Agro-ecosystems, natural resources management and human health related research in East Africa

Ecosystem approaches and ecosystem health are new ideas that are transforming the traditional sectoral and disciplinary approach to agriculture, land management and human development. A consortium involving the several Ethiopian institutions, international research institutions, and non-governmental organisations facilitated by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) recognised the need for more holistic trans-disciplinary approaches to tackling these complex problems. They posed two basic ideas. One was to test the suitability of the ecosystem health approach to attaining sustainable natural resources management. The second was to test the hypothesis that agro-ecosystems management could provide a complementary approach to delivering improved human health the conceptual, theoretical and methodological issues involved in the application of agroecosystem-health approach to research and development and some application case studies in East African highlands were discussed at a conference held at ILRI. Those a are presented in this book