Determinants of livelihood strategies in Wolaita, southern Ethiopia

Transcription

1 Agrcultural Research and Revews Vol. 1(5) pp June 2012 Avalable onlne at Wudpecker Research Journals Full Length Research Paper Determnants of lvelhood strateges n Wolata southern Ethopa Adugna Eneyew 1 and Wagayehu Bekele 2 1 Department of agrcultural Economcs and Extenson Jmma Unversty Ethopa. 2 Resource and Envronmental Economcs Dre Dawa Unversty Ethopa. Accepted 27 Aprl 2012 Lvelhood strateges are at the centre of human lvelhoods. However econometrc analyss of determnants of rural household s choce of lvelhood strateges n Ethopa has receved lttle attenton. Ths study used multnomal logt model to dentfy determnants of lvelhood strateges n Wolata Southern Ethopa. A two stage stratfed random samplng technque was employed to select 120 household heads. Data was collected usng key nformant ntervew focus group dscusson and ntervew schedule. Data analyss revealed that agrculture has a leadng contrbuton to the total ncome of sample households (64.1%) followed by nonfarm (22.8%) and off farm (13.1 %.). The multnomal logt result showed that age educaton and sex of household head credt land sze lvestock and agro-ecology as the factors that reduced the lkelhood of dversfcaton; whle famly sze dependency rato frequency of extenson contact membershp to cooperatves nput use and remttance ncreased the lkelhood of dversfcaton. The fndng of ths study suggests that polcymakers need to reflect on the most sutable ways of supportng lvelhood dversty. Rural development strategy should emphass n promotng nonfarm actvtes n rural areas. To effect self development of the communty support to local cooperatves may have postve effects on the ncome generatng capacty. Key words: Lvelhood strateges multnomal logt Wolata Ethopa. INTRODUCTION One of the contrbutons of sustanable lvelhoods approach s to deepen the understandng of poverty n rural Afrca through emprcal studes. Dversfcaton can assst households to nsulate themselves from envronmental and economc shocks trends and seasonalty - n effect to be less vulnerable. Lvelhoods dversfcaton s complex and strateges can nclude enterprse development. Research nto the nature of rural poverty utlzng the lvelhoods approach tends to uncover aspects of rural poverty that have not been well understood or have been neglected n manstream polcy dscourses (Ells and Allson 2004). Ethopa wth an estmated populaton of 82 mllon of whch about 83% are rural populaton s an agraran country (CSA 2009). The agrcultural sector plays an mportant role n the natonal economy lvelhood and soco-cultural system of the country. The sector supports *Correspondng author. E-mal: adugna_e@yahoo.com. employment of over 80% of the populaton and accounts for 45 to 50% of the natonal Gross Domestc Product (GDP) (Berhanu 2006). Dversfcaton of ncome sources assets and occupatons s the norm for ndvduals or households n dfferent economes but for dfferent reasons (Adugna 2005). Despte the tradtonal beleves that vew rural non-farm sector as a lowproductvty sector recent years have wtnessed a shft away from ths poston towards a recognton that of the rural non-farm contrbuton to economc growth rural employment poverty reducton (Lanouw and Lanouw 1995). Ecologcal and envronmental nfluence due to human developmental actvtes has been steadly ncreasng and causng unprecedented magntude and rate of global ecosystem change. The rural poor have developed the capacty to cope wth ncreasng vulnerablty assocated wth agrcultural producton - dversfcaton ntensfcaton and mgraton or movng out of farmng (Ells 2000). Lvelhood strateges are the combnaton of actvtes that people choose to undertake n order to acheve ther

2 Eneyew and Bekele 154 lvelhood goals. Rural people partake n a number of strateges ncludng agrcultural ntensfcaton and lvelhood dversfcaton to attan ther lvelhoods goal. However the contrbuton to be made by lvelhood dversfcaton to rural lvelhoods has often been gnored by polcy makers who have chosen to focus ther actvtes on agrculture (Carswell 2000). Understandng what factors have led to lvelhood change wll be an mportant on-gong queston n the research partcular factors affectng agrcultural and non-agrcultural opportuntes and the need to manage lvelhood portfolos n relaton to rsk. Understandng the local context of household lvelhoods s not only necessary to ensure approprate development strateges but also as a bass for montorng and