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Chapter 3 Materials and Methods

The study was conducted in Gidan Askira village in northern Nigeria to examine gully erosion and its effects on local livelihoods. Participatory geographic information systems (PGIS) were used with community members to map land use changes from 1985 to 2011 and understand the historical drivers of gully formation. Ground-truthing with GPS located important resources including the gully, forests, and agricultural lands. Discussions identified benefits and problems from land changes. A questionnaire surveyed 120 households across 4 affected villages about family, education, income, land and livestock practices, and how the gully impacts movement, infrastructure, livestock and farming. Chi-square testing analyzed the study's data.

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45 views

Chapter 3 Materials and Methods

The study was conducted in Gidan Askira village in northern Nigeria to examine gully erosion and its effects on local livelihoods. Participatory geographic information systems (PGIS) were used with community members to map land use changes from 1985 to 2011 and understand the historical drivers of gully formation. Ground-truthing with GPS located important resources including the gully, forests, and agricultural lands. Discussions identified benefits and problems from land changes. A questionnaire surveyed 120 households across 4 affected villages about family, education, income, land and livestock practices, and how the gully impacts movement, infrastructure, livestock and farming. Chi-square testing analyzed the study's data.

Uploaded by

Abdulrahman Ahmad
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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CHAPTER 3 MATERIALS AND METHODS

3.1 Study Site

The study was conducted in Gidan Askira village a town located in Dutse in

northern Nigeria. It is the capital city of Jigawa State. It is home to Federal University, Dutse

established in November 2011. With an estimated population of 153,000 (NEMA, 2009),

Dutse is currently the largest city in Jigawa State followed by Hadejia (111,000), Gumel

(43,000), and Birnin Kudu (27,000). (NEMA, 2009).

Gidan Askira is straddled by five agro-climatic zones namely humid, sub-humid, semi-humid

to arid and semi-arid. Two-thirds of the county is classified as semi-arid. The agro-ecological

zones found in the Askira include: Tropical Alpine (TA), Upper Highland zones (UH) Lower

Highland zones (LH) and upper-midland zones-UM) Gidan Askira has a population of

153,000 (GOK, 2009). Gidan Askira experiences bi-modal pattern of rainfall with long rains

(mid May-July) and short rains (August - October ). Rainfall distribution is uneven with high

potential areas receiving the highest amount of rainfall ranging from 1200 mm-1800 mm p.a

while the lower drier areas classified as semi-arid receiving 500 mm or less per annum.

Gidan Askira serves an important ecological and economic role and supports wildlife,

livestock, farming activities and human settlements. The main soil types in the county

include Andosols, Luvisols, and Acrisols. Areas with deep and well-drained soils include

hilly and escarpment, (NEMA, 2009). The community requested that gully rehabilitation be a

priority because it is threatening their livelihood. Furthermore, the road leading to Gidan

Askira is being affected by soil deposition from the gully.

3.2 Methodology
3.2.1 Past and current drivers of gully formation and development
Participatory geographic information systems are tools to convince communities on the

importance of conserving land resources. Community members from four villages near the

gully were identified. Consideration of peoples’ perception is thus an essential factor when

making decisions on soil and water conservation including land use decisions (Udayakumara

et al., 2010). In each village, purposive sampling was used to identify 20 participants who

included 10 individuals between 18-35 years, and 10 individuals above 50 years. The 36 to

49 age group was omitted because the youth and elderly were the target groups, in order to

better understand the historical land use and land cover changes. Gender balance was

observed. Participants drew maps on manila paper for 1985, 2000 and 2011 on land use and

land cover change to detect when the gully started.

The land resources targeted during the PGIS session included forests, the gully, grassland,

water resources, settlements, agricultural land, schools, police posts, churches and roads.

These are features that the community considers as important resources which they depend

on for their livelihood. Ground – truthing of 5 key features (forests, the gully, grassland,

water resources, agricultural land, schools and roads) was done using a GPS in order to geo-

reference each village.

The geo-referenced PGIS maps were printed for discussions by each village. Thirty

participants of the mixed gender and age per village were selected. Direct and indirect

benefits and undesirable effects of the changes of the major land resources were discussed.

The participants recommended the way forward in minimizing the undesirable effects of the

land resource changes.

3.2.2 The effect of gully erosion on the livelihoods of the local community
Purposive sampling was used to select the four villages affected by gully erosion. Data was

collected using a questionnaire on family size, level of education, income, livestock keeping

practices, farming practices, land management practices, causes of the gully and the effect of

the gully on livelihoods (mainly movement, infrastructure, livestock and farming practices)

and recommendations given. A minimum of 30 households (Ruxton, 2006) were selected

randomly from each of the 4 villages. According to NEMA (2009) Gidan Askira has a

population of about 150,000, with only about 11% residing in the urban areas. Pilot testing of

the questionnaire was done randomly on 10 respondents and the questionnaire rewritten

before final administration. Enumerators were selected based on previous experience in

fieldwork and level of education (secondary education and above). Key informant interviews

were conducted on the Chief, Village Elders, Ministry of Agriculture, and Non-

governmental organizations.

Land use practices (types of crops grown and livestock kept), level of income, level of

education, size of farms, soil conservation measures and impacts of the gully on livelihoods

(movement, infrastructure, livestock and farming practices) from the questionnaire were

tested using SPSS. Chi-square goodness of fit was used to determine if there were significant

effects on livelihoods.

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