Assessing Agricultural Potential in South Sudan - Spatial Analysis

Assessing Agricultural Potential in South Sudan - Spatial Analysis

Xinshen Diao, Liangzhi You, Vida Alpuerto and Renato Folledo, 2012

The country’s endowment of favorable land, water, and weather conditions makes 70 percent of land suitable for agriculture. Yet, less than four percent of total land (about 2.7 million ha) is currently cultivated while more than 80 percent is still under natural vegetation (e.g. trees, shrubs, grass). The production system remains primarily subsistence in nature and crop yield is low. The total value of agriculture production (i.e. “realized potential”) is much lower than that of its neighbouring countries. Even with an extremely low population density (13 persons per km2), per capita crop area is only at 0.3 hectare.

South Sudan faces challenges in providing enough food for its population. Obstacles in developing the country’s competitiveness in regional and global markets in the longer term also need to be overcome. It is necessary to understand the country’s current agricultural situation and potential for improvement. Using GIS-based analysis six agricultural potential typologies are identified. HH, HL, and MH are best positioned to be developed, and more than half of current cropland areas fall under these categories. There is possibility of promoting intensive farming systems since areas with “high” and “medium” agricultural potential have population density greater than 50/km2. However, there are also “high” agro-ecological potential areas with very low population density indicating the difficulty to develop them with a smallholder farming system.

Catching up with crop yield levels achieved by its neighboring countries will be the most important approach to realize agricultural potential. Given that many challenges in cropland expansion, including high upfront costs of land clearing and low rural connectivity, yield improvement maybe a more effective way to realize agricultural potential in South Sudan over the next years.