This chapter examines the efficacy of food-for-work (FFW) programmes, drawing on empirical eviden... more This chapter examines the efficacy of food-for-work (FFW) programmes, drawing on empirical evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa. FFW programmes perform effectively under a set of conditions: when these are carefully planned and implemented, when they provide short-term insurance against shocks, and when private market demand for labour fails to provide a vent for surplus labour released by those who suffer shocks. FFW is also effective in reaching vulnerable persons in areas with low rates of chronic illness or injury.
F lood-based farm ing is am ong the potential op tions in en su ring access to w ater for crop an... more F lood-based farm ing is am ong the potential op tions in en su ring access to w ater for crop and livestock p roduction for sm all-sca le farm ers in the arid and sem iarid low lands o f sub-Saharan A frica , and E th io p ia in p a rticu la r. F lo o d -b ased irrig a tio n w h ile in ex p en s iv e is ro o ted in trad ition in m any rural com m unities w h ich is in con trast to m any o ther irrigation types w hich are unavailab le (in term s o f w ater source, technology or capacity ) or are costly to develop. Spate irrigation has been p racticed in d ifferen t parts o f E th iop ia for m any decades, but it w as only recen tly that it gained the go v ern m en t’s attention . T his study w as conducted through a review and inform al d iscussion w ith the ob jectives o f docum en ting the curren t sta tus, trends and p rospects o f spate irrigation in the coun try and the associated challenges, tak ing cases o f selected schem es in different regional states. The study revealed t...
Significant part of Ethiopia and its agricultural production is affected by prolonged dry spells,... more Significant part of Ethiopia and its agricultural production is affected by prolonged dry spells, recurrent drought, land degradation and consequential low productivity, extreme poverty and highly vulnerable. This paper first deals with the various technologies used with respect to agricultural water management, and provide description of suits of technologies that are common for agricultural water management (AWM) in Ethiopia. Secondly, it evaluates the poverty impact of the various technologies based on extensive data that are collected from 1,500 households that are currently practicing these technologies in four major regions of Ethiopia. The final part of the paper deals with the integrated interventions for improving crop water productivity through combination of technologies and system intensification, using the case study. In Ethiopia, both in-situ water management and ex-situ water management technologies are used. Among the in-situ water management soil and water conservation technologies use of terracing, stone bunds, trash lines etc are common. However, evaluation of their use on crop production and productivity impact is difficult and not well established in Ethiopia. Among the ex-situ including rain water harvesting technologies ponds, river diversion, micro dams, wells and pump irrigation are most common. Based on poverty analysis, the incidence, depth and severity of poverty is less among users of technology compared to non-users and the results are statistically robust. Accordingly, users AWM technology are 22 percent less poor compared to non-users or pure rain fed systems without AWM. The high impact technologies are found to be deep well, diversion and micro dams leading to 50%, 32%, and 25% poverty reductions respectively. The difference is mostly attributed to the scale effect and reliability of systems. AWM was best exploited when it was accompanied by improved soil fertility management interventions. Yield gains of upto 2000% were obtained when Zai pits (i.e. small water harvesting trenches) were augmented by application of chemical and organic fertilizers. Integrating legume cover crops increased yield of succeeding crop significantly while improving soil fertility and water holding capacity. The effect of fertilizer application was highly pronounced when legumes were integrated into the cropping system. Growing varietal mixtures of different height and maturity period increased crop yield by up to 60% through compensation effects and better use of water and soil nutrients over time and space. Therefore, in order to improve agricultural productivity, effectively reduce poverty it is essential that the rainfall and agricultural water is managed, accompanied by soil fertility management and agronomic practices.
It is the belief of many analysts that agrarian countries like Ethiopia that depend on rain-fed a... more It is the belief of many analysts that agrarian countries like Ethiopia that depend on rain-fed agriculture are significantly vulnerable to rainfall variability, the risk which tends to aggravate with global climate change. Consequently, it is believed that future increases in food supplies and economic prosperity depend heavily on effective agricultural water management. It is with this in mind that the use of low-cost technologies for rainwater and runoff control, storage, water lifting, conveyance and application have become more widespread in Ethiopia since the recent drought of 2002/2003. A range of technologies are currently used with varying levels of impacts. This paper outlines an inventory, characterization, suitability and upscaling aspects of Agricultural Water Management Technologies (AWMT) in Ethiopia. Particular characteristics of each of the technologies, their suitability for a given environment, and the necessary conditions for their successful adoption and scaling...
