Closing yield gaps in China by empowering smallholder farmers

The authors report on attempts to increase the yield of smallholder farms in China using ten practices recommended by the Science and Technology Backyard for farming maize and wheat at county level. Better crop yields for smallholder farms Closing the gap between realized and potential crop yields is key to sustainably feeding the world's growing population. Fusuo Zhang and colleagues report on attempts to increase wheat and maize yields of smallholder farms in four villages in Quzhou County in the North China Plain, using ten practices recommended by the Science and Technology Backyard, a co-operative research project involving agricultural scientists, local extension officers and smallholder farmers. Adoption of these practices—including alternative seed varieties, sowing times and other crop management practices—raised five-year-average yields from 68% to 97% of the attainable level on target farms, and 63% to 80% countywide. The authors suggest that this approach could be adopted in other parts of the world to help smallholder farmers achieve greater yields. Sustainably feeding the world’s growing population is a challenge 1 , 2 , 3 , and closing yield gaps (that is, differences between farmers’ yields and what are attainable for a given region) 4 , 5 , 6 is a vital strategy to address this challenge 3 , 4 , 7 . The magnitude of yield gaps is particularly large in developing countries where smallholder farming dominates the agricultural landscape 4 , 7 . Many factors and constraints interact to limit yields 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 8 , 9 , 10 , and progress in problem-solving to bring about changes at the ground level is rare. Here we present an innovative approach for enabling smallholders to achieve yield and economic gains sustainably via the Science and Technology Backyard (STB) platform. STB involves agricultural scientists living in villages among farmers, advancing participatory innovation and technology transfer, and garnering public and private support. We identified multifaceted yield-limiting factors involving agronomic, infrastructural, and socioeconomic conditions. When these limitations and farmers’ concerns were addressed, the farmers adopted recommended management practices, thereby improving production outcomes. In one region in China, the five-year average yield increased from 67.9% of the attainable level to 97.0% among 71 leading farmers, and from 62.8% to 79.6% countywide (93,074 households); this was accompanied by resource and economic be