Challenges · Landscape Restoration · Water
1605
1508
Warm Semiarid
Barley, Beans, Fruit, Livestock, Wheat
The Bohele Integrated Watershed is located in Tigray National Regional State and found in the Eastern Tigray Zone Administration. The landscape is composed of state forests upstream and agricultural lands downstream. The watershed is characterized by crop-livestock farming system, with major crops including wheat, barley, beans, and apples and key livestock species including cattle, sheep, and goats.
Bohele is a part of the MERET project.
My name is Birhane Etay Reda, and I am from Freweini, Tigray, Ethiopia. I have worked in Atsbi Wonberta, Tigray, Ethiopia for 4 and half years and before that worked 4 years in Endabaguna, Tigray, Ethiopa. Now I am working at Atsbi Wonberta, Tigray, Ethiopia as a coordinator of the Natural Resource Development Utilization And Protection Department and also as the Woreda Technical Team leader of Bohele Landscape/Watershed.
Birhane Etay RedaA good understanding of the concept of the Watershed planning team's integrated activities, the community's growing ownership and empowerment, and the leadership capacity of the Watershed Planning Team and Women to protect and manage the landscape while influencing neighboring Kebeles are some of the successes.
This creates a sense of ownership in the community and causes it to prioritize the protection of the environment. Control of free grazing and practicing stall feeding through development of fodder production enhances the integration of livestock in landscape management. Through the arrangement of user groups, communal resources and benefits are shared throughout the community. The rehabilitation of upstream areas results in the reduction of flooding and siltation, improving stream flows and the harvesting of water. Placing a strong environmental impact assessment (EIA), an environmental safety measuring frameworks (ESMF) and a joint M&E at the watershed scale are innovative practices in the landscape. In all of the activities, the youth are targeted to generate income for their livelihood. Rural infrastructure development is also a component of the landscape to improve health, water, education and transport services. All interventions are checked against their environmental impact by developing and monitoring the environmental indicators and their mitigation measures.
The landscape approach started with community awareness discussions and establishing watershed planning team that is responsible to lead the planning process and management of the landscape at community level. Community-agreed bylaws are institutionalized to control unsustainable actions and share benefits. The participation of elders and religious leaders are key to increasing community participation and enhance social values. Sectoral collaboration is fostered by establishing a Steering Committee composed of key government sectors and is responsible overseeing the overall landscape activities. A Technical Committee constituted of different sectors is also established to provide technical support to the Community Planning Team and harmonize sectoral objectives, integrate sectoral planning. and implementations. This collaboration mechanism helps to enhance bottom up planning.
This workshop report includes summaries of each session that took place during the two-day event, plus information gathered from participants in a follow-up workshop evaluation.
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