Land: a scientific tool for development
p. 136
Résumé
After African countries gained independence, African agriculture was in need of modernisation. Development operations were financed with no preliminary studies, creating a need for scientific knowledge relating to African agricultural issues.
Texte intégral
1In the 1950s and until the early 1960s, large-scale agricultural surveys were initiated in a number of African countries (Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon) to provide overall statistics on the scale of vast regions. Consequently, this data concealed spatial differentiations, in addition to being static and minimising the role of food crop production.
Village scene, Rhumsiki, far north region of Cameroon.

© IRD/J.-F. Meunier
2This led to the adoption of a radically different approach in the 1960s: using monographs to describe the components of local agrarian situations which were to provide indicators tailored to every form of African agriculture. The core document was a set of land maps, defined as an “appropriate part of a territory, developed and used by the people who live therein and from which they derive their livelihood”.
Field labour, Niger.

© IRD/F. Boyer
3From the 1960s to the 1980s, generations of young geographers conducted land surveys which accurately reflected local agrarian organisations. In contrast to previous assumptions, these surveys were as elaborate as in Europe, with original features such as the pivotal role of certain trees in farming systems.
4In the 1990s, developers realised that the land-based approach could provide insight into farming innovations, such as the integration of crop growers into migrant reception centres and parcel improvements following the adoption of new agricultural outputs. The purpose of the “land management” policy was to involve village communities in the development process, notably the preservation of natural resources and land management.
5As they involved prolonged immersion in village life, land surveys raised the researchers’ awareness of the pertinence of the farmers’ knowledge of agriculture. This rehabilitation of local knowledge, which is more relevant than ever, is the foundation of endogenous rural development, free from external influence.

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