{"id":280672,"date":"2019-07-03T15:49:16","date_gmt":"2019-07-03T19:49:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.google.com\/articles\/CAIiELz1SfK_arwAbFlBftZgKi4qGQgEKhAIACoHCAow4OH9CjCg6_UCMJ-42gU?oc=5"},"modified":"2026-10-05T11:34:56","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T15:34:56","slug":"herders-in-ale-fence-off-rangeland-as-drought-stretches-ethiopias-dry-seasons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/280672","title":{"rendered":"Herders in Ale fence off rangeland as drought stretches Ethiopia\u2019s dry seasons"},"content":{"rendered":"

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 \u201cescaped\u201d 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.<\/p>\n

\"A
A young man in drought conditions in Ethiopia on 29 July 2008 (Kimberly Flowers, USAID, Wikimedia Commons, public domain) [file photo]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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\u2019s 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.<\/p>\n

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. \u201cAfter protecting the land and enforcing the bylaws, the grass began growing again,\u201d Tutu said. \u201cIt was a barren land, totally out of grass. \u2026 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

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. \u201cLife is very difficult here in our area,\u201d she said. She insists on sending her sons to school: \u201cNowadays we see different people who are changing their lives through education.\u201d<\/p>\n

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: \u201cEven if we preserve this land, it might be hard to cope with climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sources:<\/strong> ReliefWeb (Mercy Corps)<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Waiting for rain: Living in a dry season that never ends – Ethiopia  ReliefWebIt’s the rainy season in Ale, Ethiopia. But you wouldn’t know it. The farmlands are plowed and ready for rain, but there isn’t a raindrop on the ground or any signs…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":837275,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-280672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ethiopian-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/drought-ethiopia-usaid-2008.jpg?fit=1280%2C854&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-1b0Y","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=280672"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280672\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":837296,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/280672\/revisions\/837296"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/837275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=280672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=280672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=280672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}