Abstract:
The current concerted efforts of Ethiopian government for the establishment of IWM in every
rural areas is an emerging agricultural development and rural livelihood strategy aiming at
developing environmental protection and enhancing rural households income through
participating them on rural developmental activities for improving agricultural production and
productivity. This study was conducted to examine the current status of IWM in relation to its
structure and community participation on watershed development based activities, to identify
the main challenges, to evaluate the opportunities of IWM to the livelihood of the rural
households, and to assess the institutional and implementation related issues of IWM in the
study area. The study was based on descriptive survey and followed cross sectional design
encompassing both qualitative and quantitative data. A total of 212 sample respondents were
selected through systematic random sampling. The data were analyzed by using simple
descriptive statistics such as percentage, frequency, tables and charts. Qualitative data were
analyzed through interpretation and conceptual generalization. The findings of this study
indicate that the study micro-watershed faced various social, economical, institutional and
implementation problems that hinder the effective performances of watershed interventions
and development projects. Of which deforestation, soil degradation, over grazing, continuous
plows, less contact between agricultural experts and farmers are the main determinant.
Furthermore, poor education status of the respondent and farmers lack awareness of carrying
responsibility is the other challenging factors for the adoption and implementation of IWM
practices. For that reason, limited training and technical support of agricultural experts/DAs,
poor planning and identification of problems, lack of proper follow up, lack of organization, proper implementation problems, lack of coordination between farmers and DAs, lack of
support from NGO’s, limited use of proper management techniques for varying landscape,
administrative problem and failure of the committee in mobilizing the community are the main
institutional and implementation constraints in the study area. Therefore, the district
agriculture and rural development offices and every concerned stakeholder should take into
consideration the social, economical, institutional and implementation constraints affected the
effective functioning of IWM program/projects.
