Dairy Production and Marketing Systems of Smallholder Farmers: The Case of Urban and Pre-urban of Guto Gida and Bako Tibe Districts, Western Oromia, Ethiopia

Ethiopian’s economy is still dominated by agriculture and livestock share about 13-16% of total GDP. Dairy production could play a great role in the economy, considering its strong potential to provide regular income to poor rural, per-urban and urban households in Ethiopia. The objectives of the study are: to characteristics dairy production and marketing, to assess milk production and marketing system of dairy producers and to identify milk production and marketing constraints in dairy production in the study areas. Both purposive and random sampling techniques were employed to draw appropriate sample households. Data was obtained through household survey using a semi structured questionnaire. The result showed that dairy is the most important household livelihood in the study areas and out of the total dairy, about 72.97% are Horro breed. The overall average of local and cross dairy milk is 2.33 and 7.88 litter per day, respectively. The major constraints are livestock disease, feed shortage, labor shortage and low milk yield. These findings demonstrate the vital need to strengthen dairy production and market information delivery systems, encourage improved forage crop, improved breeding system and establish more market outlets with improved market facilities in order to promote production dairy in high value by smallholder farmers. Keywords: Dairy production, Ethiopia, marketing, system, pre-urban, smallholder, urba

Design and Development of an Engine-Operated Weeding Machine for Wheat Farm

Weeds constitute a serious problem to wheat crops and cause a great loss to the yield. Manual weeding is labor-intensive and time-consuming. Chemical weed control has a negative impact on both the environment and humans. To overcome these problems, an engine-operated weeder was designed and developed at Asella Agricultural Engineering Research Center (AAERC). The developed weeder was designed on the basis of agronomic and machine parameters. The developed prototype weeder consists of the mainframe, weeder blade, ground wheel, and power transmission system. The rated engine speed of 2800 rpm was reduced to 46 rpm of the ground wheels by using bevel gear, chain, and sprocket mechanism in three stages. The overall dimension of prototype weeder was 1650 mm in length, 800 mm in width and 1050 mm in height. The total production cost of the engine-operated weeder was 11,409.92 ETB. This paper is focused on machine design analysis and fabrication of prototype. Performance evaluation of prototype would be addressed in the next coming paper. Keywords: Design analysis,  develop, wheat, weeds, weed control, weeding machine DOI: 10.7176/ISDE/13-1-01 Publication date:March 31st 202

Economic Efficiency of Smallholder Farmers in Maize Production in Bako Tibe District, Ethiopia

Ethiopian agriculture is characterized by low productivity due to technical and socio-economic factors. To improve this problem integration of modern technologies with improved level of efficiency become more crucial. Accordingly, this study was conducted using Stochastic Frontier Production Function (SFPF) to estimate the level of Technical Efficiency (TE), Allocative Efficiency (AE) and Economic Efficiency (EE) as well as Tobit model to identify factors affecting these efficiencies. The mean of TE, AE and EE were 82.93%, 66.03% and 54%, respectively. The mean of TE and AE implies that there exists possibility to increase production by 17.07% without using extra inputs and decrease cost of inputs by 33.97%, respectively. The result revealed high inefficiency among maize producers. The Tobit model results revealed that age, off/non-farm activities, sex, amount of land owned and perception on agricultural policy had a significant effect on TE. Education, frequency of extension visit, perception on agricultural policy and livestock holding had significant effect on AE while age, off/non-farm activities, sex, land owned, credit utilized and perception on agricultural policy had a significant effect on EE. The result showed that there are opportunities to increase efficiency of maize production. Therefore, the policies and strategies in development and research may act on these variables to increase the efficiency level of maize producers. Keywords: Cobb-Douglas, efficiency, maize, smallholders, stochastic frontier, Tobit

Domestic and Industrial Solid Waste Management Efforts for Greener Development in Shashemane Municipality, Ethiopia

