Legume Production and Fertilizer Use in Eastern Africa
Fertilizer consumption in eastern Africa continues to be low despite recognition that fertilizer use can greatly improve food production. Most of the fertilizer is used on cash crops such as tea, coffee and sugarcane. Legume production per hectare basis is low in most east African countries. According to the FAO ( 2003 ) statistics, the yields from dry peas, groundnuts, cowpeas, chickpeas, dry beans and pigeon peas hardly exceed 1 t ha −1 (Fig. 7.1 ). Yields for soybeans range between 0.9 and 1.5 t ha −1 while that of green beans is about 3 t ha −1 . The yield of green peas varies from 3.1 to 5.6 t ha −1 but has tended to be highly variable over the years. In terms of total legume production, the yields of dry beans were between 1 million metric tones and 1.7 million metric tones per year while that of groundnuts was between 0.5 and 0.8 m Mt year (Fig. 7.2 ). Although showing a general increase in total yields over the years, the yield may be as a result of the increase in land under cultivation (Fig. 7.3 ) not necessarily an increase in legume production per unit area as discussed above. For example, the area under dry beans production increased from the lowest observed in 1994 of 1.6 to 2.4 m ha observed in 2002 while the area under groundnuts increased from 0.9 m ha in 1993 to 1.3 m ha recorded in 2002. As for the other legumes there