Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Agricultural Systems
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/agsy

Livelihood strategies, resilience and transformability in African

agroecosystems
Pablo Tittonell ⇑
Farming Systems Ecology, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 563, 6700 AN Wageningen, The Netherlands

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Aiming to translate resilience thinking theory into farming systems design practice, this paper examines
Available online 9 December 2013 fundamental properties of complex systems dynamics and their relation with the mechanisms that gov-
ern resilience and transformability in African smallholder agriculture. Agroecosystems dynamics emerge
Keywords: from the aggregation of diverse livelihood strategies in response to changes in the agroecosystem con-
Farming systems text, and are characterised by non-linearity, irreversibility, convergence/divergence and hysteresis. I
Farm typology examine a number of case studies from Africa to verify three guiding hypotheses in connection to the
Poverty traps
diversity of rural livelihood strategies: (1) diversity as alternative system regimes; (2) diversity as the
Feedbacks
System regimes
result of transformability; (3) diversity determined by changing agricultural contexts. The hierarchy of
Alternate stable states constraints that determine the space for manoeuvring in agroecosystems is described through the anal-
ogy of the Matryoshka nesting dolls: each system level confines and is confined by their immediate sub-
and supra-systems. Agricultural contexts, as defined by agro-ecological potential, demography and mar-
ket connectivity are also dynamic and their trajectory can be described as shifts across stability domains.
An example from Kenya shows that household diversity can be described as alternative system regimes,
through hysteretic rather than continuous, reversible models. In some particular cases diversity emerges
from divergent pathways that may have implied radical transformations in the past, as shown here for
rural livelihoods in northern Cameroun. A comparative analysis of East African agroecosystems shows
that thresholds in specific variables that may point to the existence of possible tipping points are rather
elusive and largely site specific, requiring systematic categorisation of agricultural contexts. While agroe-
cology needs to provide the knowledge base for the ecological intensification of smallholder landscapes,
policy and market developments are needed to deal with the Matryoshka effect – or with interactions
that are presumably panarchical in certain cases. Desirable shifts in farming systems can only be stimu-
lated by working on both ends simultaneously.
Ó 2013 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license.

1. Introduction
The extent and persistence of rural poverty in the African con-
tinent is often described in terms of ‘vicious cycles’, ‘downward
spirals’ or ‘poverty traps’ (e.g., Lybbert et al., 2004) in the attempt
to illustrate the causality at play between demographic processes,
resource degradation, national or regional politics and global
change. Explicitly or not, these views rely on two major interre-
lated assumptions: (i) the existence of alternative possible system
regimes or systems equilibria, often used to represent dynamics
and cross-scale interactions in social-ecological systems, and (ii)
a hierarchical confinement across scales, which I will describe here
⇑ Tel.: +31 317481413.
E-mail address: pablo.tittonell@wur.nl
using the analogy of the Matryoshka nesting dolls: each system le-
vel confines and is confined by their immediate sub- and supra-
systems, respectively. These two assumptions underpin, for in-
stance, the concept of fractal poverty traps or self-reinforcing cross
scale impacts (cf. Barret and Swallow, 2006): low-level equilibria
at higher spatial scales prevent positive regime shifts at lower spa-
tial scales, or across time scales, as past disadvantages of shocks
may persist across generations. This implies that strategies to
alleviate poverty – to propend to virtuous cycles or upward spirals
– must be able to provoke system shifts across certain critical
thresholds. To identify the critical thresholds or tipping points that
define bifurcating trajectories towards alternative – desirable or
undesirable – regimes remains a major challenge in agricultural
research for development. What kind of thresholds are these and
on which variable(s) can they be verified are two of the questions
that this study aims to contribute an answer to.
In complex systems, interactions take place across scales that
lead to emergent properties and self-regulatory mechanisms

0308-521X Ó 2013 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.agsy.2013.10.010
4 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14
(Holling, 1973). This is often observed in smallholder African sys-
tems operating under non-conducive circumstances. When sys-
tems are confined, i.e. when the outermost Matryoshka nesting
doll would offer small room for manoeuvring, several resilience
mechanisms will result from agroecosystem properties associated
with the meso (e.g., diverse livelihood strategies) and micro (e.g.,
farmer-induced soil heterogeneity) scales. In extreme situations
or under long-lasting pressure, smallholder livelihood strategies
may even experience radical transformations, which may imply
introducing new components and processes in a system, or even
changes in the scale at which the system operates. Thus, human
agency often overrides the net effect of major biophysical pro-
cesses in shaping the agroecosystem, and seen under the light of
the multiple equilibria theory (e.g., Walker et al., 2004) human im-
pacts on natural resources and community strategies to sustain
their livelihoods exhibit dynamics in time that are frequently
non-linear and irreversible (or effectively irreversible in human
time scales). Measures to prevent further degradation of natural
capital and human well-being in African human ecosystems, or
to restore these through development interventions, need to em-
brace non-linearity and irreversibility as inherent properties of
these systems.
The address of Walker et al. (2010) to the GCIAR Science Forum
of 2009 proposed practical definitions of general and specified
resilience, and of transformability for use in the design of new nat-
ural resource management strategies in the developing world.
These authors define general resilience as the capacity of a social
ecological system to deal with shocks, without the need to specify
the nature of such shocks or the state variable in the system that is
affected, as would be the case for specified resilience (i.e., resil-
ience of what, to what? – Walker et al., 2010). Transformability re-
fers to the capacity of systems to change when confined in
untenable situations, when alternative re-configurations of the
current system are not possible or ineffective. These properties
were illustrated by these authors through examining environmen-
tal dynamics in a watershed ecosystem in SE Australia. To date, the
plea to ‘translate’ these properties into meaningful and quantifi-
able indicators and thresholds that represent states and dynamics
of smallholder agricultural systems (in Africa) remains largely
unanswered.
In this paper I examine the role of human agency in the mech-
anisms that underpin resilience and transformability in African hu-
man ecosystems with the purpose of linking these to the attributes
that are commonly used in farming systems analysis, such as live-
lihood strategies, household diversity and dynamics. Fundamental
properties of systems dynamics are analysed to inform strategies
and development actions to preserve livelihoods in rural commu-
nities, namely non-linearity, irreversibility, convergence/diver-
gence and hysteresis. These are studied using qualitative and
quantitative evidence from African agroecosystems that span a
range of ecological and demographic gradients. As the analysis fo-
cuses on human agency operating at a mesoscale, i.e. the house-
hold, the community or the territory, the biophysical
mechanisms that govern resilience in agroecosystems are not
explicitly considered here. The paper starts with a brief description
of the theory used, followed by the enunciation of the main
hypotheses and by the analysis of case studies from rural Africa
to verify these hypotheses, and finally discusses the pertinence
and interest of using concepts from resilience thinking in farming
systems analysis.
2. Theoretical framework
Graphically, non-linear responses, thresholds and hysteresis
could be cartooned as in Fig. 1, borrowed from several authors
from the realm of resilience thinking. In Fig. 1 A, the state of the
system (characterised by a fast-changing state variable) describes
a continuous response to the underlying controlling variable and
abrupt change once a threshold is crossed. In B, there are two pos-
sible, alternate system regimes of the state variable, and alternate
thresholds or tipping points in the driving variable that, when
crossed, will trigger a switch from one regime to the other. A typ-
ical example is the cycle of stocking-destocking in smallholder
agroecosystems, in which livestock are a means of accumulating
capital that can be made available relatively easily in case of (unex-
pected) need. Gradual stocking by smallholders is a common re-
sponse to favourable agricultural seasons that allow cash crops
or food surpluses to be sold on the market. Destocking to cover
household expenditures and re-investments is typical after a
shock, such as the effect of a dry agricultural season or a plague.
When shocks are recurrent or unfavourable situations last long
households will be forced to liquidate all their livestock, including
the animals used for toiling the soil. Nutrient inputs to crops
through animal manure are no longer possible, and thus both the
area cropped and the yield per unit area will be affected, leading
to an overall decline in agricultural productivity. Under such cir-
cumstances, restocking will take long or be unachievable for cer-
tain households in the mid term. Non-livestock farms in such
cases are clearly on a lower equilibrium regime, or a poverty trap.
Fig. 1B also shows that in shifting from regime I to II and back the
development and return pathways are different, indicating hyster-
etic responses. For example, the restoration of biophysical quality
of degraded agroecosystems often implies long-term investments,
and their original productivity may not always be achieved. The
distance between the pathways of degradation and restoration is
known as the hysteresis of land rehabilitation (Tittonell et al.,
2008, 2012).
Although in Walker et al. (2010) the scheme in Fig. 1B is de-
scribed as depicting alternate stable (equilibrium) states, a term
that has become jargon in the resilience literature, Walker et al.
(2006) had earlier argued that ‘‘configurations of states in which
the system has the same controls on function, i.e., the same feed-
backs, and essentially the same structure represent different states
within the same system regime’’, indicating that the term ‘alter-
nate states’ is a misnomer. Here, I will consistently use the terms
system regimes or equilibria as synonymous, and not stable states,
to avoid confusion. Alternate system regimes or multiple equilibria
can be also illustrated through the stability landscapes proposed
by Scheffer et al. (2001), in which a system is represented as a ball
that moves between two alternative basins of attraction (a and b,
or system regimes I and II) once a certain threshold is crossed
(Fig. 1C). It must be kept in mind that in social-ecological systems
different regimes may be more or less desirable for different stake-
holders, so that in certain circumstances a may be preferable to b.
Desirability may be defined in social, economic or ecological terms,
and undesirable regimes can sometimes be very resilient (Walker
et al., 2006).
At higher scales, Fernandez et al. (2002) speak of alternative
stability domains, which are defined by a measure of (agro)eco-
system performance and an indicator of ecosystem insurance
(Fig. 1D). For example, in their analysis of sustainability of a
smallholder region of Tanzania Enfors and Gordon (2007) pro-
posed the use of a soil water index on the horizontal axis and
the ‘ecosystems insurance capacity’ on the vertical one. The for-
mer is an aggregated indicator that reflects the amount of soil
available water for food production per capita; the latter repre-
sents the capacity of the surrounding landscape to generate pro-
visioning ecosystems services that could provide alternative food
and/or incomes when crop production fails. Here, I use the con-
cept of stability domains to illustrate diversity and long term
dynamics in agricultural contexts.
 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14 5

