Land Management for Optimizing Crop Yields in Semiarid Eritrea

The book presents results of successful projects completed at Hamelmalo Agricultural College, Eritrea, with a mission to ensure zero runoff from agricultural lands and harvest at least part of the runoff from non-agricultural lands in the watershed for crop use. As output of the mission, rainfed sorghum yields increased from <0.6 to > 2.4 t ha-1 and irrigated yields to >4 t ha-1 by one irrigation and to >5 t ha-1 by two irrigations. Rainfed yields on sloping lands increased to 1.7 t ha-1 on 35% slope, 2.7 t ha-1 on 25% slope and 3.8 t ha-1 on 5% slope through adoption of bed-furrow technology. Rice yields were >2 - 4 t ha-1 under runoff farming and irrigated conditions. Wheat yields in Asmara were >5.6 t ha-1. First 4 chapters deal with situation analysis in terms of knowledge gap and available resources. Next 5 chapters deal with different watersheds, their development technology and expansion on farmers’ fields. The remaining chapters deal with crop production technology development involving students and farmers. Each chapter is written in a professional manner for use by policy makers, students, researchers, teachers and agricultural extension workers in semiarid regions.