Bezaye Tessema

Water quality impairment, due to anthropogenic activities and limited enforcement capacity, is a rapidly growing threat to water security as well as public health in developing countries. Cumulative effects of deteriorating water quality undoubtedly put pressure on public health and socio-economic developments. For example, most industries in Ethiopia discharge their effluent directly into freshwater systems without any treatment process. The problem is severe for rivers such as the Awash that pass through major cities. Although there were a few studies that looked into the issue, there is a lack of comprehensive water quality impact assessment on agriculture, health, and socio-economics. This article systematically summarizes current research on water quality issues in the Awash River Basin to generate comprehensive information that captures the water quality status of the river and impacts of water contamination, and identify information and management gaps. Results showed that wa...

Developing countries like Ethiopia are grabbling with rapid population growth, urbanization, agricultural intensification, and climate change which put intense pressure on the availability and quality of water resources. The surface water quality degradation is exacerbating due to increasing urbanization and agricultural activities. The average annual fertilizer use in Ethiopia increased from 132,522 metric tons (mt) in 1996 to 858,825 mt in 2015. Pesticide use also increases significantly from 3,327.7 mt/y in 2006 to 4,211.5 mt/y in 2010. The Awash river is one of the most affected rivers by intensified irrigation schemes, industrial, and urbanization pollution. The Awash river and its tributaries are used for domestic, irrigation, industrial, and recreational purposes. However, as per Canadian water quality indices for the drinking and irrigation water quality, the upper Awash basin scored 34.79, and 46.39, respectively, in the poor and marginal categories; whereas the middle/lowe...

Plant roots are primary factors to contribute to surface and deep soil carbon sequestration (SCS). Perennial grasses like vetiver produce large and deep root system and are likely to contribute significantly to soil carbon. However, we have limited knowledge on how root and shoot decomposition differ and their contribution to SCS. This study examined biomass production and relative decomposition of vetiver which was grown under glasshouse conditions. Subsequently the biomass incubated for 206 days, and the gas analysed using ANCA-GSL. The results confirmed large shoot and root production potential of 161 and 107 Mg ha−1 (fresh) and 67.7 and 52.5 Mg ha−1 (dry) biomass, respectively with 1:1.43 (fresh) and 1:1.25 (dry) production ratio. Vetiver roots decomposed more rapidly in the clay soil (p < 0.001) compared with the shoots, which could be attributed to the lower C:N ratio of roots than the shoots. The large root biomass produced does indeed contribute more to the soil carbon ac...

Land degradation is a major socio-economic and environmental concern in the Ethiopian highlands where the phenomenon has rendered vast areas of fertile land unproductive. To reverse this trend, the adoption of soil and water conservation (SWC) practices is crucial. However, failure by research and development organisations to take into consideration farmers preference for SWC practices have resulted into low adoption of these technologies. This paper presents the findings of a study that evaluated farmers ’ preferences of SWC practices, including the economic perspective; as a basis for enhancing adoption of the technologies in the central highlands of Ethiopia. Four soil and water conservation (SWC) practices; (i) soil bunds alone (SB), (ii) soil bunds with vetiver grass (SB+Vg), (iii) soil bunds with Susbania susban (SB+Ss) (iv) and soil bunds with elephant grass (SB+Eg), were evaluated in the Borodo Watershed in the central highlands of Ethiopia. These are the only SWC measures i...

Environmental degradation and climate change are key current threats to world agriculture and food security and human–induced changes have been significant driving forces of this global environmental change. An important component is land degradation which results in a diminished soil organic carbon (SOC) stock with concomitant loss of soil condition and function. Land management to improve soil organic matter content, condition and productivity is therefore a key strategy to safeguard agricultural production, food supply and environmental quality. Soil organic carbon sequestration through the use of plant species with high photosynthetic efficiency, deep roots and high biomass production is one important strategy to achieve this. Tropical pastures, which are adapted to a wide range of environmental conditions have particular potential in this regard and have been used extensively for land rehabilitation. Tropical pastures also have advantages over trees for biomass and carbon accum...