A No alternate regimes B Two alternate regimes

State of capital stock (fast variable)

State of capital stock (fast variable)
e II
Regim
- -

Hysteresis
Threshold

+ +
eI
Regim

Underlying (controlling) variable Underlying (controlling) variable

C Stability landscapes D Stability domains

System

Agro-ecosystem insurance
Sustained but Productive state
Reg vulnerable state
ime
II
ce
ien
si l
re
Thre g
shold s in
ea
cr
In
e
nc
s ilie
re
g
sin
t2 ea
cr
In

Re g t1 Sustained but
ime Degraded state vulnerable state
I e
Tim
t0 Agro-ecosystem productivity

E Convergence towards a single higher equlibrium F Divergence towards alternate higher equilibria

Regime II

Regime I

Fig. 1. Graphical representation of system properties used in the analysis of the various cases studies. Illustration of thresholds (A) and hysteresis (B) as proposed by Walker
et al. (2010), of stability landscapes as proposed by Scheffer et al. (2001), of ecosystem stability domains following Fernandez et al. (2002). Convergence (A) and divergence (B)
are illustrated through an ad hoc adaptation of the stability landscapes proposed by Scheffer et al. (2001).

Sometimes alternative equilibria may lay at the crossroad of with sub- and supra-systems. Often the shifts, crises, or non-linear-
two or more rural livelihood trajectories. In the sub-Sahelian ities observed in ecological systems result from processes and
savannahs of West Africa, for example, the sedentary agro-pastoral structures interacting across scales (Gunderson and Holling,
strategy that was earlier only restricted to certain ethnic groups in 2002). Then, another way of looking at fractal poverty traps or Mat-
the region became a converging equilibrium for a diversity of ryoshka effects is to think in terms of hysteresis between alternate
them. Nowadays, and although certain idiosyncrasies are still evi- system regimes. Fig. 2 illustrates the possibility of fractal poverty
dent, Fulani and Mossi agroecosystems share the same landscapes traps considering three scales or levels of integration. While the re-
and are increasingly converging in terms of structure and function- gime A of the supra-system (i + 1) may allow strongly hysteretic
ing in the central plateau of Burkina Faso (Vall and Diallo, 2009). In responses to happen at system (i) level (i.e., a big ‘jump’ from re-
some other cases, pressure on natural resources and the erosion of gime D to regime C in response to interventions), the lower equilib-
traditional livelihoods may lead to households following divergent rium regime B confines the system and interventions may only
strategies, trajectories that lead to alternative higher equilibria, induce timid shifts between two possible alternate regimes C and
implying either system re-configurations or radical transforma- D. The latter confines in its turn the possible subsystem (i1) re-
tions. Fig. 1E and F illustrate divergence and convergence through gimes, E and F, so that hysteretic responses are no longer possible,
an ad hoc adaptation of the stability landscapes of Scheffer et al. opportunities are few (linearization), and the incentives to invest
(2001). time, resources and effort wane. On the opposite cross-scale trajec-
Finally, the dynamics of a system at any given scale cannot be tory, system and sub-system regimes at higher equilibria lead to
understood without considering the dynamics of and interactions hysteretic responses, opportunity, or an increased discretisation
6 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14

Fig. 2. A graphical representation of the Matryoshka effect, or hierarchical confinement across scales (i1 to i + 1). The x axis represents the level of integration, closely
associated with the scale of analysis (cultivated field, farm, communal territory, region, country, etc.). The y axis represents the hysteresis associated with possible alternate
regimes at each scale. Poverty traps are conceptualised as situations in which alternate regimes are not possible due to confinement of the system by its immediate supra-
system (context), desirable regime shifts are no longer viable as one moves along the lower grey arrow from right to left. On the upper cross scale trajectory, conducive
situations at higher scales create room for manoeuvring at lower scales, hysteretic responses and desirable regime shifts are possible.

