Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Hiv/Aids In Ethiopia: The Epidemic And Social, Economic, And Demographic Impacts, Helmut Kloos

International Conference on African Development Archives

This paper reviews the epidemiology, driving forces and impacts of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Ethiopia and evaluates prospects for prevention and control. After the rapid spread of HIV infection in the 1980s and 1990s primarily by commercial sex workers, truck drivers and soldiers along major transportation routes, children, adolescents and the general population are increasingly infected. There is also evidence that infection rates are rapidly increasing in rural populations. But surveillance activities remain underdeveloped rendering the fragmentary data on the prevalence, incidence and impact of HIV/AIDS highly speculative and hindering the planning and implementation of prevention and control programs. Available …

Promoting Child Protection Through Community Resources: Care Arrangements For Ethiopian Aids Orphans, Steven L. Varnis

International Conference on African Development Archives

One of the key development challenges posed by AIDS in Ethiopia is providing care for the vastly increased number of orphans resulting from the pandemic. The organizational initiatives and policy responses will have an impact on a wide range of developmental indicators, as well as on the formative experiences of millions of Ethiopian children in the years to come. This paper explores the strategies and basic assumptions of community based care—which has become the orthodox approach to orphan care in Africa. Two limitations of this approach are discussed. First, it is often based on an outdated understanding and assessment of …

The Conflict Of Ethnic Identity And The Language Of Education Policy In Contemporary Ethiopia, Teshome G. Wagaw

International Conference on African Development Archives

This paper examines the current language policy of Ethiopia, especially its significance for the educational systems of that country. The policy in its present form was proclaimed in 1991 after the present government drove out the former Marxist-Leninist military junta, which had ruled the country for the preceding twenty years2. The language policy, along with other human rights and ethnic-related policies, was incorporated into the new constitution that took effect in 1996. Among other things, the policy provides for Ethiopia’s more than 90 language groups to develop and use their respective languages in the courts, in governmental and other political …

Determinants Of Farmer Perceptions Of The Severity And Yield Impact Of Soil Erosion: Evidence From Northern Ethiopia, Berhanu Gebremedhin, Scott Swinton

International Conference on African Development Archives

Farmers must perceive soil erosion as a problem before they will invest in preventing it. However, perceptions are often overlooked in the conservation literature. This study analyzes the levels and determinants of farmer perceptions of soil erosion in northern Ethiopia. Results are based on a survey of 250 farmers managing 900 fields during the 1995-96 cropping season. Farmer perceptions of the severity and productivity impact of soil erosion were measured at plot level as ordinal variables. Ordered probit and ordinary probit statistical regressions were used to analyze the levels and determinants of farmer perceptions.

Farmers were more likely both to …

Decision Making On Manure Use And Fallowing As Soil Fertility Maintenance Techniques In The Northern Highlands Of Ethiopia: The Case Of Ankober District, Senait Regassa

International Conference on African Development Archives

Degradation of the highly scarce agricultural resource, land, has been one of the notorious problems in Ethiopia. One form of degradation of land resource is soil nutrient depletion. Manure application as a source of major plant nutrients contributes to managing land resources towards sustainability through the improvement of physico-chemical properties of the soil. Fallowing too, allows for natural regeneration of the soil. However, decisions on how to manage the land are ultimately made by farmers and their decision-making process is influenced by several factors. This paper attempts to examine the effects of some important farm, family and institutional variables on …

Technological Innovation, Adoption And The Management Of Vertisol Resources In The Highland Ethiopia, Gezahegn Ayele

International Conference on African Development Archives

No abstract provided.

Differential Adoption Of Technologies And Its Implications For Policy Choice Between Equity And Growth, Beyene Tadesse

International Conference on African Development Archives

Government policies often attempt to create simultaneous impact on economic efficiency and equity. The Ethiopian government optimistically has targeted to simultaneously achieve at improvement in agricultural efficiency (growth) and equitable distribution of the benefits by all farmers in the whole part of the country. However, many scholars most often argue that growth and equity are inversely related in most development processes. Thus, the main objective of the paper was to evaluate the interhousehold and interregional technology adoption pattern (implies both growth and equity). The conceptual relationship of growth and equity, and experiences in adoption studies were first assessed. Then three …

The Eprdf And The Crisis Of The Ethiopian State, Aregawi Berhe

International Conference on African Development Archives

Present day Ethiopia constitutes a multi-ethnic society where ethnic politics and ethnic mobilization had been the path to power and the pillars to maintain it, perceptibly since the Era of Princes (1769-1855). During that period, Ethiopia was parcelled or ‘decentralized’ in disorderly fashion among local princes, who drew support from their ethnic or sub-ethnic base. To this day, ethnic grounds have been the power base of Ethiopian political elites under various banners and forms.

Ethiopia is now facing yet another experimental policy under the autocratic regime of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) whose core element is the Tigray …

Impact Of Government Policies On The Development Of Ict In Ethiopia, Dawit Bekele

International Conference on African Development Archives

During the last decades Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has changed the lives of a vast portion of the world’s population. Beyond any doubt, the impact of ICT on the human civilization will continue to be very important for decades to come.

The Effects Of Food Aid And Household Composition On Child Farm Labor Supply In Rural Ethiopia, Takashi Yamano

International Conference on African Development Archives

This paper determines the effects of household demographic composition and food aid on child farm labor supply controlling for household fixed effects. The results indicate that a child has a higher probability of working on farm if he or she is living with younger children, suggesting that older children are reducing resource constraints. The results on food aid indicate that receiving free distribution has relatively larger positive effects on the probability of girls working on farm than boys, while participating in food for work has relatively larger negative effects.

Health And Education Issues In Ethiopia, Meskerem Shiferaw

International Conference on African Development Archives

This paper is written for use in the International Conference on Contemporary Development Issues in Ethiopia that will be held, at Western Michigan University, from August 16-18, 2001. It is written for participants of the conference who are interested to know about the current situation of health and education sectors in Ethiopia, in the overall framework of the country's economy. In the paper, the earlier and existing policies and their impact on the development of the sectors is touched up on.

Financing Small Famer Development In Ethiopia, Haileleul Getahun

International Conference on African Development Archives

Agriculture in Ethiopia is the most important sector, as measured by its contribution to total output, employment, and export earnings. Small –scale peasant farming is the most predominant mode of cultivation, and it is the peasant farmer who has suffered the most from the lack of capital, lack of technology and deterioration of the soil. Although agriculture remains the backbone of the Ethiopian economy, production has been declining since the 1960s while the rate of population growth has been steadily rising. Thus Ethiopia, which could once feed itself, has been importing food on a large scale. The fall in agricultural …

Causes Of Seasonal Food Insecurity In Oromiya Zone Of Amhara Region: Farmers' View, Degefa Tolossa

International Conference on African Development Archives

Ethiopia is currently facing challenging problems, ranging from those induced by environmental crises to those caused by demographic and socio-economic constraints which adversely affect peoples` production system. The country is generally characterized by extreme poverty, continued and high population growth rate, severe environmental degradation and recurrent drought (Getachew 1995; Markos,1997, NOVIB, 1999). Resulting from these, the performance of agriculture, the sector that makes livelihood for 85% of the country’s population, has been poor over the last few decades, to the extent that the country could not adequately feed its population from domestic production. This has been manifested in the prevailing …