Several natural resources management (NRM) efforts have been undertaken with the support of international donors since 1980s. However, only a few of these efforts have been successful. The lack of integration from different disciplines, sectors and limitedparticipation of stakeholders are among the constraining factors contributed to low level of success. Farmers’ involvement in problem identification, priority setting, planning, implementation and monitoring and evaluation of the programs has been minimal. The conventional fragmented and linear research approach has also been weak to address the overall viability of the agricultural system due to the complexity of the NRM problems and the need for collective action in addition to individual solutions. This calls for a concerted effort of farmers, researchers, governmental and non-governmental institutions and a need for the interaction among biophysical, social, technological, economic and policy dimensions on NRM. Therefore, an in...

The viability of productive conservation depends on efforts to manage economic and ecological factors to ensure that the relationship between communities and environment could be sustained. Beekeeping is linking conservation and local livelihoods based on the principle that watershed pay for itself by generating sustainable economic benefits for local communities. The study revealed that by increasing beekeeping skill, honey producers in the watershed realized the value and the need to conserve watershed as they obtained alternative income from honey production as high value commodity. Honey producers have traditional culture to maintain diverse floral resources around their homesteads and farm boundaries designed to increase honey production thus help to enhance watershed conservation and climate change adaption. Quality honey was harvested through adopting good watershed rehabilitation, standard colony management and harvesting methods. An average of 15.5 kg of honey was harvested per harvesting season from intermediate hive. Therefore, if watershed conservation and livelihood preservation are to occur, it is important to bring the voices of honey producers to the forefront of watershed conservation efforts. Given the opportunity and potentials for increased export for honey in Ethiopia, it was recommended that the government at all levels should provide technical services to align improved beekeeping to watershed conservation so that honey production is increased and sustained.

A wide range of technologies to mitigate farm soil and water degradation have been generated by research and on farm. Success stories on uptake and use are many, but in small isolated pockets. However, if years of investment in research for sustainable land management are to make significant contributions to rural livelihoods, adoption of sustainable land management (SLM) technologies needs to be accelerated and scaled up. The goal of this project is therefore to identify and promote appropriate strategies to accelerate the uptake of successful SLM innovations (technologies, institutional options, approaches and tools) that have been tested in pilot sites, by more farmers over wider geographic areas. Bye law and ordinance development seeks to strengthen decentralized systems of governance by transferring specified powers and obligations, such as those dealing with natural resources management, to lower levels. SLM Bye-laws ensure sustainable, orderly and productive use of land and l...

A wide range of technologies to mitigate farm soil and water degradation have been generated by research and on farm. Success stories on uptake and use are many, but in small isolated pockets. However, if years of investment in research for sustainable land management are to make significant contributions to rural livelihoods, adoption of sustainable land management (SLM) technologies needs to be accelerated and scaled up. The goal of this project is therefore to identify and promote appropriate strategies to accelerate the uptake of successful SLM innovations (technologies, institutional options, approaches and tools) that have been tested in pilot sites, by more farmers over wider geographic areas. Bye law and ordinance development seeks to strengthen decentralized systems of governance by transferring specified powers and obligations, such as those dealing with natural resources management, to lower levels. SLM Bye-laws ensure sustainable, orderly and productive use of land and l...

Widespread adoption of sustainable land management (SLM) innovations by land users is considered key in addressing the rampant land degradation in the high rainfall and densely populated highlands of eastern and southern Africa. However, absence of enabling policy environments hamperes massive adoption of SLM innovations among rural communities. This paper presents the process and outcomes of a participatory approach for formulating and implementing SLM byelaws in the central highlands of Ethiopia. The participatory approach utilised three complementary tools, namely, stakeholder analysis, community needs assessment and policy dialogues. The stakeholder analysis revealed that several government institutions, non-government organisations(NOGs) and community groups promote SLM practices. Poor coordination among actors, top-down approach in planning and implementation, and limited capacity of communities hamperes SLM scaling up efforts. Stakeholder engagements culminates in establishin...

Widespread adoption of sustainable land management (SLM) innovations by land users is considered key in addressing the rampant land degradation in the high rainfall and densely populated highlands of eastern and southern Africa. However, absence of enabling policy environments hamperes massive adoption of SLM innovations among rural communities. This paper presents the process and outcomes of a participatory approach for formulating and implementing SLM byelaws in the central highlands of Ethiopia. The participatory approach utilised three complementary tools, namely, stakeholder analysis, community needs assessment and policy dialogues. The stakeholder analysis revealed that several government institutions, non-government organisations(NOGs) and community groups promote SLM practices. Poor coordination among actors, top-down approach in planning and implementation, and limited capacity of communities hamperes SLM scaling up efforts. Stakeholder engagements culminates in establishin...