Food insecurity, health, especially HIV/AIDS, high levels of unemployment and poverty are some of the key development challenges facing the southern Africa region. To overcome these challenges, most governments are implementing programmes that promote sustainable economic growth to reduce poverty and unemployment. As part of these programmes, rural people are coping with food insecurity and sustaining their livelihoods by using forest products, including wild foods and indigenous fruit trees. These foods supplement their diets and are traded to provide cash income (FAO, 1989). The forests and natural woodlands support millions of livelihoods for people living within and neighbouring them. They provide direct and indirect benefits that include environmental services of soil, water and biodiversity conservation, animal habitats, beauty, tourism, a variety of wood and non-wood products, medicines, herbs and fruits. They are home to several indigenous fruit trees (IFTs) that offer various products and services to rural and urban communities in Africa (FAO, 1989). These IFT products and services have sustained rural and urban livelihoods for thousands of years. The biggest challenge to forest sectors in southern Africa is to promote self-sufficiency in forest products through sustained forest management and biodiversity conservation.
Tag: indigenous varieties
Native fruit tree improvement in Amazonia: an overview
In this chapter, some of the current native fruit improvement activities in Amazonia are listed, and two cases that contrast conventional and participatory approaches are examined. The challenges for the next decade are considered. Focus was on Brazilian and Peruvian Amazonia, which constitute most of the Basin and have the greatest concentration of research and development activity
Domestication, utilization and marketing of indigenous fruit trees in West and Central Africa
This chapter discusses the progress in participatory tree domestication in West and Central Africa. The steps in participatory tree domestication are discussed: selection of priority species based on farmers’ preferences and market; orientation; collection of germplasm from elite trees chosen by farmers or other users; establishment of passport data for trees from which germplasm was collected (for future use in tracing the owners of trees in respect of property right); development of appropriate vegetative propagation techniques for the different species under domestication; integration of improved propagules in different cropping systems; and marketing studies of products from domesticated species