Browsing by Author "Kaba, James S."

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Abundance, richness and use of medicinal plants under different land uses in the Guinea Savanna zone of Northern Ghana
    (All Earth, 2022) Yeboah, Samuel Owusu; Amponsah, Isaac K.; Kaba, James S.; Abunyewa, Akwasi A.; 0000-0001-5587-1071
    Change in land use affects the conservation of medicinal plants. We assessed the abundance and richness of medicinal plants under different land-use systems in Ghana. The land-use types consisted of protected area (PA), Fallowed Land (FL) and Farmed area (FA). A total of 45 quadrats (30 m × 30 m) were laid randomly and medicinal plants identified. Soil samples (0–15 cm) were also collected from nested quadrats for physiochemical analysis. Additionally, ethnobotanical survey of 210 key informants was carried out using Snowball sampling method to identify plant parts used and ailments treated. The result identified 107 species of medicinal plants, and the roots (34.4%) and bark (33.3%) were mostly used. PA had higher (P < 0.05) abundance (81.75 ± 6.74) and richness (19.80 ± 0.96) while FA had the least. The principal component analysis (PCA) showed that PC1 accounted for 48.7% of the variance with abundance (0.8092), richness (0.9168), TN (0.9312) and ECEC (0.7789) positively loaded on it. The PC2 accounted for 24.1% of the variance in the soil physical properties. We established that integrating medical plants into crops as Agroforestry system can improve their conservation. Our findings have implications for the attainment of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) 3 , 13 and 15 .
  • No Thumbnail Available
    Item
    Agroforestry as an old approach to a new challenge of combating climate change: a critical analysis of the cocoa sector
    (KNUST, 2024-11-14) Kaba, James S.
    Climate change is the greatest challenge to developing countries, especially where rain-fed agriculture is the main source of livelihood and revenue. Agroforestry provides an opportunity for farmers to adapt and reduce the carbon footprint. We conducted an exploratory review on the role of cocoa agroforestry for climate change mitigation and adaptation of smallholders by applying combinations of keywords that include climate change, agroforestry, stakeholders, Paris agreement, INDCs/NDCs, mitigation and adaptation. The paper combined data sources covering reports on past and on-going cocoa sustainability projects and policy interventions in Ghana as well as the output of exploratory review that utilized relevant key words to identify appropriate literature for investigation and analysis. We established that, there is low adoption of pro-environmental interventions introduced by both Government and NGOs in the cocoa sector. In addition, there is a shift in cocoa farming from expansion into forest areas to adoption of intensive cocoa monoculture. Despite the importance of shaded trees in cocoa production such as the benefits gained from agroforestry system, cocoa farmers have low appreciation of their environmental, soil, nutrients and other ecological benefits. We recommend that cocoa farmers should be involved in the formulation and implementation of pro-environmental interventions that affect their cocoa production practices. This will make farmers take ownership of the innovation instead of it being introduced to them. In addition, since our review of the literature established that the surge in yield is the impetus for cocoa mono-culture adoption, there is the need to introduce cocoa varieties with higher yields under agroforestry system. Finally, there should be monetary valuation of shade trees used in cocoa agroforestry systems for payment to farmers to help improve agroforestry adoption. We argue that cocoa agroforestry though considered an old practice, remains one of the most appropriate land-use systems that is climate-smart with great potential to contribute to sustainable cocoa production.