The purpose of the undertaken study was to evaluate the impact that the modern Hare river irrigat... more The purpose of the undertaken study was to evaluate the impact that the modern Hare river irrigation scheme had on household food security as well as on lifestyle changes of the population in the study site Chano Chalba. This was done on the basis of the FAO food security pillars access to food, availability of food, utilization of food and the overall factor of food stability. RRA tools were used to conduct a before-after comparison, considering a ten years period. The quantitative data was analysed using SPSS and/or Excel and simple statistical measures such as cross tabulations, frequencies, percentages and means gave a visible overview of the outcomes. The modern irrigation scheme did not affect the livelihood and food situation directly but indirectly through other modernizations that came with and after the construction of the modern main canal, e.g. road, merchants, agricultural office, health centre, drinking water points, school, electricity etc. The major trigger was the i...
The study examined whether access to spate irrigation leads to better nutrition outcomes. The res... more The study examined whether access to spate irrigation leads to better nutrition outcomes. The results showed that there is an overall improvement in the study sites compared to the 2011 DHS study. As far as households with access to spate irrigation are concerned, weight-for-height z-scores indicated that 8.2% of the children had prevalence of global acute malnutrition; 8.2% of them had moderate acute malnutrition. None of the children had severe acute malnutrition. The weight-forage results indicated that 27.5, 17.6 and 9.8% of the children showed prevalence of underweight, moderate underweight and severe underweight, respectively. The height-forage z-scores showed 56.5, 30.8 and 21.7% of the children had prevalence of stunting, moderate stunting and severe stunting, respectively. On the other hand, households without access to spate irrigation indicated that as far as the weight-for-height z-scores of children are concerned, there were no children (boys and girls) with prevalence ...
This chapter examines the efficacy of food-for-work (FFW) programmes, drawing on empirical eviden... more This chapter examines the efficacy of food-for-work (FFW) programmes, drawing on empirical evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa. FFW programmes perform effectively under a set of conditions: when these are carefully planned and implemented, when they provide short-term insurance against shocks, and when private market demand for labour fails to provide a vent for surplus labour released by those who suffer shocks. FFW is also effective in reaching vulnerable persons in areas with low rates of chronic illness or injury.
F lood-based farm ing is am ong the potential op tions in en su ring access to w ater for crop an... more F lood-based farm ing is am ong the potential op tions in en su ring access to w ater for crop and livestock p roduction for sm all-sca le farm ers in the arid and sem iarid low lands o f sub-Saharan A frica , and E th io p ia in p a rticu la r. F lo o d -b ased irrig a tio n w h ile in ex p en s iv e is ro o ted in trad ition in m any rural com m unities w h ich is in con trast to m any o ther irrigation types w hich are unavailab le (in term s o f w ater source, technology or capacity ) or are costly to develop. Spate irrigation has been p racticed in d ifferen t parts o f E th iop ia for m any decades, but it w as only recen tly that it gained the go v ern m en t’s attention . T his study w as conducted through a review and inform al d iscussion w ith the ob jectives o f docum en ting the curren t sta tus, trends and p rospects o f spate irrigation in the coun try and the associated challenges, tak ing cases o f selected schem es in different regional states. The study revealed t...
