Crop Production and Husbandry
Land preparation and planting
Good crop production begins with land preparation: clearing, ploughing, harrowing to a fine tilth, and levelling. Know seedbed requirements (fine, firm, moist, weed-free), planting depth (roughly two to three times seed diameter), spacing and plant population, and seed rate. Traps: assuming deeper planting is safer (it reduces emergence) and confusing spacing with plant population.
Crop husbandry operations
Candidates must describe and justify: planting date (timed to rainfall), thinning, weeding, fertiliser application (basal at planting, top-dressing later), mulching, irrigation, pest and disease scouting, and harvesting at correct maturity. Know crop rotation benefits: breaking pest and disease cycles, restoring nutrients (legumes fix nitrogen), improving structure and spreading labour.
Classification and examples
Know cereals (maize, sorghum, millet, wheat), legumes (cowpea, groundnut, beans), root and tuber crops, oil crops (sunflower), fibre crops, fodder crops and horticultural crops. Be able to name Botswana-suitable examples: sorghum, millet, cowpea, groundnut, sunflower, watermelon and drought-tolerant fodder such as forage sorghum.
Livestock husbandry basics
Cover breeding and selection, feeding (roughage plus concentrate), watering, housing, health care, record keeping and handling. Know the terms gestation, weaning, culling, breeding stock and carrying capacity.
Worked example
A farmer plants cowpea after sorghum. Justification: cowpea is a legume that fixes nitrogen, restoring soil fertility; the rotation breaks sorghum pest and disease cycles; and cowpea provides protein for the household. Present benefit, mechanism and outcome for full marks.