Abstract
Although Ethiopia is endowed with diverse agro-ecologies suitable for cereal production, the success of the production relies more on climate condition. Therefore, this study is initiated to analyze the trends of; cereal crops production area and productivity in Ethiopia. Data of meher season cereal crops productivity (qt/ha) and area of production (ha) were collected from Central statistical Agency (CSA) of Ethiopia. Trend test was carried out using the non-parametric Mann-Kendall’s trend test packaged in XLstat. The result of this study indicated that the area of cereal crops production for teff, wheat, maize, finger millet and rice showed significant increasing trend. But only sorghum production area indicated non-significant increasing trend. Moreover, Barley indicated non-significant decreasing trend. Moreover, the productivity of all cereal crops indicated significant increasing trend, except rice which decreased non-significantly. Productivity of Barley significantly increased despite non- significant decreasing production area. Similarly, productivity of Oat’s significantly increased despite significant decreasing production area; while the productivity of the rest crops (teff, wheat, maize, finger millet and rice) increased significantly with significant increasing trends of production area. However, differently from the others: Productivity of sorghum significantly increased despite non-significantly increasing area of sorghum production. Key words: Cereal crops, trend Analysis, area of production and productivity.
Highlights
Agriculture is the fundamental driver for Ethiopia’s economy and long-term food security as it offers about 80-85% of employment, more than 61% of the total export and 38.5% of gross domestic product of the country (Degaga and Angasu, 2017)
Data of meher season for cereal crops productivity and area of production in Ethiopia for the period 2007-2018 were collected from Central Statistical Agency (CSA)
Differently from the others, productivity of sorghum significantly increased despite non-significantly increasing area of sorghum production.In general, the analyses of this study have indicated increasing trends of production area for most the cereal crops in Ethiopia
Summary
Agriculture is the fundamental driver for Ethiopia’s economy and long-term food security as it offers about 80-85% of employment, more than 61% of the total export and 38.5% of gross domestic product of the country (Degaga and Angasu, 2017). Ethiopia has diverse agro-ecology that permits different agricultural systems and production of different crops. The existence of this diverse agro-ecology together with diverse farming systems, socio-economic, cultures and climate zones provided Ethiopia with various biological wealth of plants, animals, and microbial species, especially crop diversity (Atnaf et al, 2015). Cereals are the most important food crop which provides daily food calories to people. Cereal production and marketing are the means of livelihood strategy for millions of smallholder households in Ethiopia (Taffesse et al, 2012). Wheat, maize, sorghum and barley are the major cereals that occupy almost three-
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