System analysis and impact assessment of livestock development project on the livelihoods of rural households: The case of North western Ethiopia
Abstract
Ethiopia by the account of the UN is one of the least developed countries in the world. Agriculture is the dominant sector of the country's economy, contributing to about 48 % to the GDP, 80% to the employment and 85% to the total export earnings, as well as providing about 70% of the raw materials for the industrial sector. It exports coffee, oilseeds, pulses, flowers, live animals, skin and hides. Despite the importance of the sector, the agricultural sector remains the country’s Achilles heel and source of vulnerability. It is characterized by low returns, high risk and the evident inability of agriculture to provide even a reliable subsistence income. Yet Ethiopia is endowed with enormous resource potentials, but largely untapped, which offers possibilities for growth and poverty reduction. One of Ethiopia’s major resource endowments are its huge number of livestock, of which they are the country’s source of food, traction, manure, raw materials, investment, cash, security, and foreign exchange earnings. Review of the development of the livestock sub-sector in Ethiopia indicates that there is a need to focus interventions in terms of innovation systems approach. Advancing agricultural development through knowledge and innovation in several key areas of technology, institutions, policies and organizations are found to be necessary frame conditions. This study focuses on the innovativeness and impact of Ethio-Austrian Integrated Livestock Development Project (ILDP), which was designed with the advent of modernizing the livestock sector, in terms of its contribution to poverty reduction and sustainable development in the North Western Ethiopia. The project has been involved in a number of developmental activities like forage resource development, animal health service, breed improvement for milk, meat and traction, livestock and livestock product marketing & cooperative promotion, capacity building and net working. The major focus of the research will be to explore the interplay of technologies, organizations, policies, institutions, and system dynamics in innovation processes in the pursuit of livestock development for growth and poverty reduction. In addition, as far as the effect of the project on the livelihood of the community is concerned, a number of success stories have been recorded through different reports, however, there is neither ex-ante nor ex-post formal evaluation has been made on the impact of the project over the livelihood of the project beneficiaries. Further more, this study will try to recognize best fit approaches in terms of innovation processes and these examples of good practice will be identified, studied and evaluated for scaling up in different contexts and environments. Therefore, the overall objective of this research is to assess the project innovative working systems, impact on livelihood improvement, seeks to determine the level of adoption of improved livestock technologies and its contribution to increased productivity and technical efficiency of smallholder farmers, so that future projects and planners would be able to embed in concrete working modalities and interventions and to enable government extension system to scale up the “best fit” approaches of the project to other part of the country.
keywords system analysis Ethiopia impact assessment DEV-FORUM Associate Project
Publikationen
Livestock innovation systems and networks: findings from smallholder dairy farmers in Ethiopia
Autoren: Amlaku Asres, Sölkner, J; Puskur, R; Wurzinger, M Jahr: 2012
Journal articles
The impact of social networks on dairy technology adoption in North-West Ethiopia
Autoren: Amlaku Asres, Sölkner, J., Puskur, R., Wurzinger, M. Jahr: 2012
Conference & Workshop proceedings, paper, abstract
The impact of social networks on dairy technology adoption: evidence from Northwest Ethiopia
Autoren: Amlaku Asres, Sölkner, J; Puskur, R; Wurzinger, M Jahr: 2012
Journal articles
Project staff
Johann Sölkner
Univ.Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr.nat.techn. Johann Sölkner
johann.soelkner@boku.ac.at
Tel: +43 1 47654-93201, 93231
Project Leader
01.10.2009 - 30.09.2012
Ika Darnhofer
Assoc. Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Ika Darnhofer Ph.D.
ika.darnhofer@boku.ac.at
Tel: +43 1 47654-73320
Project Staff
01.10.2009 - 30.09.2012
Maria Wurzinger
Priv.-Doz. Dr. Maria Wurzinger
maria.wurzinger@boku.ac.at
Tel: +43 1 47654-93001, 93220, 93414
Project Staff
01.10.2009 - 30.09.2012
BOKU partners
External partners
Bureau of Agriculture and Rural Development, Amhara Region
Kebede Yimam
partner
Amhara Region Agricultural Research Institute
Fantahun Mengistu
partner
Food Security coordination & Disaster Prevention Office
Amare Kindie
partner
Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, North Gondar Zone
Degsew Melak
partner
Sustainable Resource Management Program Office
Teshome Mulu
partner