Conservation Agriculture in Ethiopian Highlands

On average, crop yields under DER+ and TER+ increased by 30% and 16%, respectively, as compared to CT. Our study demonstrates that field water conservation tillage practices that incorporate CA principles are effectively increasing green water in the root zone available for crops. RCA systems constitute an in-situ soil and rainwater conservation strategy in northern Ethiopia that increase agro-ecosystem.

Presenter: Tesfay Araya is the Associate Professor of Soil Science in the Department of Dryland Crop and Horticultural Science in Mekelle University, Ethiopia. (September 2014-August 2015) in the Department of Agronomy in University of Fort Hare, South Africa. Tesfay completed his PhD study in Applied Biological Sciences: Land and Forest Management, Ghent University, Belgium (from 2008-2012). His PhD thesis title was "Conservation Agriculture (CA)-based resource saving technology for land resilience in northern Ethiopia". He obtained a MSc. in Crop production from Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, and BSc in Dryland Crop Science from Mekelle University, Ethiopia.