Title: Watershed development as community coping strategy for climate change impacts in north central highlands of Ethiopia

Authors: Solomon Addisu Legesse; P.V.V. Prasada Rao

Addresses: College of Science and Technology, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, P.O. Box 530 003, India ' Department of Environmental Sciences, College of Science and Technology, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, P.O. Box, 530 003, India

Abstract: The impacts of watershed development on various indicators pertaining to biophysical environment are very high as a coping strategy to climate change related hazards. Among others, the watershed development projects conducted in Amhara National Regional State aimed at improving the biophysical and socioeconomic conditions of the area. In addition to the biophysical parameters, a total sample of 240 households from six model watersheds was selected randomly. Accordingly, about 58% of the total sample watershed areas were covered with soil and water conservation works, whereas the project impacts on the socioeconomic aspects were low to moderate in the majority of the cases. The average livestock ownership in number of oxen and total livestock unit by 2006 was found to be 1.76 and 4.70, respectively. This was found to be 1.59 and 4.73 for 2011, respectively. Similarly, the statistical t-test for both of them is statistically insignificant at 95% level of confidence. This indicates that biophysical impacts are more prominent when compared to economic impacts.

Keywords: climate change impact; coping strategies; watershed development; WSD; Ethiopia; biophysical change; community coping; Central Highlands; soil conservation; water conservation; socioeconomics; livestock ownership; biophysical impact; economic impact.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESD.2015.068570

International Journal of Environment and Sustainable Development, 2015 Vol.14 No.2, pp.105 - 115

Received: 20 Nov 2012
Accepted: 21 Jan 2014
Published online: 09 May 2015 *

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