Farmers lead the healing of their watershed during uncertain times

For almost three years, our U.S. Plant With Purpose staff were unable to visit our program partners in Ethiopia due to conflict in the Amhara region, which resulted in insecurity and severe travel restrictions. In fact, the airport was shut down only days after our media team last visited the country in July of 2023 when we documented stories of our remarkable partners in that area (Watch the Video: Threads of Transformation). 

Fortunately, because the Plant With Purpose program in Ethiopia (like all our programs) is 100% locally led, progress continued, even during the conflict.

But it wasn’t easy. The internet was completely shut down in the Amhara region. Travel and communication were difficult, even when available.

However, program goals were achieved, and families continued to rise, thanks to the work of local program staff and the resilience of participants

It is in the context of these challenges that we share Kedebe's story.

“We have proven that when a community saves its environment, the environment, in turn, saves the community.’’

- Farmer Kebede

Kebede is a 42-year-old farmer from the Ziragn watershed in Ethiopia. He remembers when the landscape was a "testament to ecological decline." He observed how years of deforestation, rapid population growth, and uncontrolled free grazing of livestock had stripped the hillsides bare.

For Kebede, the global environmental crisis was a daily, local reality. He describes the consequences as both personal and punishing—aggressive soil erosion, land degradation, frequent flooding, and unpredictable rainfall. These conditions left his family with an uncertain future as his crops remained stunted.

However, Kedebe has gone from being an observer of the degradation to an active architect of restoration. In 2021, Kebede joined a Purpose Group. Through partnership with Plant With Purpose Ethiopia, he and his neighbors received training and acquired technical skills to heal their farms and increase production. 

Kebede describes the mind shift that has now taken hold within the community. "Through strong local bylaws and a newfound stewardship mentality, we have proven that when a community saves its environment, the environment, in turn, saves the community,” he said. Armed with gabions (stone barriers), farm tools, and high-quality seeds, the community engaged in the demanding work of healing the land through regenerative agriculture. 

“Our Purpose Group members worked together and constructed stone-filled gabions to heal deep gullies,” he said. “The group transformed the watershed landscape by planting over 5,000 tree seedlings, including Indigenous junipers and productive coffee and gravilia trees across homes, common lands, gullies, schools, and churchyards.” 

Kedebe added, “I personally established a thriving garden of 70 seedlings at my own home while our Farmer Field School successfully produced an additional 1,460 seedlings.”

As the community embraced ownership of watershed management in partnership with Plant With Purpose Ethiopia, the land began to retain moisture again, effectively recharging local aquifers, or groundwater. This environmental recovery led to a transformational development for the community.

Though the community had a spring, this spring had been contaminated by free-grazing livestock. The community built a concrete structure with spouts over the spring, protecting the water source and creating a reliable source of clean, potable water nearby.

“For the village women, this development was revolutionary, drastically reducing the physical burden of water collection and immediately improving household hygiene and livestock health,” said Kedebe.

Today, the Ziragn watershed has gone from being a place of struggle to a hub of production. Beyond the water, Kebede said that the very nature of farming has changed. By adopting techniques like reduced tillage, composting, and mulching, farmers are simultaneously increasing their productivity, nutrition, and additional income.

Kebede now considers environmental restoration a mandatory foundation for life. As he looks out over the greening hillsides of the Ziragn watershed, he expresses great pride in a landscape that blooms once again.