EfD in Ethiopia, the Environmental Economics Policy Forum for Ethiopia (EEPFE) will be co-hosting a one day workshop with Forum for Environment on Tuesday 8 September 2009.

The main theme of the workshop will be on accounting and taking stock of land, soil and forestry resources in Ethiopia.

The workshop will be chaired by Dr Alemu Mekonenn, Coordinator of EEPFE.

Dr Menale Kassie, EEPFE Research Associate will present papers related to the theme of the workshop. The papers being presented are:

This study will review the past studies of the cost of land degradation in Ethiopia, assess the major methodological and conceptual issues and problems existing in the different approaches, compare the findings across these studies considering the relative merits of the different approaches, and draw implications for policies and programs, as well as for future research related to land management in Ethiopia.

Climate change is likely to exacerbate the dry conditions already experienced in southern Africa. When rainfall does come, it is likely to be in bursts of greater intensity, leading to erosion and flood damage. However, these predictions have had very little influence on policy in southern African countries.

There has long been a great deal of interest in methods for analyzing energy use and energy use intensities. Many methods developed within energy studies are also applicable in other areas where materials use is of interest, but in several cases these methods have not been applied to other materials.

As part of a natural resource accounting project being undertaken in Namibia, energy accounts have been compiled and are used to analyse energy use by different economic sectors. Households account for most energy use, especially of traditional fuels, and many households continue to rely on Ž rewood even when they have access to electricity.