The role of livestock in mitigating land degredation, poverty and child malnutrition in mixed farming systems: the case of coffee-growing midlands of Sidama - Ethiopia

This study illustrates the role played by livestock in alleviating land degradation, poverty and the resulting child malnutrition in integrated farming systems in Ethiopia. It looks at the link between land dedgradation and child malnutrition, and whether protecting one can reduce the other.Findings include:the prevalent farming system of the midlands of Sidama is under stress mainly because of burgeoning human population. Symptoms are not only the high proportion of children acutely or chronically affected by malnutrition but also the progressive degradation of resources in an environment once extremely fertile in order to buffer the progressive crisis, and given the presence of markets for cash crops and dairy products, the mixed system in Sidama midlands is rapidly evolving into specialisation; coffee and chat plants are gradually replacing food crops in the garden such as ensete, yam and maizethe situation in Sidama is intermediate between what was observed in the Rwanda highlands and the positive Machakos case, Kenya. Nevertheless, Sidama has less marketing opportunities than Machakos and the enrolment rates for primary schools reported from Ethiopia may reduce the possibility of off-farm employment, for local farmersthe main underlying factor of malnutrition in children of Sidama is povertyalthough child mortality is higher in poor households, the protective effect of the family income on children decrease soon after they are weanedThe report concludes that livestock play a protective role against land degradation and poverty. Llivestock allows households to diversify household production and diet. There is no major differences in the faming skills and knowledge of members from low or high income households. The main difference between them is the possibility to modulate their production and marketing strategies:High income farmers have a good area of manoeuvre within which they can adapt their decisions according to rapidly changing conditions.low income farmers have to sell products soon after harvest, when prices are low, or consume them before they become ripe and reply on traditionally standardized husbandry techniques developed when pressure on local natural resources was less intense. These households have limited choices that are reduced every year or in every round of the “spiral of necessity”