of system regimes. The Matryoshka analogy is used here to de-
scribe hierarchical confinement, in which slow and broad variables
constrain and shape small and fast ones (cf. O’Neill et al., 1986).
With all these concepts in mind, I propose three hypotheses
that attempt to explain diversity in livelihood strategies on the ba-
sis of properties of resilience and transformability in smallholder
agroecosystems:
1. In a majority of cases the diversity of livelihood strategies in
rural Africa can be described as alternative system regimes,
and their dynamics exhibit non-linearity, thresholds, irrevers-
ibility and hysteresis,
2. In some particular cases, household diversity cannot be
described as alternative configurations of a same system, but
rather as the result of alternative, divergent or convergent path-
ways that may have implied radical transformations in the past,
3. Hierarchical confinement, or the Matryoshka effect, may be
unravelled through comparative analysis and categorisation of
agricultural contexts based on agro-ecological potential,
demography and market connectivity.
African smallholder systems are complex, dynamic and spa-
tially heterogeneous socio-ecological systems (cf. Tittonell et al.,
2010). Underpinning poverty traps, the pathways of degradation-
restoration of biophysical resources describe hysteretic trajectories
that reinforce the co-existence of alternate system regimes.
Although the analysis of biophysical responses merits a separate
study, the agroecological potential of a certain region is one deter-
minant of the thresholds in farm sizes or population densities. One
of the first questions that arises when trying to test the above
hypotheses is to identify the measurable variables or indicators
that best reflect alternate system regimes, e.g., those that should
be plotted on both axes of Fig. 1B. I examined sets of socio-eco-
nomic data across the case studies described in the following sec-
tion and propose possible (non-exhaustive) indicators of resource
endowment and system performance. Each case study in the next
section deals with one of the hypotheses outlined above.
3. Case studies
3.1. The diversity of livelihood strategies seen as alternative system
regimes
Resource degradation and the concomitant degradation of rural
livelihoods in Africa are often assumed to follow a continuous,
reversible trajectory in time (cf. Fig. 1A). This assumption justifies
 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14 7

categorising households according to their level of resource
endowment (e.g., poor, mid-class and wealthy). Based on this, it
has been often argued that a certain threshold of resource endow-
ment should be crossed for households to reach higher welfare
equilibrium (e.g., a tipping point in terms of asset holdings, but
not necessarily in terms of system functioning). Yet we have seen
in the previous section that households that undergo a contraction
of their natural, financial and human resources become increas-
ingly vulnerable to shocks and susceptible to fall into poverty traps
(cf. Fig. 1B and related text). Impoverishment often involves liqui-
dation of capital assets, including land or livestock to cover imme-
diate expenses, loss of social credit, and sometimes a thorough
reconfiguration of livelihood strategies. The labour force of impov-
erished households is sold cheaply to wealthier ones, thereby
reinforcing the gap between both. Children from impoverished
households may be removed from school, reducing even further
their opportunities to step out of the poverty trap. On the other ex-
treme, wealthier households exhibit different livelihood strategies
that may not necessarily rely on agricultural assets. The way out of
agriculture may be contemporaneous or trans-generational, when
investments are made in the higher education of children.
The diversity of possible livelihood strategies and development
pathways in a densely populated region of western Kenya has been
categorised through a functional typology that distinguished five
rural household types (Table 1, adapted from Tittonell et al.,
2005a,b). Fig. 3A illustrates the diversity of households surveyed
in the region using total cropping area as the controlling variable
and income as an indicator of performance. The theoretical,

Table 1
Functional typology for household categorisation in western Kenya (adapted from Tittonell et al., 2005a).

Farm Resource endowmenta and production orientation Main characteristicsb

type
1 Predominantly high to medium resource endowment, Variable age of the household head, small families, mostly constrained by land availability (lack of
mainly self-subsistence oriented family labour compensated by hiring-in). Permanent sources of off-farm income (e.g. salary,
pension, etc.)
2 High resource endowment, market-oriented Older household head, numerous family (starting land subdivision), mostly constrained by labour
(hired-in) due to large farm areas; cash crops and other farm produce are the main source of
income
3 Medium resource endowment, self subsistence and (low- Young to mid-aged household head, young families of variable size in expansion, mostly
input) market-oriented constrained by capital and sometimes labour, farm produce and marketable surpluses plus
complementary non-farm enterprises
4 Predominantly low to medium resource endowment, Young to mid-aged household head, variable family size, constrained by availability of land and
self-subsistence oriented capital, deriving income from non-farm activities (e.g. ox-plough service, handicrafts)
5 Low resource endowment, self-subsistence oriented Variable age of household head, variable family size, often women-headed farms constrained by
land and capital, selling their labour locally for agricultural practices (thus becoming labour-
constrained)
a
Referring to assets representing wealth indicators (i.e. land size, livestock ownership, type of homestead, etc.).
b
These refer to the family structure (age of the household head) in relation to the position of the household in the ‘farm development cycle’ (Crowley, 1997), to the main
constraints to agricultural production faced by the household, and to the main source of income.

Fig. 3. Indicators of resource endowment and performance (‘well being’) from a survey of rural households in western Kenya (n = 55). (A) Total household income, (B) income
per capita (active household member), (C) economic return to labour, (D) total food production, (E) food per capita and (F) Maize grain yield plotted against the area of
cropland, the ratio of land owned to family labour and the ratio of cropped land to total household size (source: Tittonell et al., 2005a,b).
8 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14

