these, along with the leading
D transformed maize from a minor imported foodcrop into
the continent’s principal staple food. In the second half of the
hybrids released in Malawi in the early 1990s, were relatively
well suited to production by smallholders who process and
century, newly independent governments launched support consume their grain on farm and replant saved seeds.
programs that greatly expanded smallholder production, • Collateral support for smallholders. At independence,
leading to substantial production surges of 10 to 20 years in governments in the region expanded the input and marketing
duration.Today, after widespread adoption by both commercial support institutions to serve smallholders as well.The expansion
farmers and smallholders, farmers now plant 58 percent of all of state marketing infrastructure in smallholder areas allowed
maize area in East and Southern Africa to new high-yielding state agencies to disburse subsidized inputs on credit to small-
varieties, which on average outyield traditional varieties by holders and to recoup loans through farmer sales to the
40–50 percent even without fertilizer. marketing boards. In addition to these direct subsidies, an
The sustained domestic breeding programs that underpin expanded network of cooperative marketing depots reduced
this transformation represent impressive technical and political the transport costs that farmers incurred in selling maize in
commitments. In 1960 Zimbabwe (then Southern Rhodesia) remote areas. Pan-territorial pricing brought smallholders in
released its famous SR-52, the first commercially grown single- remote areas into production for the state and shifted produc-
cross maize hybrid in the world. tion patterns toward maize self-sufficiency at the expense of
Though these maize-breeding efforts were an undeniable other crops.At the same time most governments subsidized the
technical success, broader efforts to support national produc- retail price of industrial maize meal to consumers, thereby
tion growth proved fiscally unsustainable, and once heavy raising the demand for domestic production under a policy of
subsidies were withdrawn, production fell (see table).This maize self-sufficiency.These systems were not effective, however,
qualified success story reveals important lessons about both in recouping credit. By 1990, for instance, 80 percent of
the strengths and pitfalls of past agricultural development Zimbabwe’s smallholder farmers receiving maize inputs on loan
efforts in Africa. were in arrears. Inability to recoup loan losses contributed to
the financial drain on the state marketing systems that later
DRIVERS OF CHANGE exposed them to pressure for reform.

