Economics of On-farm Production of Indigenous Fruits - Indigenous Fruit Trees in the Tropics: Domestication, Utilization and Commercialization - page 244

planted more IFTs because they lacked knowledge of how to do so. Still, 61%
of households anticipated planting more IFTs in the future, mostly to have the
fruits at their homestead. If the sale of U. kirkiana fruits collected from the
communal areas were to be made illegal, but if the sale of fruit from planted
trees were legal, 86.6% of the farmers would start to plant the trees. The higher
share of Takawira farmers who are willing to plant if only the sale of fruits
produced on plantations is legalized may be due to the fact that they perceive
the fruits to be less available from the commons.
Reasons for planting or not planting IFTs and EFTs are similar, but the
relative importance differs between the indigenous and exotic species. Overall,
in Murehwa, natural regeneration and relative abundance of the IFTs weighs
heavier as a reason for not planting more trees in the future than the lack of
knowledge about IFT planting. In Takawira, lack of knowledge on IFT cultivation
and resource constraints (e.g. no seedlings, no fencing material available) seem
to be more important (Table 13.2).

Analysis of costs of establishing an indigenous fruit tree orchard
In Murehwa, households have between zero and 154 U. kirkiana trees of
varying age and size, with an average of 24 trees, growing in their fields and
homesteads. These are naturally grown trees that have been preserved in
farmers' fields. If farmers start deliberate planting of the trees, investment costs,
in terms of either purchase of seedlings or own production of seedlings and
labour for planting, will accrue. In this study, costs of seedlings are calculated at
average production costs, which include labour valued at the local wage rate in
Murehwa of ZW$58 per man-day, and material inputs, i.e. tubes. Labour
requirements for seedling production are available from the ICRAF Research
Station in Makoka, Malawi (J.A. Maghembe, World Agroforestry Centre,
Malawi, 1999, personal communication) (see Table 13.3).
Due to a germination rate of 80% (Chidumayo, 1997) and a low rate of
survival (20%; Chidumayo, 1997) during the first year after planting, and a

Table 13.2. Reasons for not planting indigenous fruit trees (IFTs) in the future (%).

Murehwa Takawira

Number of farmers who do not intend to plant indigenous fruit
trees in the future:

123 32

Lack of knowledge 20 16

IFTs sufficiently abundant in the communal areas 50 9

Resource constraints a 5 34

Time to maturity too long 0 22

Other b 6 19

No answer 20 0

a Lack of land, labour, fencing material, seedlings.
b Lack of interest, fruits difficult to sell.
Figures do not add up to 100 due to differences in rounding.
Source: Mithöfer (2005).