evaluaton and a means of assessng potental for replcaton n other contexts. Therefore a thorough understandng of factors nfluencng lvelhood strateges s ndspensable n any attempt to brng mprovement and not to commt a lmted resource based on untested assumpton about the rural poor and ts lvelhood strateges. The am of the study was to analyze determnants of choce of lvelhood strateges n the study area. Conceptual framework for lvelhood strategy analyss A popular defnton of lvelhoods s provded by Chambers and Conway (1992) wheren a lvelhood comprses the capabltes assets (ncludng both materal and socal assets) and actvtes requred for a means of lvng (Chambers and Conway 1992). The lvelhoods framework provdes a comprehensve and complex approach to understand how people make a lvng. It can be used as a loose gude to a range of ssues whch are mportant for lvelhoods or t can be rgorously nvestgated n all ts aspects (Kan et al. 2005). It emphaszes understandng of the context wthn whch people lve the assets avalable for them lvelhood strateges they follow n the face of exstng polces and nsttutons and lvelhood outcomes they ntend to acheve (DFID 2000; Scoones 1998). The key queston to be addressed n any analyss of lvelhood s gven a partcular context (polcy settng poltcs hstory agro ecology and soco-economc condtons) what combnaton of lvelhood resource result n the ablty to follow what combnaton of lvelhood strateges wth what outcomes? (Ells 2000). Vulnerablty context refers to seasonalty trends and shocks that affect people s lvelhoods. The key attrbute of these factors s that they are not susceptble to control by local people themselves. The other crucal component s lvelhood assets. Lvelhood assets are the resources on whch people draw n order to carry out ther lvelhood strateges (Chambers and Conway 1992; Ells and Allson 2004). The members of a household combne ther capabltes sklls and knowledge wth the dfferent resources at ther dsposal to create actvtes that wll enable them to acheve the best possble lvelhood for themselves. The lvelhood assets are human captal lke age educaton gender health status household sze dependency rato and leadershp potental (Farrngton et al2002; Bezemer and Lerman 2002); Physcal captal comprses the basc nfrastructure and producer goods needed to support lvelhoods; Socal captal whch refers to networks and connectedness Fnancal captal lke savngs credt and remttances from famly members workng outsde the home and Natural captal whch s the natural resource stock. Polces are the general gudelnes that govern resource use whereas nsttutons are the socal cement whch lnk stakeholders to access to captal of dfferent knds to the means of exercsng power (DFID 1999). The same source stated that lvelhood strateges are composed of actvtes that generate the means of household survval and are the planned actvtes that men and women undertake to buld ther lvelhoods. The outcomes of lvelhood strateges referred to outcomes. Lvelhood outcomes are the achevements of lvelhood strateges such as more ncome ncreased well-beng and reduced vulnerablty mproved food securty and a more sustanable use of natural resources. METHODOLOGY Locaton of the study area Wolata s located at about 380km south of Adds Ababa n Southern Natons Natonaltes and Peoples Regon (SNNPR). It s part of the ensete zone of Ethopa. The system s characterzed by small landholdngs supportng hgh populatons and a low moblty of populaton because of the hgh demand for labour on farm throughout the year. Boloso Sore s one of the 12 dstrcts n Wolayta (Fgure 2). The total populaton of Boloso Sore s of whch are men and women wth populaton densty per square Km of 637. Out of the total populaton 92% lves n rural areas (BARD 2007). Samplng technque Multstage stratfed samplng technque was used. In the frst step the dstrct was classfed n to two ecologcal zones; hghland and mdland then one Peasant Assocaton (PA) from hghland and three PAs from mdland were selected proportonally. In the second step communty wealth rankng exercse was conducted to get homogeneous groups. Fnally random proportonal samplng technque was used to select 120 households. Method of data collecton Prmary data on household soco-economc characterstcs were collected usng structured ntervew schedule. For the case of qualtatve data focus groups dscusson (men women and youth groups) key nformant ntervew and wealth rankng exercses at each PA were conducted. Secondary data was gathered from varous sources lke Boloso Sore bureau of agrculture and rural