• Commercial farmer lobby. During the 1920s and 1930s

WHY DID THE PRODUCTION SURGES STALL?
settler commercial farmers in Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Zambia
successfully lobbied colonial legislatures for government assis- • Unsustainable financial subsidies withdrawn. State
tance and protection from both world markets and small- subsidies on inputs, producer prices, and consumer prices,
holder competitors. Catalyzed by slumping world agricultural combined with limited recovery of input loans, exacerbated
markets during the worldwide depression of the 1930s, the fiscal crises in Kenya, Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Because
colonial governments created parastatal crop-buying stations in governments could not afford to sustain these operations
European farming areas, offering prices that were typically far indefinitely, they were forced to scale down their public
above export parity prices.These crop-buying stations and support and subsidy levels during the 1990s. As input costs
associated price supports were not scaled up to serve small- rose and state buying stations were withdrawn, farmer incen-
holder farmers until the post-independence years. In addition, tives collapsed and production fell, particularly in the more
at the urging of the commercial maize farmers, governments remote areas.
established publicly funded maize research programs in 1932 in • National research systems atrophy. Public funding for
Zimbabwe and in 1955 in Kenya. maize research fell in the 1980s and 1990s.The scientific and
• Breeding breakthroughs by national research institutional cooperation that created the maize success story of
programs. Investments by colonial governments in maize earlier decades collapsed as governments prioritized other
research radically transformed opportunities for maize farmers expenditures.The number of new variety releases stalled, as
in Kenya and Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe’s maize breeding program, funding dried up and key personnel vacated the research
initiated in 1932, was the first outside of the United States to systems.
produce double-cross hybrids for commercial use, releasing • Drought, poverty, and erratic crisis management
Southern Rhodesia-1 (SR-l) in 1949. During the 1960s both the policies. Spotty rainfall in the 1990s contributed to erratic,
Kenyan and Zimbabwean breeding programs launched a stream crisis-motivated food and agricultural management policies,
of highly productive conventional and nonconventional hybrids including greater reliance on food aid and a patchwork of often
that fueled steady yield and output gains. From the mid-1970s poorly coordinated operations by nongovernmental organiza-
the Zambian program released an array of hybrids and improved tions (NGOs) and donors.
IMPACT production and marketing investments.The current environ-
• Production. Today, farmers in East and Southern Africa plant ment, however, is characterized by great policy instability. On the
58 percent of maize area in improved varieties. A large part of one hand there is ostensible commitment to a more market-
the 40 percent yield gain currently experienced over local oriented input and commodity pricing and distribution system. In
varieties can be attributed to improved hybrid cultivars, Kenya, Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, however, the state retains
although extension messages, improved management practices, a major presence in maize marketing and stockholding.
and the input and marketing subsidies fueling intensification of Government programs distributing subsidized inputs in Malawi,
fertilizer use are also responsible for the yield gains. Zambia, and Zimbabwe continue to cause uncertainty in input
• Equity. During the post-independence period of rapid markets and limit the incentives for private actors to invest
smallholder production growth, nearly all small farmers in more aggressively.As a result, rural input and credit markets
Zimbabwe used improved varieties, while 87 percent did so in remain highly fragmented. In the future, governments and their
Kenya, 65 percent in Zambia, and 43 percent in Malawi. partners must ensure policy stability and find financially sustain-
• Sustainability. The highly subsidized input supply and able models for delivering inputs and credit to smallholders.
marketing systems proved financially unsustainable, accounting • Political pressure and responsiveness. Can a local
for as much as 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in constituency be formed to successfully stake a claim on public
Kenya and Zambia. Following withdrawal of these subsidies, the resources over the long run to support agricultural research,
artificially inflated production booms of the prior period led to marketing institutions, and other kinds of growth-promoting
output contractions of 10–20 percent in the cases of Kenya, public goods? The experiences with maize in the four case study
Zambia, and Zimbabwe (see table). Ecologically, poor soil fertility countries underscore the strong connection between agricul-
management under continuous fertilized maize production has tural development and governance.The early success of the
led to soil acidification, fertility loss, and plow and hoe pan maize industry in Kenya and Zimbabwe can be attributed largely
buildup in some locations. to the strength of the institutions built by settler farmers, which
provided a constituency to encourage sustained public and
KEY LESSONS FOR BUILDING FUTURE SUCCESSES private support for the sector.Today farm lobbies are uniformly
weaker and smallholder farmers continue to be poorly repre-
• Sustained investments in agricultural research. Seed sented in the political process. A crucial issue is how the key
genetic change is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for growth- and equity-promoting investments in agricultural
improving the welfare of African smallholders. Maize successes research, infrastructure, and market institutions can be financed.
in the future will continue to depend not only on strategic Perhaps most important, from where will the domestic political
breeding improvements to relieve specific environmental and pressure for these public investments come? ■
disease problems and enhance the stability of net returns to
farmers, but also on enabling these advances to release land
for alternative uses and diversify the income sources for Maize production growth
farmers, regions, and nations. Continued development of (compound annual growth rates)
improved seeds and seed markets and a realistic understanding
of farmers’ needs remain critical. Patience and the commitment BOOM PERIOD PERIOD OF UNCERTAINTY
to steady funding are crucial. Lead times for plant breeding
COUNTRY Years Growth (%) Years Growth (%)
average roughly a decade, while new livestock technologies
may demand 15 to 20 years. Long-term commitment to agri- Kenya 1965–80 3.3 1990–2000 -1.5
cultural research remains essential. Malawi 1983–93 3.1 1994–2000 4.4
• Financially viable input and credit delivery systems for Zambia 1970–89 1.9 1990–2000 -2.4
smallholders. In the past decade necessary investments in Zimbabwe 1980–89 1.8 1990–2000 -0.2
germplasm research have declined and investments in institu-
tions that can translate germplasm advances into improved
income, including seed and grain markets, have faltered.The For further reading see M. Smale and T. S. Jayne,“Maize in
public investments in state-controlled, coordinated input and Eastern and Southern Africa: Seeds of Success in Retrospect,”
output markets were not fiscally sustainable. In many instances, Environment and Production Technology Division Discussion
the cost of generating additional maize in remote areas Paper No. 97 (Washington, DC: International Food Policy
exceeded the value of the output.The policy focus on maize also Research Institute, 2002); C. Eicher,“Zimbabwe’s Maize-Based
directed public resources to maize production in areas where Green Revolution: Preconditions for Replication,” World
farmers may have been better off with a different set of crop Development 23, no. 5 (1995): 805–818.

Melinda Smale ([email protected]) is a senior economist for the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) and a research fellow in the
Environment and Production Technology Division of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).T. S. Jayne ([email protected]) is a professor of agri-
cultural economics at Michigan State University.

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