By mid-2019 the rainy season had brought almost no rain to Ale, Ethiopia. Fields were plowed and ready, but the sky stayed clear. Rain that fell at the end of February “escaped” before the seeds got enough water, a 29-year-old farmer named Tutu told the aid group Mercy Corps. If the rains did not come back, it would be the second season in a row without a harvest.
Mercy Corps said worsening drought threatened the livelihoods of more than 80 million Ethiopian farmers who depend on rain-fed crops and livestock. Agriculture accounts for almost half of Ethiopia’s economic output and 90 percent of its exports, and more than 80 percent of the population depends on it, the group said. As herders travel farther in search of grass and water, grazing land is trampled and stripped bare.
Tutu is secretary of a farmers group supported by Mercy Corps. The group used GPS, satellite positioning, to mark the edges of its land, put up fencing and wrote bylaws to keep people and cattle off while the grass recovered. “After protecting the land and enforcing the bylaws, the grass began growing again,” Tutu said. “It was a barren land, totally out of grass. … But now we have rehabilitated it, so we can now easily get grass for our cattle. We can also supply it for other villages that need it.”
Gale, 21, another member, starts each day walking 20 minutes to a riverbed that is now dry and digs in the sand with her hands until she finds water. “Life is very difficult here in our area,” she said. She insists on sending her sons to school: “Nowadays we see different people who are changing their lives through education.”
The protected grass let the group fatten and sell cattle in three to four months instead of a year. Members planned to protect a second area, build a store for grain bought from the highlands to sell at a fair price, and use some of the income to support elderly people with no children to help them. Tutu remained cautious: “Even if we preserve this land, it might be hard to cope with climate change.”
Sources: ReliefWeb (Mercy Corps)