Togo’s farmers struggle with poor soils and declining yields. The reason: low awareness of nutrients status of soils and inefficient fertilizer use.
A regional initiative is helping smallholder farmers in Togo farm fertile ground again. The Regional Hub in West Africa and the Sahel is driving a fresh initiative to improve fertility and soil health by promoting efficient fertilizer use in Togo.
To address this the Regional Hub for Fertilizer and Soil Health Hub for West Africa and the Sahel- a collaborative initiative to promote soil health and sustainable fertilizer use in the region – is using data science and advanced modelling to develop site specific fertilizer recommendations for farmers to improve soil fertility management and productivity.
Launched in 2024 as a sub-program of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Regional Hub brings together diverse stakeholders who include IITA, International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC), OCP Africa, African Plant Nutrition Institute (APNI), University Mohammed VI Polytechnic (UM6P) and the World Bank through the Accelerating Impacts of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA) project.
The Regional Hub provides technical assistance for the development and implementation of ongoing, new fertilizer and soil health-related investments in Africa. One of its key functions focuses on developing site-specific fertilizer recommendations tailored to local soil conditions and crop needs using high-quality agronomic datasets and cutting-edge data science techniques. The fertilizer recommendations align with the principles of Integrated Soil Fertility Management (ISFM) and the 4Rs of nutrient stewardship; right source, right rate, right time, and right place to support climate-smart, efficient, and sustainable agriculture across the region.
“Farmers are the real beneficiaries of the Regional Hubs’ work,” says Abalo Adodo, Country Director, of the International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) in Togo. “They will know how to promote and keep fertility of their soil, and improve their skills on soil health management, which will help them to improve their productivity without disturbing the nutrients balance or accelerating the degradation of their soil.”
Through a recent workshop, the Regional Hub conducted a comprehensive assessment of Togo’s Soil Information System (SIS) status, revealing critical gaps such as fragmented soil data, which is not well shared, an underused SIS platform (FertiTogo), and limited capacity in soil laboratories at the Institut Togolais de Recherche Agronomique ( ITRA) and the University of Lomé.
The assessment also enabled the explanation of the Nutrient Omission Trials (NOT) protocol and to facilitate the implementation of trials in line with the 20 functions aligned with the Lome roundtable declaration. This method helps avoid wasting fertilizer by showing exactly what the soil lacks. During this workshop, 3 out of the 20 functions were initiated for implementation in Togo.
The workshop was also helpful in identifying weaknesses in Togo’s fertility and soil health management enabling the Regional Hub to develop an action plan by providing valuable information on soils and fertilizer application.
“This is crucial for Togo’s agriculture transformation because it will help the country to recommend an appropriate fertilizer formula for soils and ensure that information for soil health management is readily available at any time and at low cost for farmers,” said Adodo.
The IFDC leads the activities of the Region Hub in Togo serving as direct contact with the government and other key stakeholders. The Togo Ministry of Agriculture as the main regulator body and ITRA as a public research institution are at the forefront of any interventions for agriculture sector transformation.
“Having government and research institutions buying-in the intervention of the Regional Hub is key to our success. Being able to promote such collaboration is a big factor of success for the Regional Hubs activities in Togo,” Adodo said.
Adodo emphasized that access to value-added information on the fertility and soil health status for Togo is the key in ensuring that any interventions made match reality when it comes to fertility and soil health.
Togo will have information set up on the global system. As a result, this can help to inform key partners on the types of interventions and support to provide to Togo improve productivity for sustainable food security in the country. By using the local resources to implement activities, Regional Hub is promoting a transfer of capacity, which will be needed when the project ends.
