Dagnew, Belay (2007) Assessment of Causes and Extent of Land Degradation in Hashenge Catchment, Southern Tigray. Masters thesis, Addis Ababa University.
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Abstract
A field study was conducted in Hashenge catchment, Ofla wereda, Southern zone of Tigray, Ethiopia. The objective of the study was to assess the causes, indicators, and extent of land degradation and to compare the current land use type to the treatment oriented capability classification. Comparison of the present and past conditions of lake hashenge(the only lake in the region) was one type of indicator. The gullies, springs dried, and exposed tree roots were additional examples of indicators of land degradation. Conducting the sample house holds was a means used to identify the main causes of land degradation and hence data was collected from 132 house holds and analyzed using inferential statistics. To evaluate the extent of land degradation soil samples were taken from three land use types with replications and the CEC, OM% and BD was analyzed on laboratory. Gullies were quantified to evaluate how sever was the land degradation in the area using two transect lines South to North and East to west. To compare the current land use system to the treatment oriented capability classification a transect line was made and the result was compared to the recommended one. The lake surface area was reduced by 128.27 ha during the last 21years. 29 springs have dried permanently and 17 springs dried temporarily. There are several gullies and on average there was 1010.44m3 ha-1 of gullies with in the catchment. The main causes of land degradation in the area were: Open nutrient cycle, Poor farming system and Poor livestock management. Accordingly, 1852.76 kg of fuel wood, 1000.32 kg of dry dung, 626.94 kg of dung cakes and 953.16 kg of crop residue was consumed per house hold per year. A total of 4433.18 kg of biomass fuel was consumed per household per year. There was a significant difference of BD%, CEC (cmol/110gm) and OM% on the three land uses. The current land use system of the study area match with the recommended one only by 15%.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GE Environmental Sciences Q Science > QE Geology S Agriculture > S Agriculture (General) |
| Divisions: | Africana |
| Depositing User: | Selom Ghislain |
| Date Deposited: | 25 Sep 2018 12:45 |
| Last Modified: | 25 Sep 2018 12:45 |
| URI: | http://thesisbank.jhia.ac.ke/id/eprint/5651 |
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