Waste management contributes to two third of employment opportunity in the developed world though it is at infant stage in Ethiopia. This study was designed to assess the status of solid waste management in Shashemane city.  3% of the inhabitants were selected by stratified random sampling from representative ketenas of the sample sub-cities. Field survey, measurements, interview, focus group discussion and consultative workshops were used to gather information. The result showed the types of waste generated, as expressed by 80.3% of the respondent, is mostly organic. 29% of the respondents were served by trash collectors; 17% were packing the waste and dispose to the final disposal containers and 45.1% of the respondents were mainly disposing in the open field. Regulating waste management, as 42.3% of the respondents, is not know. Therefore, awareness raising, public involvement and commitment of the concerned actors are crucial. Keywords: Shashemane, organic, trash collectors, solid wastes, house service typ

Beyond the individualization of punishment: reflections on the Borana Oromo’s Collective Criminal Responsibility

The article mainly looks at the role collective responsibility plays in the prevention of crime among the Borana Oromo of Ethiopia. Borana is a clan-based society where every member of a clan enjoys privileges and is given protection by his (her) clan. The clan provides support to its member when it is needed, and assumes responsibility when a member commits crime. If a member of a clan commits homicide, Guma is paid by the perpetrator’s clan to the clan from which a member has been killed. The objective of this article is to examine the underlying philosophy for the principle of collective responsibility and the merits of the principle in preventing crime among the Borana. The philosophy differs from that of the formal criminal justice system, where crime is individualized and the individual is answerable for the crime he commits. The article is based on the interviews the author has made from 2012-2014 with Borana elders during fieldwork to the area and review of the relevant literature. As it is part of the cultural values of the society and suitable for the clan-based and pastoralist Borana society, the practice of collective responsibility cannot easily be dismissed by forcibly imposing individual responsibility.Keywords: Borana, clan, collective responsibility, crime, Gum

Causes of Seasonal Food Insecurity in Oromiya Zone of Amhara Region: Farmers\u27 View

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 chronic and transitory food insecurity which have almost become structural phenomena and the way of life for a significant proportion of the population of the country

Effects of Different Soil Management Practices Under Maize-Legume Production System on Rainfall-Runoff and Soil Loss Relationships in Bako, West Oromia, Ethiopia

Soil erosion is one of the major factors responsible for soil degradation and becomes a threat to human survival. Sustainable soil management systems must be developed to reduce degradation and restore the productivity of the eroded land. Therefore; this study was carried out under natural rainfall conditions with the objective of investigating and evaluating the effects of different soil management practices on runoff, soil, nutrient losses at Bako, Ethiopia. Eighteen experimental runoff plots of 8 m length and 3 m width each were framed with corrugated iron sheets. The experimental design used was randomized complete block design (RCBD) with six treatments namely; sole maize conventional practices (SMCP), sole haricot bean conventional practices (SHCP), maize-haricot bean conventional practices (MHCP), maize-mulch conventional practices (MmCP), maize-haricot bean conservation agriculture (MHCA) and maize-mulch conservational agriculture (MmCA) that were replicated three times. Parameters observed included soil loss, runoff depth, and nutrient losses. The results revealed that there was a significant difference at (P<0.05) between the treatments regarding their effect on runoff depth, soil loss and sediment associated nutrient losses. The seasonal runoff depth ranged between 22.12 and 44.99 mm while the seasonal soil loss varied between 4.04 and 18.92 t/ha during the entire study period. The loss of nutrients and organic carbon (OC) were in the range of 82.719 to 368.747 kg/ ha for OC, for total N (TN) 7.550 to 33.538 kg/ ha, available P, 0.039 to 0.179 kg/ ha and 3.230 to 14.230 kg/ha for available K. The results showed that MHCP, SHCP, MmCP, MHCA and MmCA could control the runoff by the order of 50.83, 36.89, 24.13, 20.25 and 9.40% in comparison to SMCP. Treatments reduced the soil loss in the following order; MHCA > MHCP > SHCP > MmCA > MmCP which was 78.64, 75.21, 62.84, 49.47 and 47.99 % respectively. MHCA had higher reduction potential of nutrients for P, K, OC and TN which was 78.41, 77.30, 77.57 and 77.49 % respectively as compared to SMCP of farmer practices. The results indicated that practicing conservation agriculture can be used as better soil and water conservation tool to effectively check soil and nutrient losses under the existing slope and rainfall conditions in Bako area in Ethiopia. Keywords: Soil erosion, Tillage practices, runoff, soil loss and nutrient los

