Peasant Irrigation Development and Food Production in Ethiopia

This paper examines the development and constraints of small-scale irrigation in Ethiopia, and its role in food production, particularly since the 1984/85 famine. Although irrigated agriculture in Ethiopia probably predates the Axum empire, it is still unimportant in the densely populated highlands. The government-sponsored small-scale irrigation programme, although resulting in increased production in some producer cooperatives, has been plagued by civil war, the villagization and resettlement programmes, insecure land tenure, absence of adequate water-use legislation and, above all, lack of peasant interest in government-sponsored projects. A crop census by the Ministry of Agriculture in 1986/87 showed that the crops most commonly grown under irrigation in 1020 peasant associations and producer cooperatives were vegetables, the staples maize, potatoes and barley; fruits; the cash crops coffee and chat (Catha edulis); and sugar cane. Marked local and regional variations in cropping patterns were associated with market forces and prevailing agricultural systems. In order for significantly more Ethiopian peasants to use irrigation and to increase food production, it is imperative that peasants themselves play a central role in its development and operation, that greater land tenure security be achieved, that appropriate community-based irrigation organizations and government support structures be developed and a comprehensive water-use law is