Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

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.

Emerging Informal Land Markets: A Quest For Equitable And Efficient Land Tenure Systems, Tesfaye Teklu

International Conference on African Development Archives

This paper is motivated by the need for an informed analytical discussion on land issues and policy options. “There is a danger that if a process of learning and policy dialogue on land tenure issues is not started soon, Ethiopia, like a number of other African countries, will adopt ‘ready made’ land tenure reforms that are based on ideological considerations and misconceptions about current problems” (Bruce, Hoben and Rahmato, 1994). This paper shares this view (or, warning) and follows it as a guiding principle.

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 …

Papers Of International Conference On Contemporary Development Issues In Ethiopia, August 16-18, 2001, Sisay Asefa

International Conference on African Development Archives

Introductory remarks of the First International Conference on Contemporary Development Issues in Ethiopia held in Kalamazoo, Michigan August 16-18, 2001.

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 …

“Today's Children, Tomorrow's Leaders”: Are We Neglecting The Agents Of Change?, Assegedetch Hailemariam

International Conference on African Development Archives

There is an abundant body of knowledge that suggests that early experience influences later human behavior. This paper reviews and analyzes existing literature to demonstrate that human development, at the individual level, has far reaching consequences on social, economic and political development of a people. For instance, education, one measure of human development, has been inaccessible to more than 50% of school age children in Ethiopia. To effect fundamental changes in Ethiopia, attention and resources must be dedicated to children’s well being and potential. In addition, the paper discusses early psychological processes in human development in contrast to the current …

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 …

1st Annual International Conference On Contemporary Development Issues In Ethiopia, Western Michigan University

International Conference on African Development Archives

No abstract provided.