3 155 Agrc. Res. Rev. Key H=Human captal S=Socal captal F=Fnancal Captal P=Physcal captal N=Natural Captal Pl=Poltcal captal Key Ag= agrculture NF= non farm OF= off farm Vulnerablty context Shocks Trends seasonalty H F N P S N Pl Influence s& access Polces Insttutons & Processes Gov`t Prvate Laws Culture Insttutons Processes Lvelhood strateges Ag NF OF Lvelhood outcomes More ncome Increased wellbeng Reduced vulnerablty Improved food securty Sustanable use of NR Fgure 1: Sustanable lvelhoods framework adapted from DFID N W E S W OLITA ZONE SO UTHE RN REGION Fgure 2: Map of the study area development. Followng Greene (Green 2003) suppose for the th faced wth choces we specfy the utlty choce as: respondent Data analyss technques Econometrc model To dentfy the determnants behnd rural household decson to engage n varous lvelhood strateges the assumpton s that n a gven perod at the dsposal of ts asset endowment a ratonal household head choose among the four mutually exclusve lvelhood strategy alternatves that offers the maxmum utlty. U = Z β + ε.... (1) If the respondent makes choce n partcular then we assume that U s the maxmum among the utltes. So the statstcal model s derved by the probablty that choce s made whch s: Prob (U >Uk) for all other K. (2)

4 Eneyew and Bekele 156 Where; U s the utlty to the th respondent form lvelhood strategy Uk the utlty to the th respondent from lvelhood strategy k If the household maxmzes ts utlty defned over ncome realzatons then the household s choce s smply an optmal allocaton of ts asset endowment to choose lvelhood that maxmzes ts utlty (Brown et al 2006). Thus the th household s decson can therefore be modelled as maxmzng the expected utlty by choosng the th lvelhood strategy among J dscrete lvelhood strateges.e.: max E( U ) f ( x ) ; 0... J (3) In general for an outcome varable wth J categores let the th lvelhood strategy that the th household chooses to maxmze ts utlty could take the value 1 f the th household choose th lvelhood strategy and 0 otherwse. The probablty that a household wth characterstcs x chooses lvelhood strategy P s modelled as: P J ' exp( X ) ' exp( X ) 0 J Wth the requrement that P 0 J= (4) 1 for any Where; P = probablty representng the th respondent s chance of fallng nto category X = Predctors of response probabltes Covarate effects specfc to th response category wth the frst category as the reference. Approprate normalzaton that removes an ndetermnacy n the model s to assume that 1 0 (ths arse because probabltes sum to 1 so only J parameter vectors are needed to determne the J + 1 probabltes) (Galab et al. 2002) so that exp( X 1) 1 mplyng that the generalzed equaton (4) above s equvalent to: Pr( y and Pr( y / X ) P 1/ X ) P 1 exp( X ) J ' 1 exp( X ) 1 1 J ' 1 exp( X ) 1 for = 0 2 J... (5) Where; y = A polytomous outcome varable wth categores coded from 0.. J. Note: The probablty of P 1 s derved from the constrant that the J probabltes sum to 1. That s p 1 p 1. Smlar to bnary logt model t mples that we can compute J log-odds ratos whch are specfed as: ln p x J x f J 0 p J (6) RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Several dfferent methods of characterzng household lvelhood strateges can be found n the lterature. Most commonly economsts group households by shares of ncome earned n dfferent sectors of the rural economy (Brown et al 2006). Smlarly ths study consdered ncome shares of each lvelhood actvty as a means to conceptualze lvelhood strateges. From the ncome portfolo analyss the share of agrculture accounts for about 64.1% nonfarm 22.8% and off farm 13.1%. Further observaton of the data revealed that off-farm actvtes (agrcultural wage land rent and envronmental gatherng) are survval mechansms pursued manly by the poor and less poor groups but not vewed as an opportunty that farmers engage n as a choce. Non farm actvtes such as rural craft s also manly choce of the poor than the counterparts. The poor tend to concentrate on off farm actvtes wth low entry constrants. Ths result leads to the understandng of the challenges whch prevent the poor and less poor from engagng n lvestock producton (see Table 1). Multnomal Logstc Regresson Model was used to dentfy determnants of lvelhood strateges. The model was selected based on the ustfcaton llustrated earler. The ndependent varables (contnuous and dummy) and ther defnton are gven n Table 1. The result