hand-drawn lines in Fig. 3A give an indication of what I believe to
be two alternate regimes corresponding to low and high welfare
equilibria. Households of type 1 are those that have stepped out
of agriculture to engage in off-farm activities to earn most (>60%)
of their income. Although they may continue growing small areas
of food crops for self-consumption, their main livelihood strategy
exclude them from the general trend in the relationship between
resources (land) and performance (income). Households of type
2, the wealthiest, grow cash crops and practice a more intensive
agriculture that integrates cropping and livestock activities, and
that relies on external inputs and additional labour. These house-
holds consist of numerous, often polygamous families.
In search for more evident thresholds or tipping points in re-
source endowment to trigger regime shifts, other commonly used
indicators and thresholds were plotted in Fig. 3B–F. The ratio of
available land to household labour was used as indicator of re-
source endowment, and per capita food production and income
as indicators of performance. In spite of the differences discussed,
most of the households surveyed in this case lived with less than 1
us$ per capita a day (Fig. 3B) – a commonly used poverty threshold.
The economic return to labour invested on-farm was lower than
the average wage perceive for agricultural work in the area for
most of the farms of type 3–5 (Fig. 3C). Food production was virtu-
ally proportional to the area cropped, with edible dry matter yields
of between 1 and 2 t ha1 (Fig. 3 D), which is above the average of 1
t cereal ha1 often cited for sub-Saharan Africa. Among the house-
holds that did not reach food self-sufficiency, calculated as the
caloric equivalent of 180 kg maize person1 year1, the ratio of
available land to family labour was always smaller than ca. 0.4
ha person1, which corresponds to about less than one acre per la-
bour unit (mostly in types 4 and 5 – Fig. 3E). Food yields were not
necessarily the largest in wealthiest households, who allocated
their best land to growing cash crops. Households of type 3 tended
to achieve the largest yields of maize, the stapple food in the region
and a major source of income for them (Fig. 3F).
In terms of shifts between the lower and higher welfare equilib-
ria along the agricultural intensification pathway (i.e., T1 house-
holds excluded), one may suggest that under the agroecological
and market conditions of western Kenya, households would need
at least 1.8 ha (about 4 acres) of cropping land to step onto the
higher welfare regime (cf. T2 households in Fig. 3A). Households
of type 3 may exhibit cropping areas, land:labour ratios and levels
of agricultural productivity similar to those in type 2, but yet re-
main on a lower welfare regime. Significant differences between
these two household types can be seen in: (i) the type of livestock
activity, (ii) the presence of cash crops (tea, coffee, tobacco), and
(iii) access to credit. Wealthier households are always self-suffi-
cient and able to store maize surpluses, to sell them at peak prices
before the next harvest, or use them to pay for hired labour (Ta-
ble 2). Poorer households struggle to achieve self-sufficiency. Nev-
ertheless, they often sell their maize immediately after harvest,
when prices are the lowest, and buy food the rest of the year. These
feedbacks keep poorest households (T4 and T5) trapped in a low
welfare regime, while ensuring cheap labour to wealthiest house-
holds (a form of credit).
3.1.1. Farm typologies and resilience
The functional typology proposed for western Kenya (cf. Ta-
ble 1), which was later corroborated across a wider range of agro-
ecosystems of East Africa (Tittonell et al., 2010), differentiates
households pursuing basically three main livelihood strategies,
which may be also described as Dorward (2009) did: (1) ‘Hanging
in’, which takes place in situations of poor natural resource poten-
tial and market opportunities, and where households engage in
activities to maintain their current livelihood (subsistence farm-
ing); (2) ‘Stepping up’, in situations of high agricultural potential
and where investments in assets are made to expand current pro-
duction activities (semi-commercial farming); (3) ‘Stepping out’,
when activities are used to accumulate assets that may allow mov-
ing into different activities, not necessarily farming (i.e. migration
to cities and/or local engagement in non-farm activities). Farm
types can be seen fluctuating within two alternate system regimes.
To illustrate this, Fig. 4 shows now the five household types placed
in a two-dimensional plain defined by levels of resource endow-
ment and ‘performance’ in terms of indicators of well-being; i.e.,
income, food security, investment capacity, etc. Households of type
3, 4 and 5 may be distributed along a curve that represents a low
welfare equilibrium (System regime I): increasing resource endow-
ment allows increasing performance up to a certain level P’ (mov-
ing from T5 to T3), and vice versa (from T3 down to T5). The poorly
endowed households of type 5 are ‘hanging-in’ at meagre levels of
well-being, with several feedback mechanisms confining them to
very resilient poverty traps. The point (P0 ; R0 ) in Fig. 4 corresponds
to a threshold of accumulated asset holdings that may allow
investments to be able, in the short or the long term, to ‘step up’
to a higher welfare regime (System regime II: T2 households) (cf.
Figs. 1B and 2).
Resource contraction along the high welfare regime may reduce
performance down to a certain level P’’. The point (P’’; R’’) corre-
sponds to a degree of impoverishment that often forces wealthier
households to ‘step out’ of farming through engagement in off-
farm activities, totally or partially, in order to preserve their level

Table 2
Main characteristics of the six sites surveyed in East Africa (Tittonell et al., 2010).

Characteristic Central Kenya Western Kenya Eastern Uganda

Meru S. Mbeere Vihiga Siaya Mbale Tororo
Agro-ecological potential
Altitude (masl) 1500 1100 1600 1200 1600 1100
Rainfall (mm)a 1600 700 1800 1400 1200 1100
Soil fertility Inherently high Moderate to low Inherently high, degraded soils Inherently moderate Inherently high Moderate to high
Demography
Population density (km2) 800 400 1000 350 350 250
Farm sizes (ha) 0.5–3 1–10 0.3–2 0.5–5 0.5–5 1–8
Food self sufficiency (months) 7.0 5.8 3.5 6.9 9.7 9.0
Market connectivity
Distance to urban areasb Close Close Close to medium Medium to far Far Medium to far
Distance to marketsb Close Close to medium Close to medium Medium to far Medium to far Medium to close
Major cash crops Coffee, tea Khat, groundnuts Tea, coffee Sugar cane, cotton Coffee Cotton, tobacco
a
In all sites rainfall takes places in a bimodal pattern (i.e., long and the short rains seasons).
b
These appreciations take into consideration not only physical distance but also infrastructure for transport and communication.

Performance (well-being)
T2
T1
‘Stepping out’
P’’
‘Stepping up’
T3
P’
T4
‘Hanging in’
T5
R’’
Resources (natural, social, human)
Fig. 4. Theoretical representation of the position of five household types that are
common in East Africa (T1–T5 – cf. Table 1) in a two-dimensional plain defined by
resource endowment and performance (in this case, ‘well-being’). Full lines indicate
two alternate system regimes, and the possible shifts interpreted as livelihood
strategies are represented by block arrows.
of well-being (T1 households). Resource contraction may also take
place through liquidation of asset holdings after a drought or to
face the costs of funerals, through asset subdivision due to inheri-
tance, or when household members face long lasting health prob-
lems that compromise their labour force or their social and
financial capitals, etc. Success in preserving levels of well-being
when stepping out of agriculture depends on educational levels,
financial capital and opportunities (e.g., to find wage jobs in urban
areas, to start a business, etc.). Often the step out of agriculture
may be temporary, or partial, when part of the income obtained
off-farm is reinvested in agricultural assets (notably in acquiring
livestock). Obviously households of type 3, 4 or 5 may attempt to
step out of agriculture from different situations defined by P and
R levels, but a distinction is made between families that pursue
an off-farm strategy (T1) from those that are ‘expelled’ from agri-
culture when unable to sustain a living in rural areas. Here, I cir-
cumscribe the concept of stepping out (T1) to cases in which off-
farm strategies are a choice, and off-farm activities become the ma-
jor component of total household income. It must be noticed that
often the families that migrate to urban areas are not necessarily
the poorest, as they need a start-up capital to get established
and/or some ‘contacts’ in town.
3.2. Diverging-converging livelihood strategies and transformability
A farm typology derived from a survey of households done on a
single point in time, or synchronically, may sometimes mask
important aspects of the trajectory of livelihood strategies and
the consequent transformations in the agroecosystem through
time. Convergence and divergence (cf. Fig. 1E and F) may lead to
initially distinct livelihood strategies ending up resembling in to-
day’s activities and assets levels, and vice versa. A study in the Sah-
elian region of northern Cameroon that aimed at understanding
farm diversity in relation to the niche for cotton as a main liveli-
hood activity, revealed consistently converging and diverging
pathways in household trajectories. The study was done in a small
territory near the town of Garoua in the basin of the Benoué river, a
representative example of the former savanes cotonnières of central
Africa. During the 1970s and 1980s cotton production in the region
was seen as an engine for development: ‘‘Cotton builds roads, cotton
brings water, cotton opens schools. . .’’. Deregulation of production
and marketing and the dismantling of national commodity boards
to support the industry, in combination with severe fluctuations in
P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14 9
the international price of fibre led to a considerable decrease in the
areas under cotton in the region (ICAC, 2010). Livestock keeping or
cultivation of food crops such as maize or sorghum are increasingly
replacing cotton, as besides contributing to food self-sufficiency
these crops may fetch more attractive prices on the market.
A functional farm typology based on a 2009 survey in the area
distinguished four major household types (Debru, 2009): live-
stock-based livelihoods (type 1), agriculture-based livelihoods
(type 2), diversifying livelihoods (type 3) and off/non-farm in-
come-based livelihoods (type 4). This typology confirms and at
the same time simplifies previous farm typologies derived for the
region about a decade earlier (e.g., Mbetid-Bessane et al., 2003).
Cotton can still be seen mainly on farms type 2 and to some extent
on type 3. The current landscape is shared between the two major
R’
ethnic groups that were present in the area since pre-colonial
times, the Peuhls and the Mafa, originally nomadic pastoralists
and sedentary agriculturalists respectively (Fig. 5A). These groups
have shaped the landscapes they inhabit creating contrasting spa-
tial patterns that reflect different natural resource management
systems. The typology proposed, however, falls short from being
able to differentiate such strategies, as it does not consider the his-
tory of land use and the evolution of livelihood strategies among
the various farm types identified.
A historical analysis of land occupation and land use patterns
revealed three major phases (Debru, 2009): a phase of sparse set-
tlement and land clearance for cultivation (until about 1980), a
phase of massive land clearance for agricultural expansion during
the 1990s, and a phase of sedentarisation of nomadic pastoralists
during the last decade (Fig. 5B). The introduction of cotton and
the subsequent expansion of agriculture were fuelled by a number
of development investments, including the creation of the national
cotton production and processing corporation Sodecoton in 1974.
Converging and diverging livelihood strategies throughout these
three phases led to the diversity of livelihood activities that can
be observed today in this territory and that were captured in the
farm typology. However, current farm type 1 may be the result
of either sedentarisation of nomadic pastoralists or of the abandon-
ment of cotton by wealthier Mafa farmers investing in livestock.
The diversifying farms type 3 may correspond to an alternative
to the latter, or be the result of diversification strategies by seden-
tary pastoralists, or by young Mafa farmers within links in town.
Etcetera. Current farm types may have followed several possible,
converging trajectories. In cases such as this one, in which transfor-
mations are possible and relatively frequent, farm types cannot be
seen simply as alternative states of a same system, and farm typol-
ogies must be delineated considering long-term trajectories, or
diachronically.
3.3. Do we need typologies of agricultural contexts?
In his classical review of methods for farm categorisation devel-
oped and applied in France Landais (1998) suggests the need to
delineate typologies of agricultural contexts. To understand diver-
sity of farming strategies, farm types should be interpreted and
analysed within the context in which they operate. This relates
well with the concept of Matryoshka effects outlined earlier (cf.
Fig. 2). In targeting interventions to improve livelihoods through
agricultural policy, investment in infrastructure or technology pro-
motion, two main dimensions that determine opportunities and
constraints across locations are often considered: agroecological
potential and market opportunities (e.g., IFPRI, 2007). These are
also the two dimensions that Dorward (2009) uses to distinguish
livelihood strategies of the poor in rural areas (cf. Section 3.3). At
local scale, these strategies and their determinants are nuanced
by differences between households in terms of resource endow-
ment, aspirations and social capital (cf. Fig. 4).
10 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14

