Effect of multi-stakeholder assessment in agroforestry practices to enhancing watershed management for sustainable farmer’s livelihoods in highland of north- western of Rwanda: Case study: Mugogo watershed

Abstract

Multistakeholder partnership model in agroforestry is a useful approach in watershed management to promote sustainable use of various resources and to improve the economic wellbeing

of the local people. Properly designed and managed agroforestry systems can provide various benefits and has potential to meet environmental and socioeconomic requirements. The research were focused on effect of multi-stakeholder assessment in agroforestry practices to enhancing watershed management for sustainable farmer’s livelihoods in highland of northwestern

of Rwanda. Different multistakeholders such as Rwanda mountain tea environment officer, sector agronomists, farmers (71) and Reducing Vulnerability to Climate Change through Community Based Adaptation (RV3CBA project) were visited. Quantitative and qualitative were used through Interview, questionnaire, group discussion and key informant methods were used for different stakeholders involved in agroforestry practices for watershed management and then the collected data were subjected to descriptive analysis using STATA (version 16) tools. The result indicates that 19.72 % of local community participate in Mugogo watershed management, 36.6% 42.25 % of respondents had implemented agroforestry, 69.01 % of respondent had attended primary education, 16.90 were illiterate and 11.27 % had secondary education, 32.39 % and 67.61% of respondent were female and male respectively, 87.32% mentioned that there were no radical and 12.68 progressive terraces along Mugogo watershed, 91.55 % of respondent agreed that in the catchment of Mugogo there were no trees on ditches whereas 8.45 % agreed the presence of trees on ditches and water ways, the soil of Mugogo watershed are sandy loam and sand clay loam. Watershed management are strengthened with different stakeholder who are sharing different activities in agroforestry practices such as distribution of seed tree, nursery preparation, tree planting, weeding, pruning, thinning and harvesting. Putting together the effort by different stakeholders is major solution for management of Mugogo watershed while improving living condition of local community.