VHR imagery to quantify crop response to fertilizer and develop business services for smallholders

Traore PCS, Blaes X, Chomé G, Lambert MJ, Schut AGT, Ajeigbe HA, Defourny P. 2016. VHR imagery to quantify crop response to fertilizer and develop business services for smallholders.

Food needs arising from the demographic explosion of sub-Saharan Africa can only be met through agricultural intensification. Smallholder systems feature enormous yield gaps, which may be reduced through ISFM and other sustainable intensification practices. However, today’s huge variability in farming practices and returns on investments is likely to exacerbate in the future. Monitoring changes in productivity across scales is a significant challenge in heterogeneous systems, where overall low SOM and nutrient deficiencies prevail. Fortunately, remote sensing can help monitor crop performance at levels of granularity increasingly compatible with smallholder farming. This opens support applications for precision agriculture, allowing the exploitation – rather than the mitigation – of spatial heterogeneity, and the demonstration that enhanced productivity and livelihoods are possible in complex cropping systems.