The impacts of large-scale land investments on agropastoral livelihoods in Ethiopia

Land is at the center of rural livelihoods in developing countries. Despite this, access to land is contested in developing countries, particularly in Africa. The situation in Ethiopia is not different. Since the 1970s, state-run large-scale land investments (LSLIs) in sugar plantations have encroached into pastoral rangelands in Ethiopia. As a result, pastoralists have lost access to dry season grazing areas. Since 2010, new LSLI plans have been expanding on the remaining productive rangelands, exacerbating the problem. The conversion of rangelands to LSLIs in sugar plantations has implications for the livelihoods of the local population. The concerns are high in pastoral areas of Ethiopia where poverty and food insecurity are widespread. However, much of the research so far has focused on investigating the impacts of foreign-run LSLIs, although state-run investments cover the largest part of the agropastoral regions in Ethiopia. With this motivation, this thesis aims at investigating the impacts of LSLIs in sugar plantations on agropastoral livelihoods in four dimensions; food security, land degradation, land use conflict, and resilience. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the thesis.

Chapter two presents the impacts of LSLIs on household food security based on panel data. Food insecurity affects one-third of agropastoral households. The results show that proximity to LSLIs is associated with additional food intake. However, the positive effect of proximity to LSLIs on household food consumption should be regarded with care. According to the random effects regression, positive effects on food security are mainly due to household access to land, quality soil, irrigation, and forests. Moreover, the impact of proximity to LSLIs on food intake declines by household access to road and market. When using the household coping strategies index, food insecurity increases by household proximity to LSLIs. Hence, the food security impact of LSLIs varies by the indicator of food security. However, the food security of the study populations is generally low, and urgent actions need to be taken by the government of Ethiopia and other stakeholders to improve this situation.  

Chapter three discusses the impact of LSLI-induced displacement on land degradation in agropastoral areas of Ethiopia by using cross-sectional survey data.  The results show that 75% of the surveyed households have experienced moderate to severe land degradation and 55.8% lost land due to LSLIs. The results reveal that the displacement of households leads to a significant increase in land degradation. LSLIs aggravated land degradation directly by destroying common resources (clearing vegetation and grass) in favor of plantation production and dispossessing grazing land and exacerbating overgrazing. Drought and conflict exposure, the number of livestock, overgrazing, and sharecropping increase the intensity of land degradation. Market access, extension services, household income, and mobility, on the contrary, limit the occurrence of land degradation. Attention should be given to the rehabilitation of degraded lands and the prevention of people's displacement.

Chapter four identifies the determinants of land use conflict between agropastoralists and LSLIs. Based on household and community surveys, the study shows that land use conflict has been increasing since the establishment of LSLIs and has affected more than a quarter of the study population. The results show that dispossession of land by LSLIs, lack of trust for LSLIs, and scarcity of pasture land, both from a supply- (land degradation, drought, and invasive weeds) and a demand-side (herd size) perspective were the drivers of land conflict. The state appropriation of traditional pastures for industrial plantations exacerbates land conflicts. The Ethiopian government and stakeholders should resolve the conflict over land between LSLIs and local communities.

Chapter five explores the likely effect of LSLIs on household resilience in pastoral areas using panel data.  About one-third of the study population has low resilience capacity, while more than half has low welfare resilience. The results show that proximity to LSLIs significantly reduces households’ resilience capacity. Factors that enhance the resilience capacities of households include access to livestock markets, social safety nets, extension, mobility, and social and infrastructural services. Future resilience programs in agropastoral areas should mitigate the adverse effect of LSLIs by enhancing livelihood diversification and households’ access to communal pastures. Providing resilience-enhancing interventions for pastoralists and particularly for women-headed households would improve their resilience capacities.

The overall findings of this thesis provide empirical evidence that LSLIs increase the vulnerability of local people to shocks, land conflicts, land degradation, and food insecurity in terms of coping strategies. Thus, I conclude that the following is needed: (i) balancing the trade-off between maximizing export revenue from LSLIs and improving local livelihoods; (ii) ensuring land tenure security for communal lands to improve the livelihoods of pastoral people; (iii) resolving land conflicts between pastoralists and LSLIs through negotiations and traditional institutions  (iv) enhancing the resilience capacity and food security of pastoral communities with more focus on women-headed households (v) promoting diverse livelihood strategies to specifically address the needs of different communities.