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This study analyzes cattle farmers' perceptions of risk and risk management strategies in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia. We use survey data from a sample of 356 farmers based on multistage random sampling. Factor analysis is employed to classify scores of risk and management strategies, and multiple regression is then used to investigate the relationship of scores and farmers' characteristics. The results demonstrate that shortage of family labor, high price of fodder and limited farm income were perceived as the most important risks. Use of veterinary services, parasite control and loan utilization were perceived as the most important strategies to manage risks. Livestock disease and labor shortage were perceived as less of a risk by farmers who adopted the practice of zero grazing compared to other farmers, pointing to the potential of this practice for risk reduction. We find strong evidence that farmers engage in multiple risk management practices in order to reduce losses due to cattle morbidity and mortality. The results suggest that government strategies that aim at reducing farmers' risk need to be tailored to specific farm and farmer characteristics. Findings from this study have potentially important policy implications for risk management strategies in developing countries.

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Market-led agrarian reform (MLAR) has gained prominence worldwide since the early 1990s as an alternative to the state-led approaches widely implemented over the course of the 20th century. This neoliberal policy framework advocates voluntary transactions between 'willing sellers' and 'willing buyers' and the removal of various 'distortions' from land and agricultural markets. Related policies aim to secure and formalise private property rights. Emerging evidence from across the developing world suggests that such policies are incapable of challenging the political and economic power of large landowners and are unlikely to meet the land needs of the rural poor and landless. In key areas such as land transfer, farmer development and programme financing, MLAR is shown to be falling far short of its objectives. Meanwhile, it is being actively challenged by national and international peasant movements that are calling for more direct intervention by the state in order to restructure patterns of landholding and provide the necessary support for small-scale farmers, many of whom produce primarily for their own consumption. The future of agrarian reform, it is argued, lies not in a return to the top-down, statist models of the past but in new forms of partnerships between progressive political forces and peasant movements that go beyond the confines of the market to redistribute land and create sustainable livelihood opportunities for the rural poor and landless.There was no evidence . . . that effective land reforms could result from 'market-friendly' policies alone. Registering land titles and facilitating real estate transactions between willing sellers and willing buyers do not by themselves change power relationships in favour of the rural poor. In many situations, such policies are likely to reinforce agrarian structures by providing large landholders and speculators with additional legal protection, while leaving the bargaining power of the poor unchanged or diminished. (Solon Barraclough) 1