Determinants Of Smallholder Farming Households’ Participation In Watershed Managemen; In The Case Of Hababo Guduru District, Oromia National Regional State, Ethiopia

Abstract

The study explores the participation of smallholders farming household in watershed management practices existing in the area, to analysis the determinants of households’ participation in watershed management practices and to investigate challenges and opportunities of farm household participation in watershed management in Hababo district in Gudane Dedu and Lalistu Loya sub-watersheds. The study was used mixed research approach. Simple random sampling was used to select small holder farmers and 2 kebeles of Hababo Guduru district were purposively selected based on their potential in watershed. Sample sizes of 130 respondents were selected from Hababo Guduru district and sample size was determined by using Yamane formula. Questionnaires, interview, focus group discussion and observation were used to collect data. The Binary logistic regression model was used. Descriptive statistics was used to summarize the mean and proportion of the independent variables in association with the dependent variable. Findings of the study revealed that; age of farmer household, farmer household experience, slope of farm land, access to credit, farm land size, agricultural extension contact, and training of farmer household significantly affects participation of small holder household watershed management positively while farm distance from watershed management site significantly affects participation of watershed management negatively. Soil bund, stone faced soil bund and mixed approach like agro forestry practices are existing watershed management programs in the study area. The study concluded that there are different factors affecting farm household participation decision in watershed management in Hababo Guduru district. Effective and sustainable integrated watershed management should be done by the concerned body to intervene on the gap created by different factors on watershed management in the study area