Land Evaluation, Sustainable Land Management and Impacts of Climate Change in Agriculture; Ethiopia: Review

Abstract

Sustainable land management has emerged as an issue of major global concern. In many countries particularly in Ethiopia, the concern of suitable land management is because of the increasing population pressure on limited land resources, demanding for increased food production, the degradation of land and water resources accelerating rapidly. If the lands well suited for agriculture, it will follows further increases in production to meet the food demands of increasing populations, must come about by the more intensive use of existing agricultural lands. Climate & soil conditions, land use type and management, determine the production limit.To contest cited venomous effects of intensification, regard to environmental effects requires the development and implementation of technologies and policies, which will result in sustainable land management (Gisla-dottir and Stocking, 2005; Campbell and Hagmann, 2003). The major factors reason for low productivity include dependence on traditional farming techniques, soil degradation caused by overgrazing and deforestation, poor corresponding services such as extension, credit, marketing, infrastructure, and climatic factors such as drought and flood (Deressa, Hassan, & Ringler, 2011). In addition to the low soil fertility, soil degradation in Ethiopia; reduces soil productivity which results to food insecurity, economic losses and aggravates the recurrent droughts (Shiferaw & Holden, 1999; Mitiku et al., 2006). It has also increases vulnerability of people to the adverse effects of climate variability and change, by reducing soil organic carbon level and water holding capacity, which in turn decreases agricultural productivity and local resource assets (TerrAfrica, 2009; Nyssen et. al., 2003a; Hurni, 2000; Mitiku Haile,2006 & Daniel et al., 2015). Climate change causes wide-ranging effects on the environment, socioeconomic and associated sectors: water resources, agriculture and food security, human health, terrestrial ecosystems, and biodiversity (Belay Zerga & Getaneh Gebeyehu, 2016). Ethiopia is extremely vulnerable to climate related disasters including drought, heavy rains, floods, frost and heat waves which leads to a negative impacts on agriculture, food security, rural livelihoods, and economic development (NMA 2007). Planning of changes in land use requires a inclusive knowledge of the natural resources; a trustworthy estimate of what they are capable of producing, so that reliable predictions and recommendations can be made. Production potential, the conservation of soil and water resources for use by future generations requires consideration in planning land development. For these reasons sustainable land management is now getting considerable attention from development experts, policy makers and researchers. In long-term period, any utilization over its capability of the land will cause degradation and yield reduction. Therefore, to know the land production capacity and to allocate the land to the satisfactory and to the most profitable should be cared.