Participation and beneficiary of women from restored hillside exclosures in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia

Hillside exclosure is a sound mechanism for the rehabilitation of degraded land in Ethiopia. Women have a great role in land rehabilitation and restoration, though they are benefiting less from hillside exclosures. This study investigated the role of women in land rehabilitation, their participation, and how they are benefiting from restored hillside exclosures distributed to the community. A simple random sampling technique was employed to select 143 respondents among the participants in the hillside distribution. Observations, household surveys, key informant interviews (KII), and focus group discussion (FGD) data collection tools were employed. The Chi-square test was used to determine the association between categorical variables. This study revealed that the participation and benefit sharing of women in hillside distribution were significantly low (P<0.05). The main reasons for poor participation and benefit sharing from restored exclosures were sociocultural perception and low interest in participating in hillside exclosures. Thus, it is recommended that attention be given to women empowerment tasks to encourage women to participate in exclosure and hillside restoration programs.