In tandem with local farming partners, the Development Fund of Norway has today launched a project designed to establish the impact of sustainable agriculture on Malawi’s soils. Agriculture consultant Mahara Nyirenda explained to reporters that the project will gather empirical evidence that would serve to help promote sustainable farming practices to a larger proportion of farmers throughout the country. "For a long time, we have been saying that sustainable agriculture practices are very effective once engaged just because we observed increased crop productivity, we want to establish what exactly happens in the soils where a particular sustainable agriculture practice has been used." He said the Development Fund of Norway, together with its implementing partners Find Your Feet, Circle for Integrated Community Development (Cicod), Mzuzu Agricultural Development Division (Mzadd) and Trustees for Agricultural Production and Promotion (Tapp), have already started conducting soil analysis to determine changes that have taken place in the soil over past years. The Development Fund of Norway has, since 2001, been promoting sustainable agricultural practices in the country under a project that extends to neighbouring Zambia. However, Nyirenda said there was now a need to move from the current practice which solely assesses the efficacy of sustainable farming solely on changes in harvest output, to one that would detail the exact changes in the soil. "It might be hard for some people to understand that its these practices that lead to the improved yields because improved yields could be influenced by other factors as well depending on location," added Nyirenda. "We believe that when we have this evidence in place, we will be able to say this is what you can get if you use a particular sustainable agriculture practice, and we believe this way we can easily market the practices." Nyirenda also said that Norway’s local implementation partners are also starting to encourage farmers who have already tested sustainable agriculture practices to implement them on a larger scale.