Impact of water harvesting ponds on household incomes and rural livelihoods in Minjar Shenkora district of Ethiopia

This paper presents the findings of the socio-economic impact of household-level water harvesting technology. Before water harvesting was introduced, onions were not grown in the area due to lack of seedlings. Thus onion seedlings were grown on 100 m2 plots using water from the ponds in the dry season, then sold or planted under rainfed conditions during the rainy season. The results obtained show that the average net income from onion seedlings was 155 US$ per 100 m2 plot, while those from bulb onions grown rainfed in the field was 1848 US$ per ha, making the contribution to farmer incomes by onions alone about 2003 US$ per year which is higher than from rainfed teff and wheat combined.