Fig. 5. Occupation of a rural territory by two different ethnic groups (Mafa and Peuhl) in northern Cameroon. (A) Aerial picture illustrating typical patterns of land cover
associated with natural resource management practices by the different groups; (B) Convergence and divergence of livelihood strategies illustrated with a timeline that
represents the historical evolution of different clans and ethnic groups in the Benue region of northern Cameroon. The typology of households delineated from a socio-
economic survey conducted in 2009 shows that different current farm types may have followed different trajectories throughout their history, involving somewhat
irreversible transformations, such as sedentarisation (adapted from: Debru, 2009).

In most cases, however, agroecological potential and market
opportunities – which are also frequently related to each other –
are not enough to explain the observed diversity of livelihood
strategies across and within locations. Historical, political and
especially demographic processes, in combination with local vari-
ability among households, determine the space of opportunities
and constraints within which households types develop (cf.
Fig. 6). This can be illustrated by comparing household surveys
from three regions of relatively high agroecological potential but
differing in market access and population pressure (Tittonell
et al., 2010): Eastern Uganda (Mbale and Tororo districts), western
Kenya (Vihiga and Siaya districts) and central Kenya (Meru South
and Mbeere districts) (Table 2). Market opportunities can be de-
fined by the size, development and accessibility of major markets
(e.g. proximity to urban and export markets, infrastructure, market
information, transaction costs). For example, Meru South and Mbe-
ere districts vary widely in agricultural potential but both are lo-
cated close to the city of Nairobi (with an international airport)
and surrounded by the densely populated areas and mid-sized
towns of central Kenya, relatively well connected through major
national roads. In terms of agoecological potential, soils are inher-
ently more fertile in the districts of Meru South and Mbale, located
on the foot slopes of Mt. Kenya and Mt. Meru, respectively, and
receiving ample rainfall. The highest rural population densities oc-
cur in Vihiga district, in western Kenya and the lowest in Tororo,
eastern Uganda.
Intuitively, one may perhaps expect higher population densities
in areas with the highest agroecological potential and best market
opportunities. Vihiga, with more than 1000 inhabitants km2 in
much of the district, does not directly follow this trend due to eth-
no-cultural and historical reasons (Crowley and Carter, 2000). Pop-
ulation densities beyond a certain (site-specific) threshold are
often inversely proportional to the availability of resources per
household, but a larger population may also create more local
market and/or job opportunities in rural communities. In areas of
high resource potential and ample market opportunities such as
Meru South, different households may hang in, step up or step
out, or pursue mixed strategies, such as investing in lucrative cash
crops and re-investing their income into higher education for their
children (to eventually step out). By contrast, areas of poorer nat-
ural and market potential force most households to hang in. The
conditions required to promote viable stepping-up strategies can
be illustrated by looking at indicators of current land use and pro-
duction orientation.
In Fig. 6A, the six sites from East Africa have been plotted
according to their respective average areas allocated to cash crops
and left as fallow (n = 236 farms). While it may be assumed that
market opportunities increase in parallel with the area allocated
to cash crops, the effect of agroecological potential is not unidirec-
tional. The lines h1 and h2 represent, respectively, the degree of
complementarity and substitution between allocating land to cash
crops (a proxy to market orientation) and leaving land fallow (a
proxy for maintenance of soil fertility through traditional, exten-
sive methods). Population growth exerts pressure by reducing
the average land to labour ratios. Below a certain threshold of land
available per family, which differs across sites according to agroe-
cology and market opportunities, most households are forced to
step out. This is the case of Vihiga district in western Kenya, where
a large number of families pursue off/non-farm income strategies
as mentioned before. Earlier studies in the Kenya highlands indi-
cated minimum thresholds in farm sizes to ensure viability of
smallholder farming to be around 0.4 ha – about one acre (Salasya,
2005; Waithaka et al., 2006), which is not far from the current
average farm sizes in Vihiga district (Table 2). Likewise, it may
be hypothesised that there is an optimum farm size in relation to
the particular characteristics of each locality that may allow com-
plementarities between market orientation and sustainable land
use, represented in Fig. 6 A by the line h1. The two least populated
 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14 11

Fig. 6. Market orientation versus traditional management systems. In A, the six agroecosystems described in Table 2 are plotted according to the average area share of cash
crops (a proxy to market orientation) and the percentage of the farm area left fallow (a proxy to traditional soil management) or fallow duration; i.e., an area 20% fallow is
equivalent to 5 years of fallow duration. The hypothetical lines h1 and h2 indicate, respectively, the degree of complementarity and substitution between both strategies; i.e., a
given area with cash crops corresponds to sufficiently-long fallows on h1 or to too-short fallows on h2. In B, the contexts in which these agroecosystems operate (regions) are
depicted across stability domains defined by average levels of current soil fertility (ecosystem state) and of communally owned natural resources such as forest or grazing
lands (ecosystem insurance). The arrows represent the forces that confine the system towards a degraded state (population density and land degradation).

