Success story of Mieso Woreda

1.    Background:

Mieso Woreda is located in the West Harerghe Zone, Oromia Regional State. Its located 401 km from the capital city of Ethiopia, Finfinne, and it has 25 km from the zonal capital town Chiro. Woreda shares borders with Somali Regional State in the north, West Bordodde in the southeast, and Dobba in the east. The Woreda is among the pastoralist Woredas and it is currently subdivided into 31 rural kebeles and two municipal towns. It has a total area of land of 2,573km2 and an estimated population of 144,750 (female, 61,954). Among the thirty-one rural kebeles of the woreda, Buri Mullu Kebele is one of the target kebeles identified for the documentation of this success story, which is 14 km away from the woreda center. The major livelihood of this kebele resident’s community relies on either pastoral or pastoral and agro-pastoral. The total population of Buri mullu Keble is 2,544 (1,089 females). The title of the identified success story is "Integrating Physical and Biological Soil and Water Conservation Techniques on Rehabilitating Degraded Pasture Lands."

2.    The Story

The selected degraded pasture land is located in Buri Mullu Kebele of Miesso Woreda, West Hararghe Zone, Oromia Region. The name of the specific selected area is Faro. In the area, pastoralism and agro-pastoral ways of life are practiced by dwelling communities.

The main problems the community confronted include, frequent and severe droughts, floods, and the invasion of exotic bushes and weeds. Due to climate change and the topography of the area, drought and flooding extremely affect pasture lands and agricultural fields in the area. The selected pasture lands are also one of the degraded areas in the kebele. The area, estimated at more than 300 ha, which was left as unbeneficial land due to a high degree of degradation. The community cannot use this land for any purpose due to the high gullies created, the removal of palatable trees and grass species, and also an invasion of some exotic bushy trees and weed species in the area.

On the other hand, due to the expansion of agricultural fields, pasture lands have decreased in size and are also being degraded by overgrazing, in addition to the natural disasters explained above. Thus, the problem of natural resource deterioration has many causes, and it needs integrated activities to overcome the problems.

3.    Community Consultation

To solve the problems of pastureland degradation and other natural resource deterioration, LLRP identifies issues through community consultation and field observation within Woreda and Zonal relevant sector experts. After the area was selected and prioritized for rehabilitation with the support of the project in 2014E.C, the willingness of the community to participate in the rehabilitation of degraded pasture lands and allow the lands to implement project interventions was identified through consecutive consultation and awareness-creation processes.

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