Exploring land use/land cover changes, drivers and their implications in contrasting agro-ecological environments of Ethiopia

The southwestern Ethiopian montane forests are one of the most species‐rich ecosystems and are recognised globally as a priority area for the conservation of biodiversity. Particularly, in contrast to the drier central and northern Ethiopian highlands, they have received little attention by researchers. Here, we review changes to agricultural systems in and around these forests that are known as the genetic home of coffee (Coffea arabica L.) and that are important to the livelihoods of many rural people who have developed traditional management practices based on agro‐ecological knowledge, religious taboos and customary tenure rights. We explored the impacts of conversions to agroforestry and cereal‐based cropping systems on biodiversity, soil fertility, soil loss and the socio‐economic conditions and culture. The increasing trend of cereal cropping, resettlement and commercial agriculture causes the deterioration of natural forest cover in the region and threatens biodiversity, land quality, sustainable, traditional farming practices and the livelihood of the local community. Large‐scale plantations of tea, coffee, soapberry locally known as endod (Phytolacca dodecandra L'Her.) and cereals have resulted in biodiversity loss. Following the conversion of forests, cultivated fields exhibit a significant decline in soil fertility and an increase in soil loss as compared with the traditional agroforestry system. The establishment of a sustainable agricultural system will require a change in paradigm, whereby the intrinsic values of the traditional forest‐based agricultural system are recognised, rather than the ongoing mimicking of agricultural policies that were developed for the open fields of central Ethiopia. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Transition from forest-based to cereal-based agricultural systems : a review of the drivers of land use change and degradation in Southwest Ethiopia

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Land-use and land-cover changes (LULCCs) are the result of complex interactions between the human (cultural, socio-economic and political) and the biophysical environment at different spatial scales. The present study assessed the spatial distribution of LULC (1976–2008) in the high and low altitude zones in the northern highlands of Karatu, Tanzania, using both qualitative (in-depth interviews and focus group discussions) and quantitative techniques (Intensity Analysis). The qualitative approach was used to elicit information on the coping strategies adopted by land users as transitions occurred with time and the Intensity Analysis was used to assess the systematic land losses, gains and persistence of the various land categories with time. The results of the Intensity Analysis show that overall land transformation is decelerating in both agro-ecological zones across the two time intervals. In the low altitude zone, woodland, settlements and bushland are active categories unlike cultivated and grassland,...

An Intensity Analysis of land-use and land-cover change in Karatu District, Tanzania: community perceptions and coping strategies

How is it that rural poverty in southern Tanzania appears both easy to explain and yet also mystifying? Why is it that 'development' is such a touchstone, when actual attempts at fostering development have been largely ephemeral and/or unpopular for decades? In this book, Felicitas Becker traces dynamics of rural poverty based on the exportation of foodstuffs rather than the better-known problems connected to exportation of migrant labour, and examines what has kept the development industry going despite its failure to break these dynamics. Becker argues that development planners often exaggerated their prospects to secure funding, repackaged old strategies as new to maintain their promise, and shifted blame onto rural Africans for failing to meet the expectations they had raised. But the rural poor, too, pursued conversations on the causes and morality of poverty and wealth. Despite their dependence and deprivation, officials found repeatedly that they could not take them for granted.

The Politics of Poverty: Policy-Making and Development in Rural Tanzania

Land degradation in South Eastern Tanzania, the country’s major cashew producing area, has been attributed to deforestation. By comparing land-use/cover maps derived from aerial photographs of 1965 with maps derived from satellite images of 2002, we assessed how land-use changed in six villages, and relate these to local and global drivers. Land-use/cover changes are complex processes, which we analyzed by determining the relative net changes, losses, persistence and gains of each land-use/cover categories. Widespread planting of cashew trees only started in the 1960s; while the ‘villagisation’ program in the 1970s, altered settlement patterns as centrally planned villages were created. Population growth and rural development policies were major local drivers for land-use/cover change; international trade and technological innovations were principal global drivers. Though population increase led to a reduction of natural vegetation, the spread of cashew trees resulted in a case of ‘more people, more trees...

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John Tenga

Papers

More people, more trees in South Eastern Tanzania: local and global drivers of land-use/cover changes