Performance Evaluation of an Engine-Operated Weeding Machine

Weeds constitute a serious problem to wheat crops and cause a great loss to the yield. Manual weeding is labor-intensive and time-consuming. Chemical weed control has a negative impact on both the environment and humans. Today the agricultural sector requires non-chemical weed control that safeguards consumers demand for high quality food products and pay special attention to food safety. The objectives of the study was to evaluate the performance of an-engine operated weeder by evaluating the weeding efficiency, plant damage, effective field capacity, field efficiency, fuel consumption, performance index, energy consumption, and cost economics of engine operated weeder in wheat crop. The experimental design was a randomized complete block design (RCBD) and evaluation was conducted at three weeder forward speeds (1.5, 2, and 2.5 km/hr), two depths of operation (from 0 to 20 and from 0 to 40 mm), and three levels of soil moisture content (9.4, 12.34 and 15.25%). The performance of the weeder was found to be optimum at 15.25 percent soil moisture content with 0 to 40 mm depth of operation at a forward speed of 1.5 km/hr. The results revealed that maximum weeding efficiency of 90.1 percent was obtained with lower plant damage of 3.31 percent whereas the effective field capacity, field efficiency, fuel consumption, performance index, and energy consumption were found to be 0.052 ha/hr, 85.99%, 0.41 l/hr, 276.78 ha/hp, and 481.71 MJ/ha, respectively. The analysis revealed that forward speed, depth of operation, and soil moisture had significant effects on weeding efficiency, plant damage, effective field capacity, and fuel consumption at P<0.05 level of significance. The cost of weeding per hectare were 758 and 1920 ETB/ha for engine-operated weeders and traditional weeding methods, respectively. Based on the performance results, it can be concluded that the weeding machine is efficient, effective, and economically viable option with high scope for acceptability among small and medium scale farmers. Keywords: Cost of weeding, Energy consumption, field efficiency, plant damage, Performance, Weeding efficiency DOI: 10.7176/JIEA/13-2-01 Publication date:March 31st 202

Review on Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) Breeding in Ethiopia

Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) is a self-pollinated diploid species with 2n = 26 chromosomes. Sesame improvement research in Ethiopia was started in the late l960s at Werer Agricultural Research Center. The objective of sesame breeding in Ethiopia is to develop the potential by creating cultivars which meet the demands of the sesame farmers, processor and user. The improvement of sesame has lagged behind due to a lack of research shortage of trained personnel, limited financial support and limited international cooperation. Although Indeterminate flowering nature and shattering of capsules at maturity, insects, pests and diseases, heat and drought, among other things are the major factors for low yields of sesame are seen as the challenges of the crop breeding. Suitability of different agro ecology, availability of genetic resource and diversities, market proximity, mutation breeding and different biotechnology approaches are some opportunities of Sesame breeding in Ethiopia. Application of biotechnology together with conventional breeding methods is a valuable approach for breeding superior varieties in a short period of time. Keywords: diversity, importance, opportunities and Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/9-17-07 Publication date:September 30th 201

Soya Bean Value Chain Analysis in Chewaka District, Buno Bedele Zone of Oromia

Soybean is among the important pulse crops grown in different parts of Ethiopia as stable food and income generation source. Market continue to be seen as the means for ensuring that smallholder farmers of agricultural products are effectively integrated into the mainstream of national economies. The study was conducted in Chewaka district of Buno Bedele zone. Both primary and secondary data were used for this study. A three stage of sampling technique was employed to select appropriate sample household heads. Descriptive statistics and costs and margins analysis methods along the value chains were employed for the study. The core functions in soya bean value chain of the study area include: input supply, production, marketing, processing and consumption. Under this core functions, actors are broadly classified into three, namely inputs suppliers, direct market actors and chain supporters. The study result indicated that there is fair producers’ share of final price among all major marketing channels and market actors obtained fair selling price of net margin in five major marketing channels, but traders obtained low net marketing margin. Major constraints that influence the development of soya bean value chain in the study area were identified and prioritized. Access market information, linkage, farmers-cooperatives contractual and others issues need attention. Keywords: Soya bean, marketing margin and value chain