Integrated crop management for smallholder farmers in Africa with special reference to coffee in Malawi

Integrated crop management (ICM) goes beyond integrated pest management (IP M) in taking a more holistic approach that incorporates crop protection act ivities as an aspect of crop husbandry and as part of the overall farm mana gement plan. This encourages farmers to consider the pest management benefi ts of sound crop husbandry and soil nutrient management, so that the use of commercial pesticides is a last resort, but when their use is necessary it is fully integrated with cultural practices. Viewed in this way, ICM has m uch to offer agriculture in Africa, which is still largely based on smallho ldings. However, the ICM concept as it is applied in developed countries wi ll require careful adaptation to the needs of smallholder agriculture in th e developing world. The most significant difference between the two levels of agrarian development is that in Western Europe and to some extent North America, food production is in surplus, whereas in Africa the need is still to maximise food production per hectare. Environmental concerns cannot the refore be a central component of an ICM system that will be acceptable to a n African smallholder. The first requirement if ICM is to be adopted in Afr ica is that it should deliver yield increases and also that the crop produc tion increases are sustainable. Practices that pollute the environment or d eplete the resource base are not ICM-compatible. Smallholder coffee in Mala wi is taken as a case study to illustrate the contribution that an ICM appr oach could make to sustainable increases in crop production. (C) 2000 Socie ty of Chemical Industry.