sites, where most households achieve food self-sufficiency (Tororo
and Mbale), lie close to the hypothetical ‘complementarity’ bound-
ary described by h1.
Unfortunately, soil degradation and the dwindling of farm sizes
often occur simultaneously. This is not equivalent to state that the
relationship between population density, land use change and soil
degradation is simple and unidirectional. I adhere to the non-
Malthusian view of several authors who argued that soil degrada-
tion is not gradual and uniform (e.g., Wrigley, 1957; Grigg, 1974)
and notably to the view of Crowley and Carter (2000), whose early
documentation of islands of soil fertility created by Maragoli farm-
ers inspired much of my own subsequent work on within-farm,
management-induced soil heterogeneity (e.g., Tittonell et al.,
2005a,b, 2007). But the increasing pressure on the surrounding
12 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14
ecosystem and the inability of farmers to access agricultural inputs
to sustain soil fertility when fallows disappear may push the agro-
ecosystem across the stability domains proposed by Fernandez
et al. (2002) – cf. Fig. 1 D.
As population densities increase, the natural ecosystem is
increasingly occupied and fragmented, on-farm resources are used
more intensively and subdivided across generations, and commu-
nally owned resources tend to disappear (Fig. 6B). Such trajectories
can be seen by analysing the biophysically comparable agroecosys-
tems of western Kenya, where high human population and soil
degradation were already common in the beginning of the 20th
Century (Maxwell et al., 1930), against those of Central Kenya, that
were still unpopulated after independence (e.g., Chogoria, in Meru
South – Suijkerbuijk, 2005) and those of the highlands of eastern
Uganda, that are still relatively sparsely populated with respect
to their potential carrying capacity. As systems become increas-
ingly confined, the outer Matroyshka gets smaller, and opportuni-
ties wane. Yet, the examples shown here indicate that thresholds
in variables such as population density, land size or soil fertility
status remain very elusive and may vary enormously across loca-
tions. They may be better described as ‘frontiers’ of possibility as
shown in Fig. 6. A typology of agricultural contexts that contem-
plates current drivers, as proposed by Landais (1998), but also
systems trajectories throughout their history (convergence-
divergence) seems essential to understand current diversity and
opportunities for rural livelihood strategies.
4. Discussion and conclusions
This paper contributes some initial responses to the call for
more concrete links between theory and practice around resilience
thinking in the realm of agricultural development (cf. Walker et al.,
2010). The case studies examined here illustrate how concepts
from systems ecology can be used in conceptualising and studying
key properties of smallholder African farms (cf. Fig. 4) and their
context (cf. Fig. 5). The focus was on human agency, in explaining
the diversity of livelihood strategies using concepts from resilience
and transformability, and not on the underlying biophysical pro-
cesses in agroecosystems (cf. Tittonell and Giller, 2013). Describing
household diversity as possible alternative system regimes that
follow non-linear trajectories implies – at least by analogy – that
a set of farms in an area may exhibit attributes of population
dynamics. This analogy may be valid in many cases, but not neces-
sarily so when it comes to describing the forces that keep house-
holds within a certain system regime preventing change. This is
because inequities are often reinforced by the nature of very resil-
ient local institutions.
A typical example of this is the free grazing of crop residues by
collective herds of cattle during the dry season that takes place in
many African agroecosystems (cf. McIntire et al., 1992). Communal
grazing on the village croplands represents a transfer of nutrients
via animal manure from all the fields of all the farmers of a village
to the fields of only those farmers who own livestock, usually less
than 20% of them (e.g., Zingore et al., 2011). Poorer farmers without
livestock face negative nutrient balances and a continuous decline
in land productivity. Poorer farmers will also often depend on live-
stock owners for animal power to prepare their land on time for
the first rains, and eventually to access some manure to fertilise
their fields, both of which they may obtain in exchange of labour.
As a consequence, the poorest farmers of the village often plant
their crops late and with little nutrient input. Less resource en-
dowed households face declining yields, less opportunity, strong
dependence on wealthier households, and unfavourable negotia-
tion terms – a typical positive feedback. Such inequitable situa-
tions tend to be resilient, reinforced by local institutions and
power, and aggravated when the times are difficult, as in the case
of droughts or of political instability. The propensity of system
shifts may be then weak and barely influenceable by external
forces, and households can remain fluctuating on the same system
regime for generations. In such cases the theory is not good, as it
makes little sense to describe household diversity as alternative
system regimes when the alternative is not really there. These
could be better described as endogenously reinforced poverty
traps.
When mobility is possible, when the propensity of upward and
downward shifts is there, this way of conceptualising household
diversity may open new insights. It implies that tipping points or
thresholds can be found beyond which increasing resource avail-
ability can stimulate system shifts in the desirable direction. It im-
plies that minimum thresholds could also be found that delineate
‘no-trespass zones’ if backward shifts are to be avoided. These are
essential to inform development aid or policy measures necessary
to preserve livelihoods. This way of conceptualising household
diversity also implies that in designing development programs it
is not enough to just deliver agricultural inputs to farmers, to pro-
vide them with single technological innovations, or to help them
gain access to more land or to capital assets. Such an approach
stems from conceptualising systems dynamics as represented in
Fig. 1A, in which trajectories are assumed to be continuous – albeit
with a threshold – and reversible. Resources are obviously neces-
sary, as are education and initiative, but these are pre-requisites
for shifts to happen and not necessarily shift-triggers in them-
selves. We saw through the examples presented here that it is vir-
tually impossible to identify single thresholds in single indicator
variables due to the existence of hysteresis and (effective) irrevers-
ibility (cf. Figs. 3 and 4), and to the influence of evolving contexts
(Fig. 6). Upward shifts may require profound reconfigurations of
the farming system, fuelled by a combination of opportunities
and attitudes within conducive socio-economic and biophysical
environments.
I presume that in a large number of cases the diversity of live-
lihood strategies in rural Africa can be described as alternative sys-
tem regimes which dynamics exhibit non-linearity, irreversibility
and hysteresis. In cases of converging livelihood strategies, as in
the example of Sahelian Cameroon (cf. Fig. 5), systems that may
bear some resemblance today may have had little in common
throughout their history. Household diversity is then the result
of divergent-convergent livelihood pathways that may have im-
plied radical transformations in the past. This may or not be rele-
vant when targeting development actions, depending on the
nature of the intervention, but it makes the delineation of house-
