Performance of common pool resources management in the mixed farming system in Goncha district, northwest highlands of Ethiopia

Common pool resources, such as forests, shrubs, and grasslands, have been and continue to deliver a valuable contribution to the livelihood of millions of smallholder farmers in the mixed farming system areas. However, these resources are threatening by the overuse of the local community in the Ethiopian highlands. Studies accommodating sustainable management of ecological, economic, social, and institutional criteria on common pool resources are very limited over those highlands. The study is aimed at evaluating the performance of common pool resources management schemes in Goncha district, in the northwestern highlands of Ethiopia. It was developed as an alternative management scenario of common pool resources. Participatory key informant interviews were conducted with purposely selected twenty-four farmers, twelve practitioners, and three experts to generate the data. The data were analyzed by using a multi-criteria analysis (weighted score) method. The study indicated that complete enclosure management of forests and shrublands was highly contributed to enhancing biodiversity and curb gullies expansion, while poorly performed in harvesting and fair distribution of fodder and fuelwood. Alternatively, grasslands management in the periodic enclosure without rotation was largely emphasized on the fair distribution of fodder. Natural forests and shrublands in the semi-open-access management and grasslands in the open-access management were performed between very weak and poor performance to almost all criteria/indicators. Therefore, the management schemes of common pool resources should reformulate to the integrated premise of ecological, economic, institutional, and social criteria for sustainable management and productive crop-livestock mixed farming systems.