from Tables 2 and 3 below showed the defnton and out puts of varables entered n to the multnomal logt models. Out of the ffteen varables hypotheszed to nfluence choce of lvelhood strateges thrteen were found to be statstcally sgnfcant. Among these sex age and educaton level of household head lvestock holdng land sze famly sze nput use credt use membershp to cooperatves dependency rato recevng remttance frequency of extenson contact agro ecology were found to nfluence choce of lvelhood strateges by the household at dfferent probablty levels. Interpretaton of the sgnfcant varables Sex of household head (SEX): culturally defned gender roles socal moblty lmtatons and dfferental ownershp of/access to assets affects lvelhood dversfcaton (Galab et al. 2002). In the study sex of household head s found to negatvely and sgnfcantly (< 0.05) nfluences dversfcaton nto off farm actvtes by Female Headed Households. Thus keepng the nfluence of other factors constant; the lkelhood of females choce of agrculture and off farm lvelhood strategy decreases by 24.8 %. Some prevous studes have ensured the same fndng (Adugna 2005; Berehanu 2007). Age of household head (AGE) Age was found sgnfcant (p<0.5) to negatvely nfluence

5 157 Agrc. Res. Rev. Table 1. Income composton by wealth category. Cash ncome composton (%) Wealth categores Total Poor (N= 51) Less poor (N=42) Better off (N=27) Lvestock Crop Agrculture sub total Petty trade Remttance Rural craft Non-farm sub total Gatherng Wage Hre/rent Off-farm sub total Mean annual ncome per AE F p-value 0.000*** farmers decson to dversfy to non farm actvtes whch mples that farmers partcpate n non-farm actvtes at a decreasng rate as they age. The lkelhood choosng agrculture and nonfarm actvtes decrease by 1.4% wth ncreasng age. The possble reason s that farmers whose age s relatvely younger leavng other factors constant could be pushed to engage more n non-farm actvtes than agrculture alone. Ths s because younger farm households cannot get enough land to support ther lvelhood compared to the older farm households. Ths result s congruent wth prevous studes (Barrett et al. 2001). Educatonal level of household head (EDU) Educatonal attanment proves one of the most mportant determnants of nonfarm earnngs. Ths varable has a negatve and sgnfcant (p<0.01) and (p<0.05) nfluence on the decson of the household partcpaton n off and non farm actvtes respectvely. The possble explanaton s that the average educaton acheved (whch s below prmary level) by the sample households s not suffcent to be formally employed and educated farmers do not fnd skll demandng lvelhood opton n the study area. Ths s smlar to other fndngs (Barrett et al. 2001). 2006). Famly sze (FAM) Famly sze was found to have postve and sgnfcant relaton to dversfcaton of lvelhood strateges nto AG + OFF + NF at < 10% probablty level. Ths means one extra person n the household ncreases the lkelhood of dversfyng lvelhoods by 3.3 %. The postve correlaton between famly sze and dversfcaton mght be due to the relaton between larger famly sze and household labour. Agro-ecology (ECO) Ths varable has a negatve and sgnfcant (P<0.10) correlaton wth the lkelhood of choosng agrculture plus off farm plus nonfarm. Ths ncreases as we go from hgh lands to mdland. Hence the probablty of dversfyng nto agrculture plus off farm and non farm drops by 15.7 % for hghland households. Ths mght be due to dfferences n the qualty and sze of land the amount and dstrbuton of ranfall and populaton denstes that nfluence between hghlands and mdlands. Lvestock holdng (LIVEST) Lvestock holdng negatvely nfluence household s choce lvestock holdng would be oblged to dversfy lvelhoods nto off and non farm n order to meet needs. In the study the lkelhood of dversfyng lvelhoods nto off and non farm actvtes decrease by 1.9% for households wth more lvestock number. The result s n lne wth others fndngs (Destaw 2003; Roa et al. 2004; Mulat et al. Land sze owned (LAND) The area of land owned by the household has a sgnfcant (P<0.05 and p<0.10) negatve correlaton wth the lkelhood of choosng AG+ OFF and AG+OFF+NF respectvely. Ths suggests that rural households wth more land tend to follow agrcultural extensfcaton rather than dversfyng. Ths mples the probablty of dversfyng to off farm and nonfarm actvtes decreases

