The expansion of agriculture into wild lands poses an enormous risk to conservation efforts and to the ecosystem services upon which our societies depend. An alternative is growing more food on less land. To help farmers in Tanzania accomplish this, CIAT is leading a work stream to spatially target agricultural intensification investments that promote smallholder farmer inclusiveness and sustainable use of natural resources.
Funded by the Science for Nature and People (SNAP) partnership between The Nature Conservancy, Wildlife Conservation Society and National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, the group will focus in the Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania (SAGCOT). The first working group meeting was held on September 15-17 in Dar es Salam, Tanzania, attended by Evan Girvetz and Deborah Bossio and members from the SAGCOT Centre Limited Liability Company, the Tanzanian government, NGOs, the private sector, academia, and the Agriculture Non-state Actors Forum association of Tanzanian farmers’ organizations. The next working group meeting will take place in March 2015.