Natural Resource Management in Ethiopia: Making Good Use of Indigenous Knowledge

Abstract

Abstra ct: Narural resource degradation is a major environmental, socioeconomic
and policy challenge ill Ethiopia. /11 particular, la1ld degradation
due to soil erosion and lIutriellt depletion has put a perilous stress 0 11
rainfed agriculture on which the COUI/try's economy and livelihood of its
people largely depend. Conservation projects have been designed and
extensively carried Ollt during the past three decades under various
packages by governmental and lion-governmental organizations. However,
il is widely recognized that the projects have little succeeded in meetillg
their objectives. Among others, the top-down nalllre of conservatioll
approaches i1/ tile development alld trallsfer of technologies considerably
contributed to the ineffectiveness of the strategies and failure of the
projects. This paper lIIgues that making good lise of and building lipan
indigenous knowledge and practices of the land users in the development
and implemellwtioll of conservatioll technologies could bring about
effective recllnological trallsfer and sllstailwble land use.