PIERI-20620 Productivity Impact of Integrating Soil Fertility Management Interventions (SFMIs) in Input Subsidy Programs (ISPs): Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial in Malawi

Abstract

Despite implementing the Farm Input Subsidy Program (FISP now called AIP) from 2004/2005 season to improve food security through improvement in Maize productivity, it has been documented that maize productivity among smallholder farmers is still very low. FISP has marginally increased maize yields from 1 MT/Ha to around 1.8MT/Ha much lower than the potential of 7,000MT/Ha. Among other things, low maize productivity Malawi is due to poor soil health associated with high rates of soil degradation emanating from continuous cultivation and poor cropping practices. Some studies have pointed to the potential of supplementary soil fertility management interventions (SFMI)in enhancing the impact FISP but these have not used experimental evidence which casts doubts on causality. In this trial we aim to evaluate the impact of SFMIs in FISP on maize productivity. SFMIs that will be tested includes legumes, organic fertilizer; and agricultural lime. Maize productivity will be the main outcome variable. We will implement this experiment in 14 districts of the 28 districts of the country which represents all the four agroecological zones of the country. We will use the block cluster randomised trial design to allocate the treatments. The agro-ecological zones will form the blocks and agricultural sections form the clusters. The treatments will be randomised at cluster level. To attain an 80% statistical power and 5% level of significance, the trial will involve 4 blocks, 9 agricultural sections (clusters) per block and 12 farmers per cluster which results in a sample of 432 participants per treatment arm.

Members

Project leader: Levison Chiwaula

Scientific mentors: Brian Feld

Policy outreach mentors: Stephen Wainaina

Journal publication

No journal publications.

Working Papers

	Title	Modified	Size	Comments	Recommendations
	Productivity Impact of Integrating Soil-Fertility-Management interventions in Input-Subsidy Programs: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Malawi	2024-12-07	1.73MB	0	0

Policy Briefs

	Title	Modified	Size	Comments	Recommendations
	Improving maize productivity by adressing soil health issue through Malawi's input subsidy programs.	2024-10-26	2.41MB	0	0

Final report

No final reports.

Proposal

No proposals.