Biofortification is a promising strategy to reduce micronutrient malnutrition especially in rural areas. In most of these areas, the poor grow their own food. According to IAPRI (2016), the percentage of rural households who manage to feed themselves and actually sell some of the maize is at 61% with the remaining being able to feed from their produce for a less long period from their produce. In these settings, the strategy involves breeding staple food crops to be a rich source of one or more key micronutrients, such as iron, zinc, vitamin A, and iodine, and disseminating these crops in areas where the rate of micronutrient deficiency is high and where poor households consume a large share of calories from staple foods. On average, an adult Zambian consumes about 74 kg of maize per year and it remains the dietary mainstay in central, southern and eastern Zambia accounting for about 60% of the national calorie consumptions (Dorosh et al, 2009). Apart from maize, the other staple is cassava, accounting for roughly 15% of national calorie consumption. In the Northern and Western parts of Zambia, cassava takes a much more prominent role and usually this area is referred to as a dual staple zone (Dorosh et al., 2009; Haggblade et al., 2012).
Poverty levels in rural areas have remained high (76%) as compared to urban areas (27%) even though they have been reducing at a lower rate. Malnutrition related problems have barely changed over the last decades. Stunting, for children below 5 years of age has increased to 48% from about 45% in 2010, according to the Living Conditions Monitoring Survey (LCMS) "Central Statistical Office, 2015".Vitamin A deficiency is equally high, at about 54% of the children below 5 years of age (WHO, 2009). Zambia, despite recording bumper harvests year after, has also been ranked poorly on the Global Hunger Index which measures nutritional outcomes. In the 2015 report, Zambia is among the 3 worst countries in Africa. All this underscores the need for newer approaches to responding to nutrition challenges the country is facing.HarvestPlus Zambia working with Self Help Africa in the Integrated Research in Development Programme with the financial help of Irish Aid has been promoting and researching on vitamin A maize (VAM) in the Northern parts of Zambia. Havert Plus is a global leader in fighting micronutrient deficiency (hidden hunger) working in Asia, Africa and South America. The programme is co-hosted by the International Food Policy Research Institute and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture. Self Help Africa is an international Non-Governmental Organisation that is working on sustainable agriculture and nutrition programmes. In this project, HarvetPlus partnered with World Fish Center and Center for International Forestry Research, also members of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research to manage the research in development programme while Self Help manages the development aspect of the programme. The research programme is a 3-pronged approach focusing on nutrition, fisheries and forestry with each component managed by Harvet Plus, World Fish and CIFOR, respectively. Harvest Plus concentrates its efforts on promoting biofortied crops and researching on adoption and utilization. The goal of the project is to reach some of the most poor in the communities and to do this, quite homogenous grouping of the poor had to be established.
These were arranged at village level. Groups consisting of 45 members of the community who are chosen on a vulnerability (poverty) criterion were organized- these were named Livelihoods Enhancement Groups (LEGs) and numbered numerically.
In the first season of promotion of VAM, seeds of about 60 g were distributed to members of the Livelihood Enhancement Groups (LEGs) to host demonstration plots for two varieties, GV 665 A and HP 1002. The demonstration plots were at zone level- usually comprising of about 4 LEGs. The demonstration plots were a point of learning for both the farmers and the researchers. For the farmers, they got first-hand experience on how to grow VAM after receiving trainings on the agronomic and nutritional value of VAM. After harvest, the groups shared the produce among themselves for household use, while others stored and used them at group (LEG) level. Depending on the number of members who were active and the production level, quantities shared differed but all those interviewed got at least 10 kg. Depending on the family size, frequency of preparation and quantity received, households were able to eat VAM for a period of between a month and 3 months. A follow-up utilization survey was then conducted to investigate farmers’ perceptions on the growing of VAM and how well it was being integrated into common diets. Results of the survey constitute this article.
Cropping patterns and nutrition
The economy of Northern Province is predominantly agricultural based. More than 80% of Northern Province’s population depends on agriculture and natural resources. Though there are variations across the districts in terms of the specific activity portfolios, the main activities include crop farming, fishing, livestock and forest extraction. The main crops grown in the province are cassava, maize, groundnuts, beans, millet and sweet potatoes. The two districts, Mbala and Luwingu have some differences also within them. According to Ngoleka (2013) who did some livelihoods zoning in the two districts, four zones were identified (3 in Luwingu, 1 in Mbala). According to the report, Mbala district comprises one livelihood zone: the ‘Maize, Cassava and Bean Zone’. The three zones in Luwingu are:
1. Fish pond fishing, cassava and agricultural trade zone,
2. West and east cassava, groundnuts and rice zone, and
3. Lake fishing, cassava and irrigated vegetable zone.
While Mbala is a maize belt, Luwingu is a cassava belt and it is only recently that farmers have started growing maize mainly because of the inputs they receive through the Farmer Input Support Programme (FISP). By giving heavily subsidized inputs (fertilizer and maize seed) mostly meant for maize, even farmers who traditionally grew cassava are switching to maize so as to access these inputs and because of the certain market they are assured for maize through the government grain marketing board, the Food Reserve Agency. For promotion of VAM, this is a good opportunity because VAM will be part of ‘maize’ that is being adopted than bringing it later on after they have known other white maize varieties for years. Knowledge of growing maize is also noticeably different among farmers in these two districts. Cassava is grown in both districts, but more so in Luwingu. The province accounts for about 39% of the total cassava production (quantity); this is compared to just about 17% for maize nationally (CSO/MAL, 2014). The other main starch is millet, though it is mostly used for brewing of both alcoholic and non-alcoholic local beverages. In times of shortage of both maize and cassava, people resolve to cooking nshima from millet (finger) flour. The main legumes are bean and groundnuts. This is traditionally a bean producing region, with 71% of the national produce coming from the province. Most of the bean is traded and sees its way to major consumption hubs like Copperbelt and Lusaka and little is kept for home consumption. The major farming systems in the province include shifting cultivation [chitemene], semi-permanent hoe system, semi-permanent hoe system and ox plough system, semi-commercial cultivation, and commercial systems. The majority of the smallholder farmers in the districts of Mbala and Luwingu use simple technologies [hand hoe and oxen] and there is minimal purchases of inputs such as fertilizers.