hold typologies rather challenging, and questions at the same time
the pertinence of commonly used structural typologies based so-
lely on asset levels. Although statistical clustering techniques be-
come increasingly powerful in differentiating homogeneous
groups (e.g. multi-dimensional scaling, classification trees), the
resulting clustering may not shed much light on understanding
the determinants and the long-term dynamics of household diver-
sity. Any clustering technique may be useful when there is, prior to
the statistical analysis, a solid hypothesis concerning household
diversity in a certain context and for a given purpose (cf. Tittonell
et al., 2010).
Typologies are necessarily context-specific, and the context it-
self is dynamic (cf. Fig. 6). The development of alternative liveli-
hood strategies in a given context is confined through the
Matryoshka effect, which is determined by local agro-ecological
potential, by demography, by market connectivity and ultimately
by local institutions. The analysis of cross-scale interactions pre-
sented here considers only one possible theoretical model: hierar-
chical confinement. The Matryoshka analogy, which offers a
graphical representation of fractal poverty traps, could perhaps
 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14
be of use to describe also the alternative model of panarchical rela-
tions, when both top-down and bottom-up interactions may occur
(Gunderson and Holling, 2002). I did not attempt to test this
hypothesis here, as this will require collecting and analysing extra
empirical evidence. Yet there are a number of examples from Afri-
can agroecosystems that suggest possible panarchical interactions.
For instance, all over the savannahs of West and Central Africa, an
unprecedented process of ‘privatisation’ of natural resources is tak-
ing place, by which agriculturalists claim ownership over their
crop residue biomass while herders claim ownership on their ani-
mal’s dejections. This often leads to conflict and to meagre flows of
carbon and nutrients between the crop and livestock components
of these agroecosystems. This compromises food security not only
now but also in the future, as soils are increasingly mined of nutri-
ents and physically degraded due to insufficient inputs or organic
matter.
In most of Africa, shrinking farm sizes prevent fallowing for soil
fertility restoration and make investments in agriculture unattrac-
tive, compromising both the productivity (soil fertility in this case)
and the insurance capacity of the agroecosystem (cf. Fig. 6B). The
buffering effect of communal resources such as forests or natural
grasslands as sources of carbon, nutrients, food, fuel and incomes
is decreasing as these areas shrink or degrade. Strategies for the
ecological intensification of smallholder systems – such as agroe-
cology – are urgently needed to propose alternative means to
maintain soil productivity, thereby displacing the minimum and
optimum farm sizes to the lower left corner in Fig. 6A (i.e., requir-
ing shorter or no fallow periods). The area available for crop pro-
duction and the land to labour ratio appeared as consistent
indicators of resource endowment (cf. Fig. 3). Indicators of perfor-
mance such as per capita income, i.e., the one dollar a day barrier,
were less informative. As farm sizes decline, increasing market ori-
entation may in some cases offer opportunities to step-up from
viable farms for subsistence to viable farm enterprises – only in
favourable contexts. Although thresholds are elusive, analysing
optimum or viable farm sizes across agroecological and market
development conditions is undoubtedly a research question to
investigate further, to provide supportive evidence, for example,
for land subdivision policies.1 And here is another possible panar-
chical interaction: smaller farm sizes means denser rural popula-
tions, with basic needs in terms of food, health and infrastructure,
but also with increasing needs for energy, most of which is nowa-
days obtained from in situ sources of biomass (firewood, cattle dung,
crop residues).
Designing sustainable, viable forms of natural resource manage-
ment in human ecosystems may often imply radical transforma-
tions of the status quo. A conspicuous example of resilience and
transformability is the radical change in the configuration of Cuban
agriculture following the collapse of the Soviet Union and their
support through subsidised agricultural inputs (Funes-Monzote
et al., 2008). In Africa, evidence shows that in spite of the multiple
shocks and stressors – whether endogenous or exogenous, uncon-
trollable – that affect rural communities, regulatory feedbacks and
self-organised adaptability prevent a large majority of smallhold-
ings from collapsing. Several buffering mechanisms operate at
community level that emerge from collective action, local rules
or traditions, regulating the utilisation and conservation of com-
mon natural resources (e.g., Meinzen-Dick et al., 2004; Speelman
et al., 2013). Alternative livelihood strategies built on strong rur-
al–urban connectivity (e.g., Andersson, 2001) and farmers’ adap-
1
This has been a long lasting debate in countries such as Kenya, for instance, where
the government has been trying to pass a law limiting land subdivision through
inheritance below a certain threshold area. Such a debate became particularly hot
during the last election campaign (see e.g. The East African Standard, Nairobi, 22
September 2007, www.eastandard.net).
13
tive capacity to perceived environmental changes (e.g., Enfors
et al., 2008) play also a major role in the resilience of these sys-
tems. By analogy to the concept of informal economies of de Soto
(2000), such alternatives have been termed informal resource
strategies (Tittonell et al., 2009), as they tend to be unaccounted
for in agroecosystems analysis.
Agroecosystems are complex socio-ecological systems, with
biological and cultural dimensions, and their resilience and adapt-
ability result from the aggregation of individual decisions. Deci-
sion-making often responds to rules and traditions established by
agents that compete for/ negotiate over the use of communally
owned resources. A key step to understanding adaptation strate-
gies is then the study of local perceptions and knowledge sustain-
ing mechanisms of indigenous resilience, particularly at the scale
of the landscape and its functionality. While agroecology needs
to provide technical answers for the sustainable intensification of
smallholder landscapes, policy and market developments are
needed to deal with the Matryoshka effect. Desirable shifts in
farming systems can only be stimulated by working on both ends
simultaneously. In designing such interventions, operational defi-
nitions of system properties such as non-linearity, irreversibility,
convergence/divergence and hysteresis are essential to understand
the dynamics that govern agroecosystem resilience and
transformability.
Acknowledgement
This research was partially funded by the European Union
through the project ABACO, Agroecology based aggradation-con-
servation agriculture (DCI-FOOD 2010/230-178).
References
Andersson, J.A., 2001. Reinterpreting the rural-urban connection: Migration
practices and socio-cultural dispositions of Buhera workers in Harare. Africa
71, 82–112.
Barret, C.B., Swallow, B.M., 2006. Fractal poverty traps. World Dev. 34, 1–15.
Crowley, E.L., 1997. Rapid data collection using wealth ranking and other
techniques. International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF), Nairobi,
Kenya, 16 p.
Crowley, E.L., Carter, S.E., 2000. Agrarian change and the changing relationships
between toil and soil in Maragoli, western Kenya (1900–1994). Human Ecol. 28,
383–414.
