Farmers Willingness to Participate In Voluntary Land Consolidation in Gozamin District, Ethiopia

Abebaw Andarge Gedefaw,Walter Seher,Reinfried Mansberger,Clement Atzberger

doi:10.3390/land8100148

Abebaw Andarge Gedefaw, Walter Seher + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/land8100148

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Abstract

In many African countries and especially in the highlands of Ethiopia—the investigation site of this paper—agricultural land is highly fragmented. Small and scattered parcels impede a necessary increase in agricultural efficiency. Land consolidation is a proper tool to solve inefficiencies in agricultural production, as it enables consolidating plots based on the consent of landholders. Its major benefits are that individual farms get larger, more compact, contiguous parcels, resulting in lower cultivation efforts. This paper investigates the determinants influencing the willingness of landholder farmers to participate in voluntary land consolidation processes. The study was conducted in Gozamin District, Amhara Region, Ethiopia. The study was mainly based on survey data collected from 343 randomly selected landholder farmers. In addition, structured interviews and focus group discussions with farmers were held. The collected data were analyzed quantitatively mainly by using a logistic regression model and qualitatively by using focus group discussions and expert panels. According to the results, landholder farmers are predominantly willing to participate in voluntary land consolidation (66.8%), while a substantive fraction of farmers express unease with voluntary land consolidation. The study highlighted the following four determinants to be significant in influencing the willingness of farmers for voluntary land consolidation: (1) the exchange should preferably happen with parcels of neighbors, (2) land consolidation should lead to better arranged parcels, (3) nearness of plots to the farmstead, and (4) an expected improvement in productivity. Interestingly, the majority of farmers believes that land consolidation could reduce land use conflicts. The study provides evidence that policymakers should consider these socio-economic, legal, cultural, infrastructural, and land-related factors when designing and implementing voluntary land consolidation policies and programs.

Highlights

Land is a scarce resource in Ethiopia, a country whose population relies on farming as the primary source of livelihood [1]
This paper investigates the determinants influencing the willingness of landholder farmers to participate in voluntary land consolidation processes
The results show that 60.1% of landholder farmers were willing to accept land consolidation voluntarily

Summary

Introduction

Land is a scarce resource in Ethiopia, a country whose population relies on farming as the primary source of livelihood [1]. As farming is an essential factor in the Ethiopian economy, land utilization and allocation is an important undertaking in the country [2]. Ethiopian smallholder agriculture is characterized by extremely small farms fragmented into several plots and cultivated in a labor-intensive manner while supporting relatively large families. Many of these farms are too small to meet subsistence needs, when using traditional technology and currently available resources [4,5]. Adverse effects of land fragmentation have been observed in many countries where spatially separated parcels of land hinder mechanization and increase the likelihood of disputes [6,7]

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