Exploring farmers' perception, knowledge, and management techniques of salt-affected soils to enhance rice production on small land holdings in Tanzania

Salt-affected soils among the key constraints to land productivity in irrigated rice schemes, posing a decline in grain yield. This study was conducted to explore the farmers' perception, knowledge, and management practices of salt-affected soils in selected rice irrigation schemes of the representative districts in Tanzania. Whereas salt-affected soils were perceived as one of the constraints in the studied irrigation schemes, the extent of coverage and the severity of the effect are rarely documented. Therefore, the primary hypothesis of this study is that salt-affected soils could have an effect on rice production across irrigation schemes; and that farmers differ in perception, knowledge, and coping mechanisms. The Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) approach was employed to explore the farmers' information from Mbarali, Iringa, Same, and Moshi districts, whereby 323 rice-growing farmers were interviewed using semi-structured questionnaires. Moreover, 120 farmers were involved in focus group discussions and 24 key informants. Our study showed that a majority (78%) of farmers attributed a decline in rice yield largely to salt-affected soils. The perception of farmers on the extent to which they experience salt-affected soils in their rice farms differed significantly (chi 2 = 50.373; p = < 0.001). In contrast, farmers' responses on salt-affected soils across the districts were not significantly (chi 2 = 6.133; p = 0.408) different, which is an interesting result indicating that salt constraints were equally important in rice producing irrigation schemes. Enhancing farmers' knowledge and providing effective and affordable management technologies can improve rice production in small land holdings affected by salts.