Debru, J., 2009. L’abandon de la culture du cotonnier est-il momentané ou définitif
?Diagnostic agro-économique d’une petite région agricole dans le bassin de la
Bénoué, au Nord Cameroun. Mémoire de Master, AgroParisTech, Paris, France,
pp. 84.
Dorward, A., 2009. Integrating contested aspirations, processes and policy:
development as hanging in, stepping up and stepping out. Dev. Policy Rev. 27,
131–146.
Enfors, E., Gordon, L., 2007. Analyzing resilience in dryland agro-ecosystems: a case
study of the Makanya catchment in Tanzania over the past 50 years. Land Degr.
Dev. 18, 680–696.
Enfors, E., Gordon, L., Peterson, G.D., Bossio, D., 2008. Making investments in
dryland development work: participatory scenario planning in the Makanya
catchment, Tanzania. Ecol. Soc. 13 (2), 42.
Fernandez, R.J., Archer, E.R.M., Ash, A.J., Dowlatabadi, H., Hiernaux, P.H.Y., Reynolds,
J.F., Vogel, C.H., Walker, B.H., Wiegand, T., 2002. Degradation and recovery in
socio-ecological systems: a view from the household/farm level. In: Reynolds,
J.F., Stafford Smith, D.M. (Eds.), Global Desertification: Do Humans Cause
Deserts? Dahlem University Press, Berlin, pp. 430.
Funes-Monzote, F.R., Monzote, M., Lantinga, E.A., Van Keulen, H., 2008. Conversion
of specialized dairy farming systems into sustainable mixed farming systems in
Cuba. Env. Dev. Sust. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/S10668-008-91427.
Grigg, D.B., 1974. The Agricultural Systems of the World: An Evolutionary Approach.
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Gunderson, L.H., Holling, C.S. (Eds.), 2002. Panarchy: understanding transformations
in human and natural systems. Island Press, Washington, D.C., USA.
Holling, C.S., 1973. Resilience and stability of ecological systems. Ann. Rev. Ecol.
Syst. 4, 1–23.
ICAC, 2010. Cotton: World Statistics, ed. International Cotton Advisory Committee
(Washington: Secretariat of the ICAC) 286 p.
International Food Policy Research Institute, 2007. IFPRI’s Africa Strategy: Toward
Food and Nutrition Security in Africa. Research and Capacity Building. IFPRI
Publications, Washington DC, 20 pp.
14 P. Tittonell / Agricultural Systems 126 (2014) 3–14
Landais, E., 1998. Modelling farm diversity: new approaches to typology building in
France. Agric. Syst. 58, 505–527.
Lybbert, T.J., Barrett, C.B., Desta, S., Coppock, D.L., 2004. Stochastic wealth dynamics
and risk management among a poor population. Econ. J. 114, 750–777.
Maxwell, G.V., Anderson, E.L.B., Owen, W.E., 1930. Report of the Committee on
Native Land Tenure in the North Kavirondo Reserve. Government Printer,
Nairobi.
Mbetid-Bessane E., Havard, M., Djamen Nana, P., Djonnewa, A., Djondang, K., Leroy,
J., 2003. Typologies des exploitations agricoles dens les savanes d’Afrique
centrale. In: Jamin, J.Y., Boukar, L., Floret, C. (Eds.) Savanes Africaines: des
espaces en mutation, des acteurs face á de nouveaux défis. Actes du colloque,
mai 2002, Garoua, Cameroon. Prasac, N’Djamena, Tchad-Cirad, Montpellier,
France.
McIntire, J., Bourzat, D., Pingali, P., 1992. Crop-livestock interaction in Sub-Saharan
Africa. The World Bank, Washington DC, USA.
Meinzen-Dick, R., Di Gregorio, M., McCarthy, N., 2004. Methods for studying
collective action in rural development. Agric. Syst. 82, 197–214.
O’Neill, R.V., DeAngelis, D.L., Waide, J.B., Allen, T.F.H., 1986. A hierarchical concept of
ecosystems. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, USA.
Salasya, B.D.S., 2005. Crop production and soil nutrient management: an economic
analysis of households in Western and Central Kenya. PhD thesis Development
Economics, Wageningen University, The Netherlands, pp. 185.
Scheffer, M., Carpenter, S., Foley, J.A., Folke, C., Walker, B., 2001. Catastrophic shifts
in ecosystems. Nature 413 (6856), 591–596.
de Soto, H., 2000. The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and
Fails Everywhere Else. Basic Books, NY, pp. 220.
Speelman, E.N., García-Barrios, L.E., Groot, J.C.J., Tittonell, P., 2013. Gaming for
smallholder participation in the design of more sustainable agricultural
landscapes. Agic. Syst. 126, 62–75.
Suijkerbuijk, N., 2005. Livelihood strategies; the case of diversification and risk
attitudes of smallholders in Central Kenya, 2005. Development Economics,
Wageningen University, The Netherlands, pp. 107.
Tittonell, P., Vanlauwe, B., Leffelaar, P.A., Rowe, E., Giller, K.E., 2005a. Exploring
diversity in soil fertility management of smallholder farms in western Kenya. I.
Heterogeneity at region and farm scale. Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 110, 149–165.
Tittonell, P., Vanlauwe, B., Leffelaar, P.A., Shepherd, K.D., Giller, K.E., 2005b.
Exploring diversity in soil fertility management of smallholder farms in
western Kenya. II. Within-farm variability in resource allocation, nutrient
flows and soil fertility status. Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 110, 166–184.
Tittonell, P., Vanlauwe, B., de Ridder, N., Giller, K.E., 2007. Heterogeneity of crop
productivity and resource use efficiency within smallholder Kenyan farms: soil
fertility gradients or management intensity gradients? Agric. Syst. 94, 376–390.
Tittonell, P., Corbeels, M., van Wijk, M.T., Vanlauwe, B., Giller, K.E., 2008. Combining
organic and mineral fertilizers for integrated soil fertility management in
smallholder farming systems of Kenya – explorations using the crop-soil model
FIELD. Agron. J. 100, 1511–1526.
Tittonell, P., van Wijk, M.T., Herrero, M., Rufino, M.C., de Ridder, N., Giller, K.E., 2009.
Beyond resource constraints – exploring the physical feasibility of options for
the intensification of smallholder crop-livestock systems in Vihiga district,
Kenya. Agric. Syst. 101, 1–19.
Tittonell, P., Muriuki, A.W., Shepherd, K.D., Mugendi, D., Kaizzi, K.C., Okeyo, J.,
Verchot, L., Coe, R., Vanlauwe, B., 2010. The diversity of rural livelihoods and
their influence on soil fertility in agricultural systems of East Africa - A typology
of smallholder farms. Agric. Syst. 103, 83–97.
Tittonell, P., Scopel, E., Andrieu, N., Posthumus, H., Mapfumo, P., Corbeels, M., van
Halsema, G.E., Lahmar, R., Lugandu, S., Rakotoarisoa, J., Mtambanengwe, F.,
Pound, B., Chikowo, R., Naudin, K., Triomphe, B., Mkomwa, S., 2012.
Agroecology-based aggradation-conservation agriculture (ABACO): Targeting
innovations to combat soil degradation and food insecurity in semi-arid Africa.
Field Crop Res. 132, 168–174.
Tittonell, P., Giller, K.E., 2013. When yield gaps are poverty traps: The paradigm of
ecological intensification in African smallholder agriculture. Field Crop Res. 143,
76–90.
Waithaka, M.M., Thornton, P.K., Herrero, M., Shepherd, K.D., 2006. Bio-economic
evaluation of farmers’ perceptions of viable farms in western Kenya. Agric. Syst.
90, 243–271.
Walker, B.H., Holling, C.S., Carpenter, S.C., Kinzig, A.P., 2004. Resilience, adaptability
and transformability. Ecol. Soc. 9 (2), 5.
Walker, B.H., Gunderson, L.H., Kinzig, A.P., Folke, C., Carpenter, S.R., Schultz, L., 2006.
A handful of heuristics and some propositions for understanding resilience in
social-ecological systems. Ecol. Soc. 11 (1), 13.
Walker, B.H., Sayer, J., Andrew, N.L., Campbell, B., 2010. Should enhanced resilience
be an objective of natural resource management research for developing
countries? Crop Sci. 50, 10–19.
Wrigley, C.C., 1957. Buganda: An outline economic history. Econ. Hist. Rev. 10, 69–
80.
Vall, E., Diallo, M.A., 2009. Savoirs techniques locaux et pratiques: la conduite des
troupeaux aux pâturages (Ouest du Burkina Faso). Nature Science Sociétés 17,
122–135.
Zingore, S., Tittonell, P., Corbeels, M., Wijk, M.T., Giller, K.E., 2011. Managing soil
fertility diversity to enhance resource use efficiencies in smallholder farming
systems: a case from Murewa District. Zimbabwe. Nut. Cycl. Agroecosyst. 90,
87–103.