BackgroundDespite the highest population, the productivity of Ethiopian livestock is low, and the direct contribution to the national economy is limited. Poor genetic potential, shortage of feed in quantity and quality, poor health care and management practices are the main contributors to low productivity and production. Data on animal disease and management practices are not in place, in this regard; we estimate the burden of animal health ailments and management practices in ruminants via simple cross-sectional study design in randomly selected peasant associations in western Tigray of northern Ethiopia.ResultsA preliminary disease survey in ruminants and their management practices comprising of cattle, sheep and goats was undertaken to evaluate the existence, burden of ruminant diseases and management practices. A total of 121 randomly selected household respondents of Maikhadrah and Bakhar (26.2%), Dansha (19.7%), Adi-Hirdi (18.0%), Adi-Remets and Inda-Selassie (36.1%) sub-districts were inspected throughout the study period. Most (81%) of farmers feed their animals on free grazing in the open environment travelling from highlands and midlands to lowlands in search of adequate feed (different species of grasses) and crop residues during the wet season up to the beginning of the dry season. Majority of farmers (43.8%) had veterinary access from governmental veterinary officers. Thirty-four (33.9%) of the respondents got veterinary access from illegal drug dealers in mini shops or market. Among the major disease constraints identified; Tick infestation (89.3%), lice infestation (68.6%) mange mite infestation (77.7%) lumpy skin disease (LSD) (42.1%), trypanasomiasis (62.8%) bovine pasteurellosis (52.1) mastitis (13.2%), sheep and goat pox (15.7), abortion (19.0%), dystocia (24.8%), retained fetal membrane (25.6%), prolapsed uterus (13.2%) delayed heat period (38.8%) were most endemic ailments directly affecting livestock production and farmers livelihood.ConclusionIn conclusion management practices in livestock production is poor to a large extent. Burden and endemicity of livestock diseases are substantially higher. The data obtained could be the source of facts for planners in animal health service delivery system in this sub region.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1186/s12917-018-1621-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Background: Currently, climate variability is a hot issue across the globe, especially in countries where rain-fed agriculture is a means of livelihood. Climate variability increases the risks of hunger in the region as it affects all four components of food security: food availability, food accessibility, food utilization and food stability. Rainfall shortage or excess hampers food production in the region, causing food insecurity and escalating famine. Extreme weather is affecting people indirectly through the sequential rather direct depletion of their assets. Therefore, looking on the impact of climate on food security is crucial to build a sustainable production system. Results: Randomized data from 150 households were collected and analyzed using SPSS software. Household Food Balance Model analysis indicates that 15.7% of the households met the recommended daily calorie intake of 2100 kcal per adult equivalent/day, while 84.3% of the households fell below the daily recommended calorie intake. The average calorie intake of the households covers only 56.2%. Female-headed households are found to be more food insecure than their male counterpart. Those food insecure households use different coping mechanism to avert the shortage like daily laborer, reducing meal, borrowing, selling productive asset and switching meals. Moreover, the annual rainfall of a 20-year record averaged 725 ml (with a standard deviation of 6.7), with the minimum and maximum records at 354.5 and 1037 ml, respectively. Similarly, the average precipitation concentration index (PCI) stood at about 24.4 ml, recording a minimum and maximum PCI of 15.6 ml and 41.7, respectively. Finally, the coefficient of variability of rainfall variability is 0.16, which indicates the variation in inter-annual rainfall distribution is medium. Conclusions: The result shows a high prevalence of food insecurity in the rural community with high prevalence in female-headed household. Therefore, strong intervention is required by the government and should exhaustively work on promoting irrigation, providing credit to farmers and subsidizing farm inputs to improve food security in rural Tigray.

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<p>In the rapidly growing world, where farming land is shrinking due to horizontal urban expansion and development-induced projects, agricultural productivity should grow by 70% to meet food needs. Spatial urban expansion in developing countries, not exceptional to Ethiopia, puts immense pressure by taking peri-urban fertile agricultural land for the purpose of development. This paper examines whether urban expansion increases or decreases the agricultural technology adoption capacity of smallholder peri-urban farmers. Households were clustered into displaced and non-displaced, and data were collected from 341 households, 101 of whom were displaced and 240 households were non-displaced. Descriptive statistics and econometric model were employed to explore the role of urban expansion in technology adoption of smallholder peri-urban farmers. The multivariate probit result shows that urban expansion decreases the tendency of displaced smallholder peri-urban farmers to participate in irrigation and adoption of a generator but urban expansion does not increase or decrease displaced households’ tendency to adopt beehive and practice row sawing. Generally, urban expansion decreases the affinity of smallholder peri-urban farmers to adopt agricultural technologies. Therefore, policymakers, particularly the Bureau of Agriculture should intensively work and train displaced smallholder peri-urban farmers on the benefit of agricultural technologies to improve agricultural productivity and use the remaining plot of farmland sustainably. Besides strong monitoring and follow-up are required to avert the negative ramifications of development-induced displacement.</p>