However, crop diversification is still limited and it has been further hampered by FISP which has continued to promote maize at the expense of other crops. The province has continued to experience chronic food and nutrition security problems, with stunting as the most common nutritional disorder affecting children under five years. Nationally, vitamin A deficiency and lack of iron are some of the serious micro-nutrient deficiencies affecting children and women. In Mbala, Vitamin A Deficiency (VAD) is above the national levels with about half of the children estimated to be affected. Halimatou et al. (2014) estimates that about 90% of the women in Luapula and Northern provinces of Zambia do not get
enough vitamin A from the commonly consumed foods. Though, there are other efforts to reduce VAD, such as the national vitamin A supplementation program which distributes high dose vitamin A capsules twice annually to children 6 to 59 months of age, and vitamin A fortification of sugar (WHO, 2009), they face challenges like sustainability, coverage and efficiency. Supplementation is targeted at young children despite having a good coverage of 89% of the country geographically between 2007 and 2011 (Kafwembe, 2009; Fiedler et al., 2013) while sugar fortification is reaching mainly the wealthy part of the population who afford other foods that provide vitamin A and has potential for hypervitaminosis (Clewes and Kankasa, 2003; Gannon et al., 2014). Biofortification aims to complement the government efforts like supplementation and commercial fortification by allowing farmers to grow micro-nutrient rich crops and access the nutrients when consumed.
To be a member of the LEG, there is a vulnerability criterion which must be passed. The criteria includes; a) female headed households and/or b) elderly headed households and/or c) households with orphans and vulnerable children and/or d) people with health conditions and impairments.
Given these criteria, members of the LEGs are expected to have below average levels of micronutrient deficiencies. Around 26% of the rural households are female headed while those headed by the elderly (60 years and older) make up 5.5% of the total rural population (IAPRI, 2016). Within households, males tend to have significantly more education than females. Women play multiple roles in both agricultural production and nutrition, and interventions that consider trade-offs between their respective roles and their time and labor constraints are more likely to lead to positive outcomes (Sitko et al., 2011). Gender is very important in nutrition related programs because women’s status and decision-making power directly affects the nutritional status of their children. Women are also the most nutritionally vulnerable when pregnant and lactating, as their bodies must cope with the additional nutritional stresses and demands of pregnancy and lactation (Sitko et al., 2011). A correlation is also present between years of schooling and income (Kuteya et al., 2011). In most studies determining causes of child malnutrition, literacy level of the mother/guardian to the child has been found to be one of the major factors (Maleta et al., 2003; Bantamen et al., 2014; Boulos et al., 2016). This means that apart from being poor, these groups’ nutritional status is exacerbated by low literacy levels. Therefore, some of the factors that are related to the acceptance of VAM among members of the LEGs given the likely nutritional status were investigated.
Because consumers are followed after they have prepared different foods at home, this approach uses a kind of home-use testing instead of the central location testing where consumers are in a central place to taste the VAM and be asked questions about it. This allows the consumers to cook the product in various ways they want for a longer period of time and give their sensory scores, perceptions, observations and any problems they encounter and in this case compare it with other products that they usually eat at home. One drawback, however, is that the researcher has no control over how the product is prepared, and any answers about taste, aroma and appearance could not dully depend on the intrinsic value of the product but maybe also on the way each household prepared it.
Data source
The data was collected from LEGs in Mbala and Luwingu. A structured questionnaire was administered to 96 farmers who are members of the LEGs and mostly took part in the growing of VAM the previous season. Fifty Two from Mbala, while 44 were drawn from Luwingu. At the time of the study, the number of LEGs in Mbala was about 102 with each LEG having 45 members selected using the above stated criteria while Luwingu had about 99 LEGs. However, the number of LEGs that took part in the VAM demonstration plots in the previous season is less as some zones did not have demonstration plots. In both Luwingu and Mbala, there were 4 zones with demonstration plots. No VAM seed was commercially available and farmers could not grow it at home but only through the HarvestPlus managed demonstration plots. VAM seed only became commercially available in the 2014/2015 agricultural season as ZAMSEED seed company marketed the first variety while in the 2015/2016 agricultural season, two more seed companies started marketing their varieties commercially as well. The sample is drawn from members of the LEGs and among members that took part in the growing of VAM because the study was also interested in the farmers experience with the crop agronomically. Because of resources, only about 30% of the number of farmers that took part was sampled. The sampling was done randomly from the participation lists during field activities at the plots. The questionnaire included questions on demographics. Focus group discussions were held with selected members of different LEGs; one in each district. This was a means of triangulating the data as well as getting some detailed information on the why and how questions that could not easily be solicited by the questionnaire. The FGD guide followed mainly in the same line as the questionnaire but with more focus on understanding the basic framework within which the decisions are made and the reasons for some perceptions that were advanced.
