ANNEX III
AHI benchmark sites
Areka site
The Areka site is located in the south-central highlands of Ethiopia, the home of sedentary Wolaita farmers. The area is a mixed crop–livestock system with a high diversity of staple and cash crops (enset, wheat, maize, barley, sorghum, sweet potato, Irish potato, faba bean, field pea, and horticultural crops). Livestock are grazed in a large communal grazing area or in semi-communal fenced plots. Despite the diversity of enterprises characterizing the system, landholdings are extremely small (0.74 and 0.26 hectares on average for high and low wealth categories, respectively) and the area is subject to chronic food deficits. Unique to this site are a large number of landless families who earn a living as sharecroppers or through petty trade.
Key NRM challenges in this site included: a) enhancing the productivity and returns from crop, livestock, and tree components without further exacerbating system nutrient decline; b) arresting water resource degradation and resource conflicts through more optimal land management practices and improved governance; and c) increasing the viability of agriculture (through intensification and value addition) as a pathway to food security.
Ginchi site
The Ginchi benchmark site is located in the Western Shewa Zone, Ethiopia, home to the Oromo ethnic group. It is a mixed crop–livestock system that is more extensively managed than other sites. The system is very limited in bio-mass. Indiscriminate cutting of remnant trees and contiguous forest stemming largely from prior land reforms and from regime change, and the resulting ambiguity in tenure systems (Bekele, 2003), as well as failure to invest in NRM practices with delayed returns due to perceived tenure insecurity, have contributed to large areas of landscape devoid of vegetation and with very low nutrient stocks. This has placed increased burden on women and children who must walk long distances to gather firewood, and negative impacts on soil nutrients due to the sharp increase in the use of dung for fuel in recent decades (Omiti et al., 1999). Loss of tree cover and cultivation of Eucalyptus around springs have led to the degradation of springs, the sole source of water for both humans and livestock. Yet the tendency for humans and livestock to share common watering points has made water quality more of a concern than water quantity in the minds of local residents.
High-value crops such as Irish potatoes and garlic are grown on fenced homestead plots, while extensive outfield areas are used almost exclusively for barley production and livestock grazing. Valley bottoms are used exclusively for livestock grazing. While all land is officially owned by the government, individuals have de facto ownership over all land in the watershed. Yet management is collective in certain spatial and temporal niches. Households own outfield areas on both sides of the catchment, cultivating one side and leaving the other for grazing during the rainy season. The side of the catchment that is left for grazing is done so by all households with contiguous plots, enabling free movement of livestock by those households owning land in the area. Valley bottoms are grazed year-round, with access during the cropping season restricted to those households owning plots of land in these areas. During the dry season, outfields and valley bottoms are open access resources. This scenario makes systems innovation very challenging, requiring collective action not only among households living within the watershed but involving others who graze their livestock in the area.
The key challenges for integrated NRM included: a) intensifying production (of crops, livestock, and trees) while ensuring sustainable nutrient management in the system; and b) reversing water resource degradation by fostering positive synergies between trees, soil conservation structures and water in micro-catchments. Furthermore, seasonal open-access grazing makes investments in afforestation and soil conservation structures in the outfields challenging, as cattle can easily destroy such investments. Site teams and local leaders have highlighted this as a key challenge for this site, and targeted local negotiations and integrated policy and technological innovations as avenues for innovation.
Kabale site
The Kabale benchmark site is located in Kigezi highlands of southwestern Uganda, home to the Bakiga ethnic group. The area is characterized by high population density, steep cultivated slopes, fragmented landholdings, land shortages, and adequate rainfall. This site is also a mixed crop–livestock system with a relatively small livestock component. Communal grazing areas are negligible, making zero grazing a necessity, and free grazing – where it does occur – a source of conflict due to crop damage. In addition to limited numbers of livestock, enterprises include Irish potatoes and vegetable crops in the valley bottoms, and cereals (sorghum, maize, wheat, finger millet), pulses, and bananas on the hillsides. Trees are few and declining in number, a trend which has been exacerbated in recent years as a result of the high demand for wood from a nearby gin distillery.
Key NRM challenges in this site have included: a) integrating technological innovation with improved natural resource governance to minimize the incidence of conflict emanating from small landholdings, limited economic opportunities, and gender inequalities; b) improving incomes from small and fragmented landholdings through soil fertility management, diversification, and value addition; and c) managing the dependency syndrome, acute in this site due to a high density of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and community-based organizations (CBOs) with short-sighted support strategies.
Kapchorwa site
Kapchorwa District is located on the slopes of Mt. Elgon in eastern Uganda. The district has a total population of 193,510 as per the 2002 population and housing census. The district population growth rate is at 4.33 percent which is high compared to the national average of 3.3 percent. The district has three ecological zones: lowlands (33 percent), which are almost deserted due to insecurity caused by cattle rustling; highlands (34 percent), which are heavily settled and cultivated; and forest (33 percent), which is a protected area. Agriculture is the main economic activity, engaging over 82.1 percent of the working population. The primary crops are maize, bananas, coffee, beans, wheat, barley, sunflower, and vegetable crops, with 82.1 percent of households living from farming.
The district is also home to the Mt. Elgon National Park, established as a Crown Forest in 1930. Management of the area within and surrounding the park has been subject to the whims of shifting government policies on forest management, changes which have affected most severely the native Benet ethnic group who have occupied the moorlands inside the park for the past 200 years. These changes have also negatively affected conservation in the area, as park officials and local residents alike have exploited the loosely guarded protected area under the current land tenure arrangement and ambiguity of rights of adjacent communities.
Key challenges include equitable resource access given histories of ethnic conflict (cattle raiding); managing resources sustainably within the buffer zone of the national park given the history of displacement and conflict; and limited quality of and access to support services due to a sparse NGO presence, limited coordination among sectors, and weak civil society.
Lushoto site
Lushoto District is located in the West Usambara Mountains of northeastern Tanzania. The district is home to the Wasambaa and small numbers of Wapare ethnic groups and migrants from other areas of Tanzania. The pilot watershed covers an area of 6,006 hectares and spans the Baga and Bumbuli Wards, six villages and a population of 13,163 (Meliyo et al., 2004). The land-use system is relatively intensified and involves the cultivation of cash crops in the valley bottoms, staple crops and tea on the hillsides, and small livestock holdings. From the 1950s onward, a number of afforestation programs designed to reduce pressure on State forest while contributing to conservation and livelihood goals were initiated, resulting in a dramatic increase in tree cover within farmland.
Challenges to INRM in this site have included: a) intensifying production of crops, livestock, and trees while ensuring sustainable nutrient management in the system; b) reversing water resource degradation by fostering positive synergies between trees, soil conservation structures, and water in micro-catchments; and c) managing environmental degradation stemming from cultivation from steep hillsides and mountain tops, and damage caused by rapid movement of water across the landscape (e.g., burial of fertile valley-bottom soils).
References
Bekele, M. (2003) Forest property rights, the role of the state and institutional exigency: The Ethiopian experience. Ph.D. Thesis, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala. pp.220.
Meliyo, J.L., A. Mansoor, K.F.G. Masuki, J.G. Mowo, L. German, and R.S. Shemdoe (2004) Socio-economic and biophysical characteristics of Baga Watershed in Lushoto District, Tanzania. AHI Site Report No. 1; Lushoto Benchmark Site, Tanzania.
Omiti, J.M., K.A. Parton, J.A. Sinden, and S.K. Ehui (1999) Monitoring changes in landuse practices following agrarian de-collectivisation in Ethiopia. Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 72: 111–118.