{"metadata":{"id":"00a23d5e00df89521c4df5690678614b","source":"gardian_index","url":"https://cgspace.cgiar.org/rest/bitstreams/904bdc0b-8ece-419c-9e68-a178ac886931/retrieve"},"pageCount":12,"title":"","keywords":[],"chapters":[{"head":"Introduction","index":1,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":52,"text":"Tigray region is characterized by a cold and frosty climate. The landscape is hilly with steep slopes. The soils are degraded and crop production is low. Livestock, particularly sheep production, are the mainstay of farmers' livelihoods. Livestock production is constrained by ecological, technical and economic limitations which result in severe feed shortages."},{"index":2,"size":41,"text":"The Feed Assessment Tool (FEAST) is a systematic and rapid method to assess local feed resource availability and use at site-level. It helps in the design of intervention strategies aiming to optimize feed supply and utilization through technical and organizational interventions."},{"index":3,"size":28,"text":"FEAST was used to characterize the livestock production system and in particular feed-related aspects of smallholder farmers of Tsibet kebele is located in Endamehoni District in southern Tigray."},{"index":4,"size":47,"text":"The objective of the current survey was to assess the feed resource availability and utilization using a feed assessment tool (FEAST) within the context of the overall farming and livestock production systems to determine the potential of site-specific feed interventions in selected areas within the sub-alpine highlands."}]},{"head":"Methodology","index":2,"paragraphs":[]},{"head":"Study site","index":3,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":111,"text":"The survey was conducted in Tsibet Kebele. Tsibet is located in Endamehoni District in the southern Tigray zone of the Tigray regional state. The kebele lies 683km north of Addis Ababa, approximately 116 km from Mekele (the regional capital city). Tsibet has an altitude of 2950-3050 m above sea level with a minimum average temperature of 4 0 C and maximum average temperature of 12 o C. The mean annual rainfall is 750 mm. The kebele has a total land area of 4016 ha, of which 1039 ha are arable. It has 1267 households of which 304 are female-headed and 963 are male headed. The average family size is 6 persons."}]},{"head":"Sampling method","index":4,"paragraphs":[]},{"head":"Selection of Kebeles","index":5,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":55,"text":"Tsibet is one of the two kebeles in Tigray selected for the Africa RISING project intervention. The criterion was based on accessibility and proximity to the administrative town of the District. Tsibet is the less accessible kebele of the two and it lies 9km from the main road and 20 km from the administrative town."}]},{"head":"Selection of participants","index":6,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":18,"text":"The criteria for selection of participants included gender, age and wealth classes based on landholding (small, medium, large)."}]},{"head":"Survey structure and format","index":7,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":69,"text":"Two tools were used for the survey, a focus group discussion using the participatory rural appraisal approach and individual interviews. A total of 20 farmers (7 women and 13 men) were selected for the focus group discussion. From the three landholding categories (small, medium and large farm size), 9 respondents (3 respondents from each categories) were selected for individual interviews. The surveys were conducted on 26 -27th December, 2013."}]},{"head":"Major results","index":8,"paragraphs":[]},{"head":"Overview of the farming systems","index":9,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":111,"text":"The farmers in Tsibet kebele are entirely smallholders with a subsistence mode of production. The average farm size is very small, about 65 % of the households have a land size of less than 0.5 ha. The landless farmers are 10 % (Table1). Tsibet has only one cropping season, the meher season (May -December). There is a short season, belg, from February to June which has become highly unreliable over the years. Irrigation (stream, well dig and check dam) is available to 20% of the households. The major crops grown are barley, wheat and faba beans covering approximately 0.20 ha, 0.12 ha and 0.04 ha respectively in each household (Figure 1)."},{"index":2,"size":111,"text":"There is shortage of land for cultivation and fallowing is done to control soil erosion. Agricultural activities in the kebele do not usually require more than family labour. Farmers with large landholdings who may need extra labour get it through the traditional labour sharing arrangements (wonfel, jige) or hire it at a cost of Birr 65 ($3.4) and Birr 40 ($2.1) at the time of weeding and harvesting respectively. Lunch and a local drink are provided. Farmers in the area have various sources of income sources (Figure 2). The main sources are sale of food crops, cash crops (ensosla and horticulture) and eucalyptus trees that contribute up to 80% in total. "}]},{"head":"Livestock production system","index":10,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":43,"text":"Majority of the households in Tsibet own sheep, local dairy cows, draft cattle, local poultry and donkeys (Table 2). Figure 3 shows the average livestock species (in TLU) per household. Donkeys, draft cattle which are later fattened and local dairy cattle are predominant.  "}]},{"head":"Feeds and feed resources","index":11,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":91,"text":"The feed resources in Tsibet kebele include natural pasture (grazing), cereal and legume crop residues, hay, naturally occurring green fodder (mainly weeds). Overall feed availability is low because farmers own very small plots of land, thus yields of cereal and pulse crops are very low. Grazing land is highly degraded and only a few farmers produce cultivated fodder, usually not more than 10 plants. Farmers do not treat crop residues in any way except chopping. They have no knowledge of mixing crop residues with any supplements to improve their nutritional value."},{"index":2,"size":80,"text":"The relative contributions of the different feed sources to the total dry matter (DM), metabolizable energy (ME) and crude protein (CP) contents of the total diet are shown in Figure 4. Famers rely heavily on grazing and naturally occurring fodder that is available after the rains from September-December (Figure 5). During the rest of the months of the year, farmers rely on crop residues which are in short supply as seen in their low (6%) contribution to DM (Figure 4). "}]},{"head":"Problems, issues and opportunities","index":12,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":59,"text":"Livestock production is constrained by a multitude of factors. The major problems and their priority ranking according to farmers are presented in Table 3. Feed shortage, leeches and low performance breed were identified by farmers as the most important problems. Poor animal husbandry and marketing problems were the second and the third most important problem in the kebele respectively."},{"index":2,"size":59,"text":"The very rough and hilly topography with high soil degradation, frosty and sub-moist climate and land shortage limit feed availability from grazing, development of planted forages and availability of crop residues. Crop production and livestock are banned in the mountains and hills due to soil conservation projects. There are limited high yielding forage species adapted to the sub-alpine highlands."},{"index":3,"size":71,"text":"Disease, traditional breeding and management practices limit livestock productivity and hence income, resulting in poor incentives for farmers to adopt improved technologies. Attitude and knowledge of the farmers towards small ruminant production does not encourage improvement because farmers consider them scavengers. Coping mechanisms of farmers and their perceived solutions to their livestock problems are presented in Table 4. Potential interventions to the livestock situation in Tsibet are shown in Table 5.  "}]},{"head":"Conclusions","index":13,"paragraphs":[{"index":1,"size":83,"text":"Despite the constraints of land shortage both for grazing and crop production, rough and hilly topography and farmers' subsistence mode of production, the interest of farmers and their experience in zero grazing is a good opportunity to build upon. Improved forage crops and improved bulls to reduce uncontrolled breeding can be introduced. The construction of water troughs through community participation (labour contribution) to control the problem of leeches needs to be emphasized as it causes high losses of production and death of animals."}]}],"figures":[{"text":"Figure 1 : Figure 1: Major crops grown in Tsibet "},{"text":"Figure 2 : Figure 2: Contribution (%) of livelihood activities to household income in Tsibet "},{"text":"Figure 3 : Figure 3: Average livestock species holdings per household in Tropical Livestock Units (TLU) in Tsibet "},{"text":"Figure 4 :Figure 5 : Figure 4: The contribution of various feedstuffs to DM (a), ME (b) and CP (c) to livestock diets in Tsibet "},{"text":"  "},{"text":"Table 1 : Average land size owned by various categories of farmers in Tsibet  "},{"text":"Category of farmers Range of land size(ha) Ranges of land size in \"timad\" % of households that fall into the category  Landless 0 0 10 Landless0010 Small Up to 0.25 Up to 1 15 SmallUp to 0.25Up to 115 Medium 0.26-0.5 1.1 up to 2 50 Medium0.26-0.51.1 up to 250 Large 0.6-0.75 2.1 up to 3 25 Large0.6-0.752.1 up to 325  "},{"text":"Table 2 : Livestock species owned by households in Tsibet Livestock species % Livestock species%  "},{"text":"of household that own the species Average number of animal per household   Fattening sheep and goats 8% Draft animal 4% Fattening sheep and goats 8%Draft animal 4%  Eucalyptus trees Dairing 4% Eucalyptus treesDairing 4%  20% Poultry Meat 20%Poultry Meat   3% 3%   Poultry eggs Poultry eggs  Cash crops 2% Cash crops2%  22%  22%  Food crops  Food crops  37%  37% Local dairy cows 75 2 Local dairy cows752 Improved dairy cow 1 1 Improved dairy cow 11 Draught cattle 80 2 Draught cattle802 Sheep 90 25 Sheep9025 Goats 5 4 Goats54 Local poultry 95 6 Local poultry956 Improved poultry 2 3 Improved poultry23 Horses 1 2 Horses12 Donkeys 95 2 Donkeys952  "},{"text":"Table 3 : Livestock