Community Participation and Sustainable Natural Resource Management: The Case of lenche Dima Watershed, Guba lafto Woreda, North East Ethiopia
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Date
2010-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
This thesis attempted to examine " community participation on eXlstlng participatory natural
resource management approaches with a due emphasis on land conservation and rehabilitation
practices in Lenche Dima water shed, North East Ethiopia." Out of the total 865 households found
in the research site, 120 households were randomly se lected and taken as representative sample size
of the target population. Similarly, a mixture of both qualitative and quantitative research methods
was used to analyze the data obtained thorough the data collecting instruments (such as household
survey, key informant interview, focus group di scussion, and field observation) used in the study.
That is, in order to see the relationship between depend<:nt and independent variables, [he
qual itative data gathered from the rese'arch respondents were described and explained in the studv.
Whereas, the quantitative data obtained in the study were analyzed by different statistical methods.
The major findings of the study were: first, before the watershed management project intervention.
farme rs were very well aware of land degradation problems in the area. As the result of this,
farmers' participation at the initial stage of the project implementation was positively significant for
the management practices in the watershed. Second, from the statistical analysis of community
participation, the socio·economic and demographic characteristics of households such as sex, age,
family size, crop production and livestock ownership were found to be signiticant and highly
associated with the participation of households. Relying on the results of the anal ys is community
participation at various planning processes, participation at the implementation stage of the
watershed project was found to be relatively very high 381 or (83.3%). However, farmers '
continuous participation (at the maintenance stage) was declined by 127 or (39.1 %) due to the
discontinuity of incentives from the project. That is, sustainable community participation was
hampered by lack of support, benefit from conservation practices, and continuous stakeholder 's
coordination. Similarly, women's participation in conservation work was found not to be significant
in the statistical analysis some observable challenges. In addition, the finding showed that
participatory sustainable resource conservation was influenced by lack of maintenance, quality of
conservation practices, the prevalence of drought, policy support and tenure security as well as lack
of stakeholders' involvement. More importantly, following the withdrawal of the \vatershed donor
project, the remaining stakeholders' role for assuring sustainable management approach was found
to be negligible. Generall y. it could be concluded that conservation practices undertaken in the area
by the project was so encouraging. Thus, the inc entive-based approach of the project was found to
be essential for implementing the project conservation activities. However, that approach created
dependency than self-reliance on community participation and identified as the major challenge for
sustainable watershed management. Therefore, there is a need for sustainab le in\'olvement of the
existing stake holders', includ ing local CBOs as well as vertical and horizontal linkage the existing
stakeholders in order to promote sound watershed management with effective community
participation
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Keywords
Community Participation