Ethiopia expects 19.6 million tons of harvest from the Meher season of 2010/11, which is almost a 9% increase from last year’s harvest of 18 million tons, according to Central Statistics Agency(CSA). With regard to Cereals (teff, maize, sorghum, wheat and barley), this year’s production is projected to be 10.97% higher than last year’s. The forecast was published last week by CSA in a 121 page report titled ‘Crop Production Forecast Sample Survey, 2010/11 (2003 E.C.)’.

The Survey report indicates the area covered by grain crops (cereals, pulses and oilseeds) and the expected harvest have increased compared to the previous three years. The report states:

Both the country level estimated cropped land area and expected volume of production of grain crops have shown significant increment over the previous three consecutive years post harvest estimates. For instance, the current year i.e. 2010/11 estimated grain crops covered area has increased by about 9.82 %, 7.32% and 4.58% over the 2007/08, 2008/09 and 2009/10 post harvest estimate, respectively. Following the same pattern, the current year (2010/11), expected volume of production estimate of grain crops at country level has increased by about 22.59 %, 14.88 % and 8.78 % when compared with the 2007/08, 2008/09 and 2009/10 post harvest estimates, respectively.

Moreover, except for pulses, the expected crop productivity is anticipated to be better particularly for cereal crops such as teff, maize and sorghum, where for instance the current year anticipated productivity of teff has shown an increment by 8.05 %, 3.36% and 2.69% over the 2007/08, 2008/09 and 2009/10 post harvest yield estimates. Similarly, the expected productivity of maize and sorghum have shown the same trend like that of teff, where the increment of expected productivity of maize and sorghum over the past three consecutive years ranges from 2.92 to 7.87% for maize and from 7.84 to 14.19% increment for sorghum over the 2007/08, 2008/09 and 2009/10 post harvest estimates.

The report further indicates the regional distribution of the expected Meher harvest. Of the expected Meher harvest, 46.2% is to be obtained from Oromia, while Amhara, SNNP, Tigray and Benshangul-Gumuz Regions will contribute 34.95%, 8.76%, 7.35% and 1.86%, respectively. Though the harvest from Oromiya is to increase by about 5% from last year, its share of the total national production slightly decreased from last year when it was almost 50%; that is, 90 million tons of the 180 million tons produced nationally.

CSA made undertook various measures to enhance the accuracy and reliability of the survey, including employing enhanced methodologies, extending the data collection period and the involvement of several stakeholders to provide data on ‘condition factors’. The survey, was conducted by 572 field supervisors and 2328 field enumerators from September 12 to October 25, 2010 and it covered 22,144 rural household in 67 of the 78 zones/special woredas in the Country. Among the 11 missing zones, one is in Gambella Region, which was left out due to flooding, while nine are pastoralist  zones of Afar & Somali regions. ‘The data entered into the computers using the entry module of the IMPS (Integrated Microcomputer Processing System) software, which is a software package developed by the United States Bureau of the Census. Following the data entry operations, the data was further reviewed for data inconsistencies, missing data …etc. by the regular professional staff from Natural Resources and Agricultural Statistics Department.’ The data processing was conducted using the tabulation component of the PC based CSPRO software, according to the report.

The report also project that, assuming the Belg season production would be similar to the same season of 2009/2010, the total production to be obtained in the year 2010/2011 could be close to 22 million tons. Note that: ‘Meher’ is the long and heavy rain season usually from June to October, while Belg refers to the short rainy seasons from March to May.

However, CSA cautions that this data is subject to positive and negative factors that may occur after the survey took place.

The table below is from the CSA report.

Open the image in a NEW TAB or NEW WINDOW for a better view.]

You may Download the Report HERE.