July 1995
"Just look at this! It's fantastic!" Dr Scott Christiansen is standing on a rocky hillside in northern Syria which only two years ago was almost totally degraded.
But now, Drs Christiansen and Ahmed Osman, pasture specialists with the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), are excited by what they are seeing.
Overgrazing, poor management by farmers and land tenure systems that give them little encouragement to improve their land, have caused the degradation of between 10 and 15 million hectares of hillsides in West Asia (the Middle East) and North Africa. Pasture land for the sheep has been lost, and milk and meat production have suffered, with fewer lambs being weaned.
In the Syrian village of Batajek, near the town of El Bab, Abou Ziad and his two brothers graze their flock of 250 sheep on a hill of some 80 hectares. Lower down in the village they grow barley as feed for the sheep.
Three years ago the three brothers agreed to a plan to revegetate 30 hectares of their hill. And it is the results of this that are causing Dr Christiansen some excitement.
"We worked with them to revegetate this section of their hill with pasture plants that are found in the area, chiefly medics, annual plants from the same family as alfalfa, and clovers," says Dr Christiansen. "We provided them with the seed and pods of these plants to scatter on the hillside. And we asked them not to graze their sheep here until the seed had germinated, matured and set more seed," adds Dr Osman.
As the hillside was suffering from a phosphorous deficiency, part of it was also fertilized with small amounts of phosphate fertilizer.
Today the results are clear. The hillside has sprung back into life. Land that was almost useless for grazing has been brought back into production.
"I've never seen the hill looking so good," says Abderrahman, Abou Ziad's older brother, aged 60, pointing to the seeded part. Medics and clovers are growing in abundance everywhere there are plants, which means that the land is more suitable for grazing sheep.
"The seeds that form on the plants fall to the ground and eventually into a crack or under a stone, and become part of a soil seedbank, which will continue revegetating the area," says Scott Christiansen.
Other farmers in the neighborhood are seeing for themselves the success that Abou Ziad and his brothers are having, and are becoming interested in doing the same. One farmer, Abou Hassan, is so convinced about the value of medics he is planning to start a small nursery to grow the seeds for oversowing on his own land. ICARDA wants him to grow more than he needs himself, so that extra seed will be available for sale to, or barter with, other interested farmers. Up until now ICARDA has provided the seeds.
"All the farmers in the area know what these medic and clover plants are," say the ICARDA scientists, "they recognize and value them for their nutritive qualities, and the contribution they can make to milk production and lamb growth rates. What we need now are mechanisms to increase the supply of seeds, and spread them to other areas with the participation of the farmers."
Christiansen and Osman believe that this seeding of degraded areas has an important part to play in stopping the process of land degradation in the West Asia and North Africa region. And it can be done, they emphasize, by using local seeds.
"All the technology we are using is right here it is locally available plant genetic resources," says Osman, "all the farmers have to do is not graze their sheep on the plants during the months of April and May when the flowering occurs, and when the plants are setting new seed. After that, the sheep can graze the plants. This management allows a stock of seeds to build up in the soil to produce plants for the future, but it also presumes that the sheep can be fed elsewhere while the rehabilitation is being implemented."
Meanwhile the other part of Abou Ziad's 80-hectare hill stands in stark contrast barren land with virtually no vegetation at this time of the year, and almost useless for grazing. This he plans to put right as soon as he can lay his hands on enough seed.
On a test hillside plot at ICARDA's farm in Aleppo, northern Syria, Mr Fahim Ghassali, a research assistant at the center, has noticed a spin-off from seeding degraded land. When sheep consume some of the small-seeded clover plants, they eventually, through their feces, deposit up to 70% of those seeds elsewhere. "In this way the sheep are acting as highly efficient seed distributors," says Ghassali, "playing a key role in helping to spread the seed and regenerate the land."
In Jordan and Lebanon, hillsides are also being sown with clover and medic seeds. Drs Osman and Christiansen, with colleagues in the Pasture, Forage and Livestock Program, and Program Leader Dr Gus Gintzburger, are hoping that many countries will adopt the system. But they stress this will take time. "Tradition is strong," says Christiansen. "Things will not change immediately, but they can start to improve."
ICARDA conducts research in 24 countries in West Asia and North Africa and is part of the worldwide network of research centers that belong to the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research.
An exciting fruit of ICARDA's research is that as much as 15 million hectares of degraded hillsides in its 24-country region could be rehabilitated. And that means more than just the revegetation of degraded land. It means more income for farmers and more milk and meat for local people. In today's hungry world, it means more food.
Contact: Guy Manners, Communication, Documentation and Information Services, Scott Christiansen or Ahmed Osman, Pasture, Forage and Livestock Program.
ICARDA, P.O. Box 5466, Aleppo, Syria.
Fax: +963-21 213490, 225105.
Tel.: +963-21 213433, 213477, 235220, 225012, 225112, 225635.
Telex: (492) 331206, 331208, 331263 ICARDA SY.
Cable: ICARDA Aleppo.
If you use this story in any form we would like to receive a copy. Thank you.