Farmland expansion is a key rural household income strategy; however, it is also a major contributor of global forest loss. Ethiopia is highly dependent on agriculture for economic growth, with farmland expansion and intensification being part of the country's growth and transformation strategies to increase agricultural production and meet the rising demand for food. However, this threatens to lead to increased deforestation and