Jordan Watershed Restoration Project

About

Although Jordan is a water-poor country with a harsh climate, it has considerable biodiversity, 90% of Jordan is an arid rangeland, or Badia, and faces substantial degradation due to overgrazing and low-beneficial barley agriculture. USFS and ICARDA will establish a pilot-scale project to restore a degraded Jordanian rangeland watershed, both upland and gully area, and to evaluate the restoration impacts on the development of the ecosystem services particularly targeting soil and vegetation.

Impact

Goals

By planting rangeland vegetation seedlings in Vallerani structures, while also filling up the gullies hence lower the valley bottom slopes, the overland run-off is slow down and up to 50% more rainwater can be captured in the ground. The overall goal is to create vegetation islands in the Badia landscape , which will be stable enough to enhance natural revegetation. This will improve the ecosystem viability; the productivity of the rangelands will increase providing fodder for the livestock.

Objectives

Specific objectives of the final year (2019) are to treat the eroded gully areas through back-filling and to sustainably enlarge the treated flood plain area (Output 1), to revegetate the landscape with native shrub and tree species with the help of USFS SEED (Output 2), and to monitor soil-plant relationships (Output 3). In a complementary study, ICARDA will model the effects of such integrated rangeland management on the hydrological system and erosion in the Badia.

Impact pathways

The revegetated gully watershed will become a model site to show integrated watershed management in the Badia, evidencing the opportunities of a more sustainable managed agro-ecosystem (IDO 3.3) in terms of reduced land degradation and amplified carrying capacity. An increased amount of palatable scrubs will decrease the fodder shortage of the local livestock holders, who will rely less on external aid to feed their animals. Besides, medicinal and flavour herbs can be harvested. This improved local productivity enhances the benefits from the ecosystem goods and services (IDO 3.2) and will reduce poverty. The improved quality and quantity of animal related products can increase nutrition and food security. Moreover, the water-harvesting based restoration increases the water retention within the Vallerani pits, mitigating drought stress during the initial plantation period. The project will thus minimize or even reverse land degradation, therefore protecting this natural capital from climate change (IDO 3.1). Discussions with the government and the local communities need to ensure that the rangeland will be used in a sustainable way to preserve the improved natural resources system and ecosystem services (SLO 3), ensuring a long-term benefit for the livelihoods of the rural people.