production problems as ranked by farmers in Tsibet Problem Score of the problem Order of the problem importance ProblemScore of the problemOrder of the problem importance Feed shortage 3 1 Feed shortage31 Leeches 3 1 Leeches31 Low performance breed 3 1 Low performance breed31 Poor animal husbandry 1 2 Poor animal husbandry12 Market problem 0 3 Market problem03  "},{"text":"Table 4 : Coping mechanisms to problems and proposed solutions proposed by farmers in Tsibet Major Farmers coping mechanisms Suggested solutions Opportunities and MajorFarmers coping mechanismsSuggested solutionsOpportunities and problem   limitation problemlimitation Feed  Collecting and conserving  Planting forages in Even though land shortage Feed Collecting and conserving Planting forages inEven though land shortage shortage green forages & crop backyards is the Key problem, they shortagegreen forages & cropbackyardsis the Key problem, they  residue  Introducing cut and have good experience of residue Introducing cut andhave good experience of   Feed purchasing and carry system zero grazing. Faba beans  Feed purchasing andcarry systemzero grazing. Faba beans  planting of forages  Destocking and field peas are well planting of forages Destockingand field peas are well    known crops next to barley known crops next to barley    and wheat and residues and wheat and residues    from these crops can be from these crops can be    used to improve the used to improve the    nutritional values of other nutritional values of other    crop residues. crop residues. Leech  Drinking animals using  Construction of water Farmers are willing to Leech Drinking animals using Construction of waterFarmers are willing to  water trough troughs cooperate in the water troughtroughscooperate in the   Controlling animals  Controlling animals construction of water  Controlling animals Controlling animalsconstruction of water  during drinking times during drinking times troughs as they realize the during drinking timesduring drinking timestroughs as they realize the   Dehydrate animals to  detrimental effects of  Dehydrate animals todetrimental effects of  remove the leach by  leeches remove the leach byleeches  denying them water   denying them water Market  Selling at high market  Introducing road Feeder road which Market Selling at high market Introducing roadFeeder road which problem price time infrastructure connects to the main road problemprice timeinfrastructureconnects to the main road   Travel to neighbor  Establishment of near is under construction.  Travel to neighbor Establishment of nearis under construction.  market places, Alaje and market place Knowledge on fattening is market places, Alaje andmarket placeKnowledge on fattening is  EndaMehoni  limited both in small EndaMehonilimited both in small    ruminant and large ruminant and large    ruminants. Farmers have a ruminants. Farmers have a    large number of animals large number of animals    with small sizes of lands with small sizes of lands    which cause low which cause low    production potential, so production potential, so    awareness creation about awareness creation about    destocking and fattening destocking and fattening    importance should be an importance should be an    intervention. intervention. Low  Cross breeding with  Establishment of AI Zero grazing feeding Low Cross breeding with Establishment of AIZero grazing feeding performance improved breeds service at kebele level system can be used to performanceimproved breedsservice at kebele levelsystem can be used to breed  Selection of local bull  Introducing improved control uncontrolled breed Selection of local bull Introducing improvedcontrol uncontrolled  breeds bulls breeding (to use only breedsbullsbreeding (to use only    Introducing breeds selected breed or bull).  Introducing breedsselected breed or bull).   adaptable to the agro  adaptable to the agro   ecology  ecology Poor animal  Supplementation using  Improving feeding Farmers are aware of the Poor animal Supplementation using Improving feedingFarmers are aware of the husbandry salt strategies importance of animal husbandrysaltstrategiesimportance of animal   Cleaning animal barns  Improve animal health, thus health  Cleaning animal barns Improve animalhealth, thus health   Built animal barn with health technicians should be  Built animal barn withhealthtechnicians should be  iron roofs and mad wall  availed at kebele level to iron roofs and mad wallavailed at kebele level to    assist farmers. assist farmers.  "},{"text":"Table 5 : Potential interventions for top priority problems in Tsibet Planting forages at irrigation and backyard  Supplementing green forages to crop residue and mixing cereal residues with legume residues  Introducing cut and carry system  Destocking and fattening Leech  Construction of water troughs is the only way of solving the problem. Establishment of AI service at PA level  Introducing improved bulls and Introducing adaptable breed for the agro ecology Problems Possible intervention ProblemsPossible intervention identified by  identified by farmers  farmers Feed shortage  Low performance  Feed shortage  Low performance  breed  breed  "}],"sieverID":"571056b5-cf86-4566-908f-7597b49c8219","abstract":""}