Rural household livelihood strategy, household reliance on forest goods, and its effect on protected area: Evidence from communities living adjacent to Kafta-Sheraro national park, Tigray, northern Ethiopia

Abstract

Issues concerning household livelihood strategies and households' reliance on forest goods around Ethiopia's protected areas have not been adequately addressed. Thus, the purpose of this study is to quantify and determine the influence of livelihood assets on the choice of livelihood strategy, as well as the contribution of forest goods to rural livelihood and its effect on park conservation. The data was collected in 2020 through a survey of 384 households. To discover livelihood strategies, cluster analysis was employed. According to the study's findings, the livelihood asset indicators that significantly affected the likelihood of the household being in one of the identified livelihood strategies were forest income, labor, education level, number of livestock in TLU, agricultural income, off-farm income, non-farm income, access to credit, membership in a cooperative, and ethnicity. The study also discovered that forest income accounted for 17 % of the total income of the sample households, which varies across livelihood strategies (10 %–24 %) and ethnic backgrounds (43 % for Kunama). Households in low-income livelihood strategies (small-business and mixed-activity operators) generate more total and relative forest income than households in high-income livelihood strategies (large-scale and small-scale). There was no safe livelihood strategy for conserving park resources, as households in the entire livelihood strategy were involved in unlawful exploitation of park resources, which resulted in the deterioration of the park's ecological resources over time. Policy on agricultural intensification and encouraging livelihood choices less dependent on natural resources through creating opportunities (credit access, skill and knowledge development, and technology) should be applied, and the use of natural resources should be regulated and evaluated regularly.

Keywords

• Livelihood asset
• Livelihood strategy
• Forest goods
• Household reliance
• Kunama ethnicity