Crisis in Israel and Gaza
As conflict escalates, the urgent need for humanitarian assistance intensifies.
Laden is a pastoralist, livestock owner, and participant in Mercy Corps’ Resilience in Pastoral Areas program, which develops market resilience and supports agro-pastoralists living in drought-affected area.
As droughts in the lowlands of Ethiopia increase in frequency and severity, a key resilience capacity for livestock producers is their ability to generate income and savings from their animals, which they can use to purchase feed and other inputs when droughts strike. A major constraint is that livestock demand in the lowlands is fragmented, highly seasonal and often evaporates during dry seasons and droughts.
For the increasing numbers of young women and men transitioning out of pastoralism (TOPs) in the lowlands of Ethiopia, a lack of technical skills is a key obstacle to their success in navigating a pathway to employment. A major underlying challenge is the absence of technical courses and services that are relevant and accessible for these youth TOPs.
Through one of its interventions, the RIPA-North team aimed to transform the structure of livestock supply chains through catalyzing vertical integration, with actors at each level investing in deeper relationships with their suppliers including new agent-based models. In doing so, the aim was to foster trust-based relationships that enable information flows and other embedded services between actors, reduce uncertainty and risk for regional traders and female pastoralists, and result in supply chains that are resilient to shocks such as drought and conflict.
Short-term, fee-based courses are a sustainable and effective business model for both public and private TVET institutions.