Trees for Food Security Project-Local Knowledge-Using local knowledge to understand soil properties and land management in Ongobo bakanisa, Ethiopia

To design appropriate interventions, it is essential to gain information about the types and the temporal and spatial changes of local soils in the target area and their interaction with trees. Information from soil maps is often not detailed enough to be operational and does not show soil variation within a landscape. The use of local knowledge can help gather information about the various soil types within an area. It does also reveal farmers view on soils and can help understand spatial and temporal changes. This study brings together two approaches to elicit local soil knowledge to inform the ACIAR project "Trees for food security". The AKT5 and InPaC-S methodologies were used to elicit farmers knowledge about soils and land management impacts. Objectives and research questions: Understand spatial and temporal changes of soil properties in the area. 1. Research question: How do farmers classify soils and what are their functions? 2. Research question: What is the spatial distribution of soils? 3. Research question: How did soils change over time? Understand farmers perception of soil soil quality and driving factors for soil quality changes 1. Research question: How do farmers evaluate soil quality? 2. Research question: How does soil management, crop management and trees change soil properties? Find synergies between the methodol oies AKT5 and modied bits of Barrios` InPac-S tool. 1. Research question: How can the two approaches AKT5 and InPaC-s complement each other?