6 Eneyew and Bekele 158 Table 2: Defnton of model varables Dependent varable Lvelhood strateges Y=0 AG Y=1 AG+OFF Y=2 AG+NF Y=3 AG+OFF+NF Independent varables AGE SEX EDU FAM ECO LAND LIVST INPU EXT COOP LEAD CRED MKTD REMIT DEPR Varables defnton and unt of measurement f the choce of the HH les n Agrculture alone Agrculture and off farm combnaton Agrculture and non farm combnaton Agrculture off farm and non farm Age of household head n years Sex of household head (1= Female 0= Male) Educaton level of household head n years Famly Sze of the household members n number Ecology of the household (0= mdland 1= hgh land) Land sze owned by the Household n Hectares Lvestock hold by the household n tropcal lvestock unt (TLU) Farm nput use by the Household (0= No 1= Yes) Frequency of extenson contact a farmer has wth extenson agent n a year Partcpaton of the household n cooperatves (0=No 1= Yes) Leadershp partcpaton of the Household Head (0=No 1=Yes) Credt use by the household (0= No 1= Yes) Dstance of the nearest market from dwellng n klometer Economc support to the household (0= No 1= Yes) Dependency rato of the household Table 3. Agrculture alone s the reference category. AG + OFF lvelhood strategy AG + NF lvelhood strategy AG+OF+NF lvelhood strategy Varables Coeff. Std.Err. t-rato Margnal Std. Margnal Std. t- Margnal Coeff. t-rato Coeff. effects Err. effects Err. rato effects ONE SEX * AGE ** EDUT *** ** FAM * 0.03 ECOL * LAND * * LIVST * INPU * 0.09 EXT * COOP ** 0.13 LEAD CRED MKTD REMIT * 0.09 DEPR * Maxmum Lkelhood Estmates Dependent varable Lvelhood strateges Number of observatons 120 Log lkelhood functon Restrcted log lkelhood Ch-squared Degrees of freedom 45 *** *** Sgnfcant at <1% 5% and 10% probablty level respectvely by 43.6% and 14.0% respectvely (Jansen et al. 2004). Thus farmers ust swtch away from off-farm actvtes

7 159 Agrc. Res. Rev. when the farm actvty s promsng. Frequency of extenson contact (EXT) Ths varable has a postve and sgnfcant (p<0.10) correlaton wth the lkelhood of choosng agrculture and off farm strategy. Keepng other factors constant; the probablty of choosng agrculture and off farm ncrease by 17.1% for those who have ganed frequent extenson contact than ther counterparts. Ths may be explaned by the message that farmers gan from extenson agents may help them to use rsk averson strateges (Lanouw and Lanouw 1995 ). Credt use (CRED) Is found to have a sgnfcant (p< 0.05) negatve mpact on the lkelhood of choosng agrculture off farm and non farm. Ths mples that the lkelhood of partcpatng n dversfed lvelhood strategy drops by 9.9 % for a household usng credt. Ths negatve mpact may be attrbuted to the fact that credt use allows farmers to follow agrcultural ntensfcaton by accessng farm nputs whch n turn mproves productvty (Samuel 2003). Dependency Rato (DEPR) Is found to have a sgnfcant (P<0.10) postve correlaton wth choce of agrculture and nonfarm strategy. Ths ndcates that wth ncrease n dependency rato the ablty to meet subsstence needs declnes and the dependency problems make t necessary to dversfy ther ncome source (Holden et al 2004). If the dependency rato ncreases by one the probablty of the household s fallng nto agrculture plus non-farm strategy ncreases by 55%. Ths result s nconsstent wth that of (Warren 2002). Inputs use (INPU) Use of chemcal fertlzer and seeds has postvely and sgnfcantly affected the choce of agrculture plus off farm plus non farm strategy at <10% level of sgnfcance. The probable reason for ths s that due to mprovement of productvty through farm nput use the farmers mght go for petty tradng and other non farm actvtes. dversfy lvelhoods nto off and non farm snce cooperatves promote access to socal captal n whch off/ non farm optons are ganed. As group dscussants revealed cooperaton n the form of credt unons producer organzatons women credt assocaton for mlk and better and churches have postve effects on the ncome generatng capacty of ther members and through producton lnkages on the wder local economy n the study area. The result s n lne wth other fndng (Warren 2002). Recevng remttance (REMIT) Ths varable has a postve contrbuton to the dversfcaton apart from agrculture to off and non farm at sgnfcance of <10 % probablty level. Ths meant that the lkelhood of a household recevng remttance ncrease choce of dversfcaton nto off farm and non farm actvtes by 8.7 %. The result s n consstent wth others fndngs of Bezemer and Lerman (2002). Concluson Based on ths study t s possble to conclude that the constrants of the rural households n choosng lvelhood strateges should not be put asde. Farm and non-farm