Abstract

Agriculture continues to be a strategic sector in the development of most low-income nations. Despite extreme climate conditions, agriculture plays a major role in the development of the economy, the eradication of poverty, sustainable growth, and the modernization of society in Sub-Saharan Africa. About 75% of Ethiopia’s landmass is categorized as dryland, which is home to approximately one-third of the country’s population. There is growing concern about vulnerabilities such as food insecurity, droughts, water stress, land degradation, and malnutrition in the dryland regions of Ethiopia. This article reviews the key opportunities of dryland agriculture and summarizes the best techniques for coping with these vulnerabilities. Drylands are areas where most of the world’s poor live, characterized by extreme rainfall variability, recurrent but unpredictable droughts, high temperatures, and low soil fertility. In terms of the absolute amount of rainfall, drylands receive between 0 and 600 mm of rainfall per year, with rainfall being less than 40% of the potential evapotranspiration. In terms of temperature, drylands have an average temperature of at least 80°F (27°C). Many upland soils in tropical dryland areas are sandy, often gravelly, and generally shallow, which cannot increase production levels without raising fertility. Agricultural diversification, livestock rearing, and the implementation of commercially oriented agricultural practices are major opportunities that allow dryland communities to improve their livelihoods and reap more than one harvest a year. Dryland agriculture needs to adopt best techniques and technologies such as reducing the loss of soil moisture, minimizing nutrient depletion, implementing good tillage practices, promoting conservation agriculture, adopting improved seed varieties, agricultural intensification, mixed farming systems, and scaling up micro-irrigation at the farm level, all of which result in improved soil fertility and food production, thereby boosting food security. The development of dryland agriculture in Ethiopia requires synergies among research, technologies, marketing systems, input supplies, credit, policies, and institutions.

Key words: Drylands, dryland agriculture, opportunities, best practices, vulnerabilities.