This paper examines the determinants of farmers' willingness to pay for soil conservation practices in the highlands of Bale, southeast Ethiopia. The paper is based on analysis of data collected from 100 randomly selected household heads. The study applied Contingent Valuation Method for the purpose of eliciting farmers' valuation of soil conservation practices in terms of both cash payment and labour contribution. The results reveal that farmers in the study area are less willing to pay cash for soil conservation measures. In terms of labour contribution, however, it was found that they are willing to spend a substantial amount of time per week. Results from logistic regression analysis show that farmers' decisions to participate in soil conservation practices are influenced by a host of factors. The implication is that taking these factors into account while planning soil conservation measures enables policy makers to come up with projects that win acceptance by the local people.

This paper examines whether eastern Tigray is still in a phase of land degradation or if a trend of landscape greening has started. Hitherto, the land cover in five representative Tigray villages was mapped for three different periods: 1965, 1994, and 2007. These maps were based on the interpretation of aerial photographs and high‐resolution satellite imagery in combination with field validation. The results show a strong decrease of the forest and bush land in favor of arable land and rangeland from 1965 to 1994. This trend is, however, slowed down and even reversed from 1994 onwards whereby some of the arable land and rangeland are abandoned allowing shrubs and bushes to regenerate. Household interviews and census data showed that the rural population number is still increasing. However, the productivity of the farming activities did not show a significant increase. The observed abandonment of marginal farm and rangeland is, therefore, made possible only through food aid and the import of food from other regions. Furthermore, policymakers stimulate land abandonment and landscape greening by establishing exclosures. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

This article examines the working conditions of extension workers and constraints to the adoption of modern agricultural technologies/practices in south-western Ethiopia. Data collected from 85 extension workers form the empirical basis for the study. The empirical results indicate that extension work in the study area has not been participatory in its nature, little consideration was given to farmers' experiences and knowledge, and extension workers lack practical skills. In addition to deciding on who should take part in the extension programme, extension agents are found to supply more services to those farmers who are financially sound and show interest in the programme. The study reveals that apart from the fact that the number of extension workers in the study area is very small, their qualification and communication skills leave a lot to be desired. The study makes it also clear that a host of factors obstructs the promotion/adoption of modern agricultural technologies/practices in the study area.

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extension programmes and policies have been formulated without due consideration to the farmers' opinion and traditional knowledge system. The various extension approaches have been biased against the livestock subsector and research and extension activities have been carried out by different organizations without proper coordination which, in most cases, has led to redundancy of effort and wastage of resources. Both the historical review and the survey results reveal that extension service coverage in the country has been very low, the research-extension linkage has been very poor and extension agents have been involved in different activities which are not related to their normal duties. The study also makes it clear that a host of factors, some of which are policy related, were