Local Economic Development in Ethiopia: Policy and Practice

Even though the current government of Ethiopia has enacted and implemented various pro-LED policies and started the actual exercise of LED in selected localities since 2009, little scholarly attention has been devoted to the policy and practice of LED in the country. The study fills this gap and contributes to the debates and evidence of local economic development in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) based on data obtained through key informants interviews and systematic review of extant literature and documentary sources on the policies and practices of LED in Ethiopia. The result of the study reveals that much work is needed to institutionalize LED practice in the country. The study also highlights that to institutionalize and sustain LED practice in the country, well-articulated LED framework and permanent LED institutions that are well integrated with the overall local government structure are needed

Effective delivery of input services (AI, feed and veterinary services) to livestock development in Ethiopia

Minutes of the Fourth Ethiopian Fodder Roundtable Meeting, ILRI, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, June 22, 2010.The IFAD-Funded ‘Fodder Adoption Project’ (FAP) uses feed scarcity as an entry point to address major constraint in livestock development in selected districts in Ethiopia. It also recognizes that fodder scarcity is not just about technologies but also about the collective capacity of a network of individuals and organizations. It therefore uses an innovation system framework to engage multiple actors along livestock commodity value chains–facilitating continuous interaction among stakeholders to generate innovation rather than just research products or technologies. The Fourth Ethiopian Fodder Roundtable was held on the theme of ‘Role of effective delivery of input services (AI, veterinary services, and feed) to fodder/dairy development in Ethiopia’. The roundtable discussions were facilitated based on discussion points emerging from brief PowerPoint presentations. The presentations outlined some key constraints contributing to feed scarcity in Ethiopia: the subsistence mode of production; poorly developed market for livestock products; chronic shortage of fodder biomass; dominance of arable production; feed being an intermediate commodity; weakness of private sector; and an extension system which focuses on the cereal sector. AI provision in Ethiopia is weak due to the constraints associated with lack of breeding policy, lack of regular monitoring of bulls for reproductive performance, absence of a herd registration and recording system, poor technical, financial and managerial support and poor networking of the service. Formation of dairy farmers associations, a cattle breeders association and establishing private business associations were suggested as options for effective delivery of AI services

Extension and adoption of biofortified crops: Quality protein maize in East Africa

Biofortified crops, bred for improved nutritional quality, can alleviate nutritional deficiencies if they are produced and consumed in sufficient quantities. These varieties can be promoted based on their agronomic performance or based on their nutritional qualities. Quality protein maize (QPM) was the first biofortified crop and has been disseminated in Africa using both approaches. To study their effectiveness, a survey of rural households was conducted in the maize-growing areas of East Africa, comparing communities with access to QPM extension activities to control communities. The results show that a third to one half of the farmers in project communities participated in extension activities in all countries except Kenya. In these communities, familiarity with QPM was high (74-80% of farmers), again except for Kenya (19%), but understanding of their nutritional benefits was much lower (47-55%, with 7% in Kenya). In all countries, farmers evaluated QPM varieties as good or better than conventional varieties (CV) for post-harvest characteristics. For agronomic characteristics, however, QPM varieties scored better than CV in Uganda, about the same in Tanzania, but less in Ethiopia. Adoption patterns differed widely between the countries: in the project areas it varied from 70% in Uganda, 30% in Tanzania to none in Kenya. In the control areas, adoption was only observed in Uganda (45% of farmers). Factors that significantly influenced adoption were farmers’ participation in extension activities, farmers’ agronomic and post-harvest evaluation of QPM vs. CM, and their understanding of the nutritional benefits of QPM. Evaluation for agronomic performance was found to be more important than knowledge of nutritional benefits, thus favoring the first approach. A reliable seed supply was, however, found to be a basic condition for adoption.Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession,

Frequency of seizure attack and associated factors among patients with epilepsy at University of Gondar Referral Hospital: a cross-sectional study, Gondar, North West Ethiopia, 2017.

OBJECTIVE: About three-fourth of adults with new-onset epilepsy become seizure-free with current anti-epileptic drugs, but around one-fourth of the patients continue to experience seizure which increases the risk of accident, disability, death and treatment side effects. Therefore, this study aimed to address the gap in determining the magnitude of the number of seizure attacks and identify the factors that provoke a repeated seizure in a patient with epilepsy. RESULTS: A total of 166(40.68%) study participants were experienced seizure attacks with a minimum of one and a maximum of seventeen times attacks. Perceived exposure to noise (adjusted incidence risk ratio (AIRR) = 1.91, 95% confidence interval (CI) [1.46, 2.49]), light (AIRR = 1.48, 95% CI [1.09, 2.00]), head injury (AIRR = 1.71, 95% CI [1.14, 2.57]) and sleep deprivations (AIRR = 1.41, 95% CI [1.02, 1.94]) were associated with increased incidence of seizure, while adherence adjusted odds ratio (AOR) = 18.18, 95% CI [3.49, 94.63]), being in middle wealth index (AOR = 3.52, 95% CI [1.14, 11.02]) and being in rich wealth index (AOR = 4.05, 95% CI [1.54, 10.69]) were associated with inflation of zero count

Disrespect and abuse during childbirth in Western Ethiopia: Should women continue to tolerate?

BACKGROUND: Healthcare coverage in Ethiopia has improved dramatically in recent decades. However, facility-based delivery remains persistently low, while maternal mortality remains high. This paper presents the prevalence and associated factors of disrespect and abuse (D&A) during childbirth in public health facilities of western Oromia, Ethiopia. METHOD: A facility-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 612 women from February 2017 to May 2017. Exit interview with the mothers were conducted upon discharge from the maternity ward. We measured D&A during childbirth using seven dimensions. Multivariable logistic regression model was used to assess the association between experience of D&A and client characteristics and institutional factors. RESULT: Three quarters (74.8%) of women reported experiencing at least one form of D&A during their facility childbirth. The types of D&A experienced by the women were; physical abuse (37.1%), non-dignified care (34.6%), non-consented care (54.1%), non-confidential care (40.4%), neglect (25.2%), detention (2.9%), and discrimination (13.2%). Experiences of D&A were 1.6 times more likely to be reported by women delivering at hospitals than health centers (OR: 1.64, 95% CI: 1.01, 2.66). Women without a companion throughout their delivery were almost 10 times more likely than women who had a companion to encounter D&A (OR: 9.94, 95% CI: 5.72, 17.28). On the other hand, women with more than 1,368-birr (USD 57) monthly income were less likely to experience any type of D&A (OR: 0.36, 95% CI: .21, .65). CONCLUSION: Three in four women reported experiencing at least one form of D&A during labor and delivery. This demonstrates a real disconnect between what the health system intends to achieve and what is practiced and calls for fundamental solutions in terms of both improving quality of facility-based delivery and ensuring women's right to receive health care with dignity

Entry Points to Improve Livestock Water Productivity in Selected Forage Based Livestock Systems

Agricultural production is challenged by increasing water scarcity and simultaneously growing demands for food and feed. Globally livestock feed sourcing is seen as one of the major causes for water depletion, and therefore increasing livestock water productivity (LWP) is necessary. Feed sources in Forage Based Livestock Production Systems [FLPS (grazing, mixed-irrigated and mixed-rainfed)] largely consist of pasture, crop residue, or immature cereal crops, and also plants cut for fodder and carried to the animals. In drylands (arid and semi-arid) eco-regions, FLPS are generally extensive and thus the scale of water depletion for feed production is a major concern. This paper synthesizes LWP-knowledge generated across different FLPS over time and systematically identifies entry points to enhance productive uses of fresh water resources. It draws on examples of grazing systems in Uganda (Nile basin), mixed-rainfed systems in Ethiopia (Nile basin), mixed-irrigated systems in Sudan (Nile basin), and mixed-irrigated systems in India (Indio-Gangana basin). Although these systems vary by their degree of intensification, scale of water related problems, and therefore in their values of LWP, a number of common entry points to increase LWP can be identified. Based on empirical evidence from these systems, we systematically clustered these entry points as: (1) improving the water productivity of feed; (2) improving livestock feed sourcing and feeding; (3) enhancing livestock feed use efficiencies; and (4) enabling institutions and market linkages to facilitate adoption of relevant technologies. The paper concludes by discussing a comprehensive framework for entry points to improve water productivity in FLPS

Determinants of Adoption of Rainwater Management Technologies among Farm Households in the Nile River Basin

Agriculture is the main sector of the Ethiopian economy, as is the case in many sub-Saharan African countries. In this region, rainfall distribution is extremely uneven both spatially and temporally. Drought frequently results in crop failure, while high rainfall intensities result in low infiltration and high runoff, causing soil erosion and land degradation, which contribute to low agricultural productivity and high levels of food insecurity. High population growth and cultivation of steep and marginal lands, together with poor land management practices and lack of effective rainwater management strategies, aggravate the situation. Over the past two decades, the Government of Ethiopia has attempted to address these issues through the large-scale implementation of a range of soil and water conservation measures, including stone terraces, soil bunds and area enclosures. Despite these efforts, adoption of the interventions remains low. Studies from the Ethiopian Highlands show that the adoption of rainwater management technologies is influenced by a variety of factors, including biophysical characteristics such as topography, slope, soil fertility, rainfall amount and variability. However, even when technologies are appropriate to a particular biophysical setting, they may not be implemented, because farmers usually consider a variety of factors when making their decisions to adopt technologies. Thus, gaining an understanding of the factors that influence the adoption of rainwater management technologies is crucial for improved management of land and water resources. In this context, this study has been carried out within the framework of the Nile Basin Development Challenge (NBDC) project of the CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food (CPWF), which aims to improve rural livelihoods and their resilience through a landscape approach to rainwater management in the Ethiopian part of the Blue Nile River Basin

Protection of Water Distribution Networks against Cyber and Physical Threats: The STOP-IT Approach Demonstrated in a Case Study

Water critical infrastructures are undergoing a process of digital transformation that entails an increasing integration between the physical and cyber layers of the system. This integration brings efficiency and monitoring advantages, but it also exposes water systems to a new threat surface that includes cyberattacks. Formed in 2017, STOP-IT is Europe’s first project dedicated to developing cyber-physical security solutions tailored to the water sector. During the 4 years of collaboration, the STOP-IT team has codeveloped an extensive list of technologies that integrates cyber and physical layers of infrastructure, allowing water utilities to prevent, detect, assess, and treat risks, as well as simulate scenarios of attacks and explore how to react to increase preparedness. This article first introduces the overall aim and main outcomes of the STOP-IT project and then focuses on the risk management integrated framework composed of modeling solutions developed to help water utilities identify vulnerabilities and protect critical parts of their systems. The solutions are presented along with the results from the demonstration activities performed by a selected water utility concerning three risk scenarios that were assessed through the mentioned integrated framework.publishedVersio