lnkages need to be addressed as well. The contrbuton made by non-agrcultural sector to rural households s sgnfcant for the poor although these actvtes are survval orented and have lttle to do wth accumulaton. The result of the multnomal logstc regresson revealed that out of 15 varables ncluded n the model 13 explanatory varables are found to be sgnfcant up to less than 10% probablty level. Accordngly sex educaton land sze have negatve assocaton wth agrculture plus off farm lvelhood strategy. Whereas extenson contact has a postvely nfluence on households choce of agrculture plus off farm strategy. Meanwhle age and educaton negatvely determne choce of agrculture plus nonfarm actvtes. Dependency ratos on the other hand postvely affect the same strategy. Agrculture plus off farm plus nonfarm s affected by agro-ecology land sze lvestock holdng credt use negatvely. Input use cooperatves membershp recevng remttance famly sze were found to affect the choce of smlar lvelhood strategy postvely. Membershp to cooperatves (COOP) Ths varable was found sgnfcant (<0.05) to postvely determne choce of lvelhood strategy towards agrculture plus off farm plus non farm actvtes by 13.2%. That means the household who partcpate n cooperatves wll RECOMMENDATIONS Household lvelhoods are hghly dverse. Polcy-makers need to reflect on the most sutable ways of supportng ths dversty. Any attempt to ntervene the communty need to target specfc groups of socetes such as female

8 Eneyew and Bekele 160 headed households wage workers petty traders and the poor. The nterventon strategy should have a needs dentfcaton to address both the basc needs as well as the needs that arse from wealth category specfc constrants. The contrbuton of crop to cash ncome and the value of own consumpton was sgnfcant. Ths mples that efforts have to be made to mprove ncome from cash crops producton (Gnger and coffee) through promoton of nput use and marketng facltes. The poor are not merely producers but also wage labourers and consumers; thus extenson should promote technologes not smply geared to ncreased producton but whch are contextually senstve to potental tradeoffs between productvty ncreased employment opportuntes and reduced vulnerablty. As famly sze ncrease there s no means of accessng more land to cultvaton to meet the demand of large famly sze. Wth these scenaro havng more household sze aggravate the problem of meetng food leave alone educaton health and other non-food demands of household that wll brng future return. Thus affrmatve acton based awareness creaton on the mpacts of populaton growth at the famly and communty level should be strongly advocated. The fact that the average years of educaton acheved by sample household heads s below prmary level ndcates t has no more ncentves to nvolve the household head n more remuneratve actvtes snce better obs demand more than ths level. Therefore non formal educaton and tranng must be arranged to enhance the skll of communty. Lvestock sub sector plays a leadng role n household ncome. Hence necessary effort should be made to mprove the producton and productvty of the sector. Ths can be done through the provson of adequate veternary servces mproved water supply ponts ntroducton effectve artfcal nsemnaton servces to upgrade the already exstng breeds launchng sustanable and effectve forage development program provson of tranng for the lvestock holders on how to mprove ther producton and productvty and mprovng the marketng condtons. Off farm and nonfarm strateges make an mportant contrbuton to household ncomes. In ths regard nterventons that enhance these actvtes n sustanable manner need to be desgned. Therefore the rural development strategy should not only emphass n agrcultural producton but concomtant attenton should be gven n promotng such actvtes n the rural areas. Moreover the agrcultural sector of the dstrct s characterzed by land scarcty and ncreasng fragmentaton of already very small farms. To ths affect the farmng economy s not vable especally for the poor. Thus nonfarm sector has to be developed to absorb more of the growng populaton. Culturally approprate forms of socal captal (cooperatves) also appear to have the potental to ad rural ncome generaton. Support to local cooperatves may have postve effects on the ncome generatng capacty of ther members and through producton lnkages on the wder local economy. The polcy to promote adopton of credt to stmulate adopton of hgh yeldng varetes and fertlzer use has not been very successful n the study area. Farmers were reportng that they faled to pose the later due to the absence of the former. Thus enhancng and expandng rural credts to subsstence farmers n the dstrct should be one of the prmary areas of nterventon and polcy optons. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The authors are grateful for Wolata Sodo agrcultural vocatonal tranng college for fnancng ths research. REFERENCES Adugna L (2005). The Dynamcs of Lvelhood Dversfcaton n Ethopa Revsted: Evdence from Panel Data Department of Economcs Unversty of Massachusetts Boston. BARD (2007). Bureau of Agrculture and Rural Development Boloso Sore Dstrct Food Safety Net program mplementaton report. Barrett CB Reardon T Webb P (2001). Non-farm Income Dversfcaton and Household Lvelhood Strateges n Rural Afrca: Concepts Dynamcs and Polcy Implcatons. Food polcy Berehanu E (2007). Lvelhood Strateges of Smallholder Farmers and Income Poverty n draught prone areas: The case of Gena- Bosa woreda SNNPRS. MSc Thess Presented to the School of Graduate Studes of Haramaya Unversty. Berhanu A (2006). Effectve Ad for Small Farmers n Sub-Saharan Afrca: Southern Cvl Socety Perspectves. Canadan Food Securty Polcy Group. Adds Ababa. Bezemer DJ Lerman Z (2002). Rural Lvelhoods n Armena.The Centre for Agrcultural Economc Research the Department of Agrcultural Economcs and Management Dscusson Paper No Brown DR Stephens EC Okuro MJ Murth FM Barrette CB (2006). Lvelhood Strateges n the Rural Kenyan Hghland. Carswell G (2000). Lvelhood dversfcaton n southern Ethopa. IDS workng paper 117. Chambers R Conway GR (1992). Sustanable rural lvelhoods: practcal concepts for 21st century. Insttute of Development Studes Dscusson Papers 296 Cambrdge. CSA (2009). Central Statstcal Authorty populaton estmates. Ethopa Adds Ababa. Destaw B (2003). Non-farm Employment and Farm Producton of small holder Farmers: A Study n Eda Dstrct of Ethopa. A Thess Submtted to the School of Graduate Studes Alemaya Unversty. DFID (1999). (Department for Internatonal Development) Sustanable Rural Lvelhoods Gudance Sheet London UK. DFID (2000). (Department for Internatonal Development) Sustanable Rural Lvelhoods Gudance Sheet London UK. Ells F Allson E (2004). Lvelhood dversfcaton and natural resource access: Overseas Development Group Workng paper 9. Unversty of East Angla UK. Ells F (2000) Rural Lvelhoods and Dversty n Developng Countres Oxford Unversty Press. Farrngton J Ramasut T Walker J (2002). Sustanable Lvelhoods Approaches n Urban Areas: General Lessons wth Illustratons from Indan Cases ODI London UK. Galab S Fenn B Jones N Rau D Wlson I Reddy MG (2002). Lvelhood Dversfcaton n Rural Andhra Pradesh: Household asset portfolos and mplcatons for poverty reducton workng paper no. 34. Green HW (2003). Econometrc Analyss: Fourth Edton. New York Unversty Macmllan Publshng Company. Holden S Bekele S Pender J (2004). Non farm ncome household

9 161 Agrc. Res. Rev. welfare and sustanable land management n a less favoured area n the Ethopan hghlands. Department of Economcs and Resource Management Agrcultural Unversty of Norway. Jansen H Damon PA John P Welemaker W Schpper R (2004). Polces for sustanable development n the hllsde areas of Honduras. A quanttatve lvelhoods approach. Internatonal Food Polcy Research Insttute (IFPRI) Central Amerca Offce Washngton DC USA. Kan N MacGregor J Tacol C (2005). Understandng market-based lvelhoods n a globalsng world: combnng approaches and methods. Internatonal Insttute forenvronment and Development (IIED). Lanouw JO P Lanouw (1995). Rural nonfarm employment. Polcy research workng paper Mulat D Fantu G Tadele F (2006). Issues n Employment and Poverty. Towards a more employment-ntensve and pro-poor economc growth n Ethopa: Dscusson Paper 22. Issues and polces Employment Strategy Department Internatonal Labour Offce Geneva. Roa J Nehof A Prce L Moerbeek H (2004). Food Securty through the Lvelhoods Lens: an ntegratve approach (the case of less favoured areas n the Phlppnes); / wau.nl/m/response/rao.pdf./ Samuel GS (2003). Summary report on recent economc and agrcultural polcy. Paper prepared for the Roles of Agrculture Internatonal Conference October 2003 Rome Italy. Scoones I (1998). Sustanable lvelhoods a framework for analyss IDS workng papernumber 72 Brghton. Warren P (2002). Lvelhoods Dversfcaton and Enterprse Development: An Intal Exploraton of Concepts and Issues. Rome: FAO.