Abstract:
The objectives of this study were to estimate farmers’ perception about the extent of their cropland degradation, vulnerability, perception of adaptation intensity, choice of adaptation strategies, and their linkages around Chebera-Churchura national Park in the Central Omo-Gibe River Sub-Basin, Southwestern Ethiopia. The study used cross-sectional data collected from 383 farm households selected based on the multi-stage random sampling procedure. The result of the ordered logistic regression model showed that farming experience, education status, livestock ownership, distance to the nearest market, use of extension service, training on SWC, participation in SWC campaign, age of the plot, residence-plot distance, and plot position in the watershed were significantly affected farmers’ perception about the extent of their cropland degradation. The result of the ordered logistic regression model showed that social factors age, sex, marital status, family size, farm experience, age dependency ratio, literacy status, and social participation affected households’ vulnerability. Economic variables including livestock ownership, use of extension service, perceived land tenure security, land size, and distance to the nearest main road, observed plot level cropland productivity reduction, and perception of plot-level land degradations were significantly influenced households' vulnerability to the impacts of cropland degradation. Park wildlife has no significant impact on farmers’ vulnerability to the impact of land degrdation. The result of the tobit regression model showed that age, sex, farming experience and observed percent yield reduction affected farm households perception of the intensity of adaptation strategies to the impacts of land degrdation. The result of MVPM showed that the five adopted adaptation strategic equations have a complementary effect on each other. The park resource was not recognized by farmers as source of adaptation strategic option to land degrdation impacts vulnerability in the area. The model results showed that age, training, agricultural income, participation in non-agricultural income-generating activities, age of the plot, land security, agricultural extension service, distance to the nearest main road, and early warning information system significantly influenced farmers adaptation strategies. The result of the seemingly unrelated trivariate probit regression model’s error terms’ correlation and significance of Breusch-Pagan’s test of independence showed that there were strong linkages between farmers’ perception of cropland degradation, high vulnerability, and adaptation. Age, dependency ratio, social participation, non-agricultural income, age of the plot since first cultivation, use of extension service, and observed plot-level crop yield reduction influenced the linkages. The study concluded that farm households have different perceptions of similarly degraded cropland, vary in level vulnerability and adaptation intensity. Farmers adopted MCLPS, SWC, UCF, combination of MCLPS, SWC, & UCF and mixed SWC & UCF strategies. The park resource had no impact on vulnerability nor as adaptation option to the impacts of land degrdation in the area. There were strong linkages between the perception of land degradation, high vulnerability, and adoption of adaptation strategies. Therefore, increasing farmers’ perception of cropland degradation help sustainable cropland conservation, reduce vulnerability, and increase their adaptation capacity and choice of effective strategies considering park resource as potential adaptive resource integrating socioeconomic and biophysical factors to increase their resilience in the study area.