CGIAR Central Asia and the Caucasus

Agro-Ecological Zones

There are five agro-ecological zones in the CAC region:

• cold semi-arid lowland rainfed;
• lowland irrigated;
• lowland rainfed;
• lowland semi-arid rangeland;
• and mountains (mountain pastures supporting extensive livestock, with irrigated crops in the valleys).

Production constraints differ in each agro-ecological zone:

a) In cold semi-arid rainfed lowland areas, drought and soil erosion are major constraints for crop productivity. Crop diversification is an important challenge as production systems are based on single crop wheat followed by summer fallow. Vast areas of marginal lands are not used either for crop or for livestock production.

b) In lowland irrigated areas, salinization, water-logging and collapse of the former state-operated large-scale irrigation systems are the major problems. Opportunities exist for intensifying irrigated agriculture, but only if appropriate water management technologies are applied for delivery of water to farms and appropriate irrigation practices are employed to maximize water productivity.

c) In rainfed areas, inputs are low in predominantly cereal-based systems and there are problems with maintaining soil fertility. Small farmers need assistance with enterprise development and the introduction of new crops and rotation patterns. There is a considerable potential for developing mixed farming through the integration of both crop and livestock production.

d) The redistribution of land and lack of state attention are leading to problems of open access, overgrazing and degradation in lowland semi-arid rangelands, which are non-arable common steppe lands and are important for livestock production. The problem is aggravated by the scarcity of firewood. Traditional arrangements that controlled access and grazing prior to collectivization have disappeared. Opportunities exist for improving their productivity by implementation of suitable access and grazing systems.

e) In mountain areas, foothills and upland valleys support dryland farming. Here, the productivity is low and the farming communities are among the poorest in the region. Harsh conditions promote out-migration and land abandonment. Subsistence is obtained from drought resistant crops, such as barley, and flocks of small ruminants that move to the mountain rangelands in the summer. Soil erosion by water run-off is a localized but major problem due to sloping land agriculture.

Resource conserving technologies are needed to rehabilitate the degraded soils and to improve livelihoods of the rural communities in these remote and fragile agro-ecosystems. Potato is the most important cash and subsistence crop providing ware to many city markets and seed to informal-based seed systems under these situations. However, potato production technologies that are less tillage intensive and more resource conserving would contribute to sustainable land management and resilience of these fragile agro-ecosystems.

This is particularly evident in countries like Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in Central Asia, and Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia in the Caucasus. Mountainous areas, and especially those above 2 000 m asl, for their pest and disease-free conditions, are the only places to be considered for pre-basic and basic seed potato production, reserving to less elevated areas the multiplication of certified class seed.