A brief snapshot of Landcare

It is estimated that approximately 65% of Asia's 1.6 billion rural population earn their livelihoods from farms located on steep slopes of greater than 8%. As a result, the region is renowned for the worst soil erosion rates in the world. This not only significantly reduces farm productivity, affecting farm livelihoods and regional economies, but also impacts on stream sedimentation, affecting water quality and storage, marine resources and biodiversity.

Nowhere is this problem more relevant in the Asian region than in the uplands of the southern Philippines, where a combination of a rurally-dominant population, high population growth, extreme poverty, insecure land tenure, intensive cropping practices, and high rainfall have led to significant soil erosion, posing a grave threat to sustainable farming and poverty alleviation. While there have been many attempts over the years to address the problem, there are few if any examples of sustained ‘on-ground’ impact.

Landcare is a relatively new initiative which is taking a different approach to this problem. It commenced in 1996 in the northern Mindanao municipality of Claveria, when local farmers, local government and technical facilitators from the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) formed a special partnership to enhance farmer development and ownership of conservation farming technologies. The term ‘Landcare’ was coined to provide the initiative with a new identity, primarily to emphasise the difference between this partnership approach with a ‘grass-roots’ farmer focus, and the more traditional ‘top-down’ technology transfer processes predominantly operating at the time (see Figure below).

In 1999, the Landcare program was expanded to two other pilot sites in Mindanao and subsequently to pilot sites in the Visayas through a partnership between the World Agroforestry Centre, the SEAMEO Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) and two international research and development organisations – the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) from Australia, and the Agencia Espanola de Cooperacion International (AECI) from Spain. The Australian partnership brought to the program the wealth of more than 15 years of Landcare experience from Australia through the direct involvement of a ‘grass-roots’ Australian Landcare group, Barung Landcare.

More information on Landcare can be obtained from the Landcare book, produced by the project, Landcare in the Philippines - Stories of people and places - full text available from a link under Publications; and from various Landcare agencies - links to information sites available under Links.

Landcare triangle

Landcare is an equal partnership between farmers, technical facilitators and local government at the local level, with a focus on farmers being supported and facilitated to learn about problems and solutions, take ownership, and then take steps to address them in their own way. While land management issues are the initial entry point or focus of the program, farmers and their households are encouraged to use the Landcare process to simultaneously tackle livelihood, social and other issues relevant to their local communities.