Characterizing and tailoring climate change adaptation practices into a diversied agroecosystem Tsega Adego (
[email protected] ) Addis Ababa University Research Article Keywords: Agro-ecosystem Characterization, Climate change adaptation, Local adaptation, Crop Production Constraints, Equity, Rib watershed, Northwest Ethiopia Posted Date: January 19th, 2021 DOI: https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-148190/v1 License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Read Full License Page 1/28 Abstract Smallholder farmers require viable adaptation strategies for climate change. Adaptation project might be mal-practiced unless it considers the local diversity. This paper argued that the challenge of agriculture in developing countries in general and Ethiopia, in particular, is much diversied and thus interventions require a systematic shift to specic agro-ecosystems. In light of this, we used agro-ecosystem analysis to design locally appropriate adaptation strategies specic to Rib watershed in Ethiopia. The agro- ecosystem uses three inputs of agro-climatic zoning, soil type and terrain analysis, and farming systems. We used primary data collected from 383 randomly selected farm-households. The survey data was supplemented by key-informant interviews, focus group discussions and secondary data. We characterized and mapped the study area in two distinct groups of agro-ecosystems: Fogera plain and Libo-Farta highlands. The nding portrayed that across these agro-ecosystems, there was considerable difference in the: potentials, constraints, crop type, income distribution, and soil type. We found blanket application of the same strategies irrespective of these heterogeneities. The income distribution shows that the poorest 20 percent of the population share about 5 percent of the income.