Poster by Amare Haileslassie, Fitsum Hagos, Seleshi Bekele Awulachew, Tilahun Amede, Katrien Descheemaeker, Don Peden, Michael Blummel, Solomon Gebreselassie: Presented to ILRI APM, 23 March 2009

1. Coping with Climate Change: Water Productivity Perspectives
Amare Haileslassie*, Fitsum Hagos**, Seleshi Bekele Awulachew **, Tilahun Amede***,Katrien Descheemaeker**,Don Peden*,
Michael Blummel*, Solomon Gebreselassie*
* International Livestock Research Institute *** International Water Management Institute and International Livestock Research Institute Which Big Issue is addressed,
** International Water Management Institute and how?
Climate change, vulnerability &
coping: improved water
Abstract productivity
There is a growing concern that global climate change and associated water shortage will be one of the limiting factors for increased food production. Who are your partners?
Several reports suggest that Africa is already vulnerable: a small rises in temperature and reductions in rainfall could 'tip the balance' and lead to severe
water shortages and reductions in crop and livestock productivity. To cope with the impacts, strategies for producing more output per unit of water input
have been suggested (e.g. CPWF project 37, note photo plates 1, 2, 3 and 5). This needs, however, further insight on the more vulnerable groups in the International Water management
society and their capacity to cope. Similarly, outputs from CPWF 19 suggest that there are a lot of scopes for institutionalizing Payment for Environmental Institute.
Services (PES), which could be used to enhance ecosystem’s resilience to climate change. In this poster relevant evidences from CPWF financed projects What else is needed to have
are presented. impact?
Dialog, awareness and actions
Figure 1: Livestock and crop water productivity (US$ ,
Case 1: Smallholder Farmers’ Access to Productive Resources m3) across different wealth groups in Gumera
Determine their Coping Capacity with Climate Change watershed, Blue Nile basin( LWP is Livestock Water
Productivity and CWP is Crop Water Productivity)
Our study on CWP and LWP (Figure 1) revealed that farmers that are endowed with more
productive resources (e.g. land and draught power) have significantly higher values of LWP and
CWP than the poor. Rich farmers maximize their benefits by using feed resources from communal a
grazing lands by keeping more livestock. Whenever public interventions are planned to improve a
communal pool resources underlining equity concerns need to be considered. Secondly, rich farmers a
b
seem to produce their animals’ feed (e.g. crop residues) with higher water productivity (Figure 1). In b
general, the poor farmers are already vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and a slight shift in c
rainfall pattern can tip the balance and worsen the current low level of agricultural productivity.
Hence, policy that target poverty reduction, through agricultural intensification must be promoted. Photo1: Managing the water that
livestock “eat”,
Probability is based on LSD test; means followed by
the same letter are not significantly different at
Case 2: Immediate Area of Intervention for Adaptation to Climate p=0.05; wealth class 1 is rich, 2 is medium and 3 is
Change is in Low Yielding Conditions poor as classified by participatory wealth ranking
methods
In many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, current extension packages to increase agricultural productivity
and thereby reduce smallholders’ vulnerability to climate change, focus on “model farmers”. Figure 2: Relation between water productivity and
Although there is scope to learn from the model farmer, whether “model farmers” should be the focal yield (Gumera watershed, Blue Nile basin)
Photo2: Change in feeding regime:
point of intervention for maximum impact is questioned. Data on water productivity across socio- addressing equity and land
economic classes (Figure 2) are important to identify immediate areas of intervention that can yield 1b)
degradation
stronger impacts. Figure 2 suggests that the poor households had the lowest grain yields and
associated CWP with negative implications for LWP in systems where residues are major feed
sources, as the water depleted to grow crops is shared between grain and livestock feed. In general,
the low yielding areas (Figure 2) are the areas of highest potential for water productivity gain and
also to address more vulnerable groups. This warrants that policy makers must target the poor.
Potential areas for interventions
Case 3: Farmers Having More Livestock are Willing to Pay for
Ecosystem Services Photo 3: Adding values to livestock
products &improving access to
institutions such as market
PES is an emerging paradigm to finance conservation programs that can increase land productivity
and enhances system’s resilience. We evaluated 325 sample households’, stratified into upstream and Table 1: Farmers WTP in cash and labor units (Koga
downstream, willingness to pay (WTP) for improved land and water management practices (Table 1 and Gumera watersheds, Blue Nile basin, Ethiopia)
and 2). About 64.9% of the households were willing to pay in cash while >90% were willing to pay
in labor (Table 1). But values of mean WTP, whatever the type, fall far short of covering the Attributes Upstream Downstream Total
investment and maintenance cost needed for land rehabilitation rendering a sole user-financed PES Willing Non-willing Willing Non-willing Willing Non-willing
WTP (cash moth-1) 99 76 112 38 211 114
scheme infeasible in the short term ( Table 2). We suggested that PES can be linked to global targets
of increasing soil carbon through land rehabilitation and multipurpose tree plantation (e.g. WTP (labor MD moth-1) 169 6 147 3 316 9
silvopasture). The analysis of the determinants of WTP reveals that asset wealth, such as livestock
ownership, significantly determine farmers’ WTP. This implies that improving the poor's asset base
will not only help reduce poverty but also enhance its capacity to invest. Thus, policy makers must Photo 4: Caring about livestock is
focus on increasing the products and services per unit of livestock without focusing on mere increase WTP is for willingness to pay; MD is for man day caring about the owner
in number of livestock.
Table 2: Estimated mean WTP in cash and labor (Koga and Gumera
watersheds, Blue Nile basin, Ethiopia)
Mean WTP N Mean value C-I (95%) P>t
MWTP ETB month-1 175 10.4 8.2 12.6 0.0029
(upstream)
MWTP in ETB month-1 150 13.1 11.8 14.5
(downstream)
MWTP ( in labor MD month-1 175 3.3 3.15 3.40 0.0000
(upstream)
MWTP in labor MD month-1 150 3.9 3.69 4.01
(downstream)
MWTP is mean willingness to pay; ETB is for Ethiopian currency = 9.6 Photo 5: Improving the quality and use of crop
ETB; MD is for man day residues and focusing on food- feed crops
This paper presents findings from PN 37, and 19 : projects of the CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food
(CPWF). The authors are grateful to the CPWF and sample farm households for unreserved willingness to provide
information. Our thanks also go to Shirley Tarawali for her comments on the draft of this poster. 23 March 2009
ILRI
INTERNATIONAL LIVESTOCK RESEARCH INSTITUTE