Sweetpotato is climate smart crop, grown with limited external inputs (fertilisers, pesticides, less labour) making it an attractive crop for resource-constrained smallholder farmers. It is also a major cash and food crop for many countries in sub-Saharan Africa. However, adoption of the high yielding and nutritious improved varieties has been disappointingly low. This study uses qualitative methods to explore the barriers and enablers of farmer varietal replacement and adoption. Unlike the extant quantitative studies that identify the determinants of adoption, we delve deeper into understanding the reasons for or against the preference for specific varieties. We used a rich set of information collected via focus group discussions which explore why farmers prefer certain varieties over others and how they perceive the new improved varieties from the national breeding programs. Doing so enabled us to unravel specific traits or trait combinations that farmers seek and identify those that they perceive needing improvement. We find that the most preferred traits were ‘yield’ and ‘good taste’. Implying that the neglect of sensory attributes by breeders contributes to the low adoption of improved sweetpotato varieties. Moreover, we find that altruism among the respondents plays an important role in farmer use of, and sharing of information about improved sweetpotato varieties. Women and men farmers obtained most of their information from neighbours, NGOs and radios. For women, the most important source of planting materials doubled as their most important source of information. Thus, concerted efforts to minimise information constraints are essential for unravelling the adoption puzzle.

Cassava is the second most important source of calories in Sub-Saharan Africa. It is subject to economically important yield losses from viral diseases, including cassava brown streak disease and cassava mosaic disease. These diseases are vectored by cassava whitefly, so improved approaches for whitefly and disease control are needed to enable smallholder farmers to protect their cassava crops. To investigate the economic viability of insecticide applications against whitefly, the effect of four insecticide application regimes on three cassava genotypes (NASE 3, NASE 12, MKUMBA) and a local landrace were evaluated, for different farmer groups. Data were collected from researcher–farmer managed fields and descriptive statistics were analyzed. Insecticide and personal protective equipment were the major costs for those farmers that applied insecticide and the dipping treatment had a marginal rate of return of 1.66 (166%), demonstrating that this option was the most profitable and effective. While insecticide users incurred more production costs, they also accrued more profit than non-insecticide users, especially if insecticide was applied at early stages of cassava growth. There is a clear need, therefore, to strengthen the commercialization of cassava crop through plant protection measures such as judicious insecticide application on susceptible varieties, so as to increase yield and crop quality.

The triadic comparison of technology options (tricot) approach to participatory varietal selection has been demonstrated to scale out the on‐farm testing of elite candidate crop varieties. In this study, we evaluated elite clones of cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) using the tricot approach. We sought to (1) synthesize on‐farm trial data from two cycles evaluating different sets of elite cassava clones; (2) assess the agronomic performance of elite cassava clones considering sociodemographic and climatic factors; and (3) assess the performance of elite cassava clones for both agronomic and food quality traits. The study involved 10 districts in Uganda, two cycles/seasons of evaluation, 20 elite cassava clones, one check variety, and 294 men and 320 women farmers. Our results indicate that the agronomic performance of elite cassava clones was influenced more by geographic than sociodemographic factors. Our analysis identified the number of days with rainfall higher than 20 mm as the most influencing climatic factor over agronomic performance. Further, the study identified superior elite cassava clones UG110164, UGC14170, and UG120193 as promising candidate varieties for release, targeting food products. Overall, our study emphasizes the important contribution of end‐users to crop improvement and provides insights into use of tricot on‐farm testing methodology to evaluate elite cassava clones during cassava variety development in Uganda, which can be used to support decision making for variety release.

The dairy industry has great potential to improve living standards for the poor in Tanzania and more so for smallholder farmers who account for the largest share of milk consumed nationally. To increase production efficiency and overall output, the Government of Tanzania and its development partners are promoting dairy market hubs (DMHs) to enhance access to milk markets, inputs and services. However, there is limited empirical evidence on the degree to which these potential benefits translate into real benefits in dairy production and income, particularly for smallholder farmers. This paper therefore, examines the effect of DMHs on smallholder farmers’ income. Using primary data collected from 461 smallholder dairy farmers in four districts in two regions of Tanzania (Tanga and Morogoro) the study employs quasi-experimental methods combining propensity score matching and difference-in-difference (DD) to estimate treatment effects. The results indicate that participation in DMHs increased household dairy income by 4.07 percentage points on average for the period 2014 to 2016. Participation is encouraged by group membership, land owned and quantity of milk sold. It relates negatively with milk price and negatively, though weakly, with age. These results suggest that it would be productive to support livestock producer groups across all potential dairy areas to move towards forming DMHs. Specific actions that could facilitate this are discussed.

The invasive weed Parthenium hysterophorus L. presents a severe socio‐economic threat to Ugandan agriculture. This nationwide study of 244 farmers in infested districts reveals near‐universal recognition of the weed and widespread negative impacts: 88.3% of the farmers report increased labour demands, 62.1% cite yield reduction and significant costs are incurred through control efforts and degradation of soil and pasture resources. A multivariate probit analysis shows that most farmers rely on single‐method strategies. Hand weeding (76.7%) is the predominant practice and is driven by labour challenges, while herbicide use (6.7%) is associated with concerns over product quality and soil degradation. Machine weeding (45.8%) substitutes for manual labour and is influenced by region, cropping system and soil health perceptions. Critically, practices are not used in complementary combinations. The findings underscore an urgent need for context‐specific extension programmes to promote Integrated Weed Management that builds upon existing farmer practices to mitigate this livelihood crisis.