UCC to start project in Ethiopia on watershed ecosystem adaptation

9 Nov 2017

UCC’s Department of Food Business and Development is entering into a partnership with the International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF), Mekelle University Ethiopia, and Teagasc to implement a three-year action research project in Tigray, northern Ethiopia, funded by Irish Aid Ethiopia with additional support to the project through Teagasc Walsh Fellowships. The project will be focussed on the Gergera watershed, which in the past has experienced substantial natural resource degradation and out-migration.

More recently, investments by Irish Aid and other development partners have contributed to regeneration of natural resources and enhanced livelihood opportunities, but there is a need to develop responses to new longer-term development challenges including impacts of climate change and the shortage of employment opportunities for a rapidly growing youth population. The project will include work on innovative agro-forestry-based land management approaches, studies of value chains for potential high-value crops and modelling work to identify future scenarios which can ensure sustainable futures in the area.

An MoU was signed on Monday 6^th November at the Irish Embassy, Addis Ababa to mark the agreement. Pictured are Dr Nick  Chisholm, Director, UCC Centre for Global Development, Sonya Hyland, Ireland’s Ambassador to Ethiopia, Dr Tony Simons, Director General of ICRAF, Dr Eyasu Abraha, Ethiopia’s Minister of Agriculture, and Simon Coveney, Ireland’s Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade.