Farmers wiped out. If the rains come too heavily, then the same devastating
 consequences can follow. Faced with such unpredictability, a farmer
 may well prefer to do the predictable-carry on with practices that
 have meant survival for his forefathers.
 Sometimes there is good sense in his resistance to the new. Take,
 for example, the growing of hybrid maize in areas susceptible to
 flooding. If traditional maize is more likely to survive in a season
 of heavy rains, then he may well prefer to forego the extra yields
 from hybrid varieties in seasons of ordinary weather, rather than
 risk a crushing loss if floods occur. It is a question of not gambling
 against disaster.
 One of the keys to your success is to know when a farmer's
 reasons are valid-when it is not possible or sensible for
 him to adopt your recommendations-or when it might be
 feasible for him to adopt only part of a recommended
 package.

 Cultural Practices
 If we take "culture" in its broadest sense of"patterns of living", then
 clearly the more ingrained these patterns, the more they will be like
 deep grooves that act against any change of direction-like a
 bullock cart moving along a deeply furrowed track.
 One seemingly unimportant practice in the project area was that
 the traditional stores were often smeared with dung. This serves a
 decorative purpose-but it could also be that the dung acted as a
 deterrent to insect infestations. A related point-when grain was
 left in the field to dry, there was no problem about storing it in
 airtight structures. But the project is recommending harvesting
 grain before it is dry-and then putting the cobs in structures that
 are loosely woven so that air can blow freely through them.
 So, in getting across the messages of the project, we have to be clear
 about the logic: if you do A, then B is OK; but if you do C, then B is
 not OK. If farmers harvest when the grain is dry, then it is OK to
 put it in airtight structures; but if they harvest when the grain is
 still moist, then it is not OK to put it in airtight structures. To
 persuade farmers to harvest early, when there is still moisture in
 the grain, is to increase the risk of moulds and contamination-
 unless we also persuade them to use rapid drying practices.
 It may be, however, that dung-smeared baskets serve another
 purpose: they hide the grain from prying eyes. As mentioned
 earlier, although Dr Mbula found that farmers were talking about


Chapter 3