Assessing the Impact of Productive Safety Net Program on Asset Building and Sustainable Land Management Practices: A Cross- Sectional Analysis from Eastern Hararghe, Haramaya

Abstract

The main objective of this study was to assess the impact of productive safety net program (PSNP) on asset accumulation and sustainable land management (SLM) practices in eastern Hararghe, Haramaya district. To this effect primary and secondary data was collected from the rural households of the study area. Both descriptive analysis and econometrics models were used for data analysis. The study has two main impact indicators, i.e, asset holding and sustainable land management. Under asset the livestock asset is converted to the Tropical Livestock Unit (TLU) while the non-livestock assets are measured based on their current market value as reported by the respondents. Under the land management there are two groups: soil conservation (stone and soil bunds, in meter per timad) and fertility improvement practices (chemical and natural fertilizer application, in kg and quintal per timad respectively). Based on the econometrics estimation results selection (participation in the productive safety net programs) was significantly influenced by household demographic characteristics, such as household head gender, family size, number of active female labor, and housing condition and number of food gap months per year experienced by the household. The second stage outcome that is the impact of program participation was found to be positive and significant for both asset formation (livestock, productive and non-productive) and land management (soil and stone bund, and chemical and natural fertilizer). Generally the result indicated that, due to program participation beneficiary households have higher asset size and more involved in land management as compared to non-beneficiary households.