LAND USE DYNAMICS AND LAND MANAGEMENT PRACTICES IN SELECTED KEBELES OF HARAMAYA WOREDA, EAST HARARGE ZONE, OROMIA NATIONAL REGIONAL STATE, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

This study analyzed long-term land use/ dynamics and their under-lying causes and elucidated their implications for land management practice. The objective of this study was to analyze land-use dynamic and land management practices in three-selected study area Kebeles (Adele Woltea, Haro Adi, and Korke) within the Haramaya Woreda of East Hararghe Zone. Time-series satellite images from Landsat 5 TM (1988, 1998, and 2008) and Landsat 8 OLI (2018) were used to generate five LULC classes, agriculture land, bare land, built-up, grassland, and shrub-land. These derived data were complemented with the help of focus group discussions, field observation, and personal interviews with the sampled households. Remote sensing analysis over the course of 30 years (1988–2018) revealed landscape-level change of agriculture and bare land to have a gross decrease of 37.17% and 50.42% in Haro Adi, 8.55% and 75.71% in Adele Woltea, and 5.87% and 87.61% in Korke, while an increase of shrub-land (52.86%) was found for Korke. The analysis result of LU dynamics generally indicated that built-up shown considerable increases at the expense of other LU/LC classes. The socio-economic surveys also showed that major factors contribute for land use dynamics could be attributed to poverty, demographic pressure, poor land management practice, and institutional and policy factors. These problems have resulted in the degradation of land resources. Thus, long-range strategies such as methods of easing population growth and ways of alleviating rural poverty need to be devised to bring about sustainable land Therefore soil and water conservation practices (terracing, afforestation, stream, rehabilitation and habitat protection) measures implemented through effective stakeholder participation was strongly recommended to enhance the land management practices of the study site