Significant part of Ethiopia and its agricultural production is affected by prolonged dry spells,... more Significant part of Ethiopia and its agricultural production is affected by prolonged dry spells, recurrent drought, land degradation and consequential low productivity, extreme poverty and highly vulnerable. This paper first deals with the various technologies used with respect to agricultural water management, and provide description of suits of technologies that are common for agricultural water management (AWM) in Ethiopia. Secondly, it evaluates the poverty impact of the various technologies based on extensive data that are collected from 1,500 households that are currently practicing these technologies in four major regions of Ethiopia. The final part of the paper deals with the integrated interventions for improving crop water productivity through combination of technologies and system intensification, using the case study. In Ethiopia, both in-situ water management and ex-situ water management technologies are used. Among the in-situ water management soil and water conservation technologies use of terracing, stone bunds, trash lines etc are common. However, evaluation of their use on crop production and productivity impact is difficult and not well established in Ethiopia. Among the ex-situ including rain water harvesting technologies ponds, river diversion, micro dams, wells and pump irrigation are most common. Based on poverty analysis, the incidence, depth and severity of poverty is less among users of technology compared to non-users and the results are statistically robust. Accordingly, users AWM technology are 22 percent less poor compared to non-users or pure rain fed systems without AWM. The high impact technologies are found to be deep well, diversion and micro dams leading to 50%, 32%, and 25% poverty reductions respectively. The difference is mostly attributed to the scale effect and reliability of systems. AWM was best exploited when it was accompanied by improved soil fertility management interventions. Yield gains of upto 2000% were obtained when Zai pits (i.e. small water harvesting trenches) were augmented by application of chemical and organic fertilizers. Integrating legume cover crops increased yield of succeeding crop significantly while improving soil fertility and water holding capacity. The effect of fertilizer application was highly pronounced when legumes were integrated into the cropping system. Growing varietal mixtures of different height and maturity period increased crop yield by up to 60% through compensation effects and better use of water and soil nutrients over time and space. Therefore, in order to improve agricultural productivity, effectively reduce poverty it is essential that the rainfall and agricultural water is managed, accompanied by soil fertility management and agronomic practices.
It is the belief of many analysts that agrarian countries like Ethiopia that depend on rain-fed a... more It is the belief of many analysts that agrarian countries like Ethiopia that depend on rain-fed agriculture are significantly vulnerable to rainfall variability, the risk which tends to aggravate with global climate change. Consequently, it is believed that future increases in food supplies and economic prosperity depend heavily on effective agricultural water management. It is with this in mind that the use of low-cost technologies for rainwater and runoff control, storage, water lifting, conveyance and application have become more widespread in Ethiopia since the recent drought of 2002/2003. A range of technologies are currently used with varying levels of impacts. This paper outlines an inventory, characterization, suitability and upscaling aspects of Agricultural Water Management Technologies (AWMT) in Ethiopia. Particular characteristics of each of the technologies, their suitability for a given environment, and the necessary conditions for their successful adoption and scaling...
The purpose of the undertaken study was to evaluate the impact that the modern Hare river irrigat... more The purpose of the undertaken study was to evaluate the impact that the modern Hare river irrigation scheme had on household food security as well as on lifestyle changes of the population in the study site Chano Chalba. This was done on the basis of the FAO food security pillars access to food, availability of food, utilization of food and the overall factor of food stability. RRA tools were used to conduct a before-after comparison, considering a ten years period. The quantitative data was analysed using SPSS and/or Excel and simple statistical measures such as cross tabulations, frequencies, percentages and means gave a visible overview of the outcomes. The modern irrigation scheme did not affect the livelihood and food situation directly but indirectly through other modernizations that came with and after the construction of the modern main canal, e.g. road, merchants, agricultural office, health centre, drinking water points, school, electricity etc. The major trigger was the i...
The study examined whether access to spate irrigation leads to better nutrition outcomes. The res... more The study examined whether access to spate irrigation leads to better nutrition outcomes. The results showed that there is an overall improvement in the study sites compared to the 2011 DHS study. As far as households with access to spate irrigation are concerned, weight-for-height z-scores indicated that 8.2% of the children had prevalence of global acute malnutrition; 8.2% of them had moderate acute malnutrition. None of the children had severe acute malnutrition. The weight-forage results indicated that 27.5, 17.6 and 9.8% of the children showed prevalence of underweight, moderate underweight and severe underweight, respectively. The height-forage z-scores showed 56.5, 30.8 and 21.7% of the children had prevalence of stunting, moderate stunting and severe stunting, respectively. On the other hand, households without access to spate irrigation indicated that as far as the weight-for-height z-scores of children are concerned, there were no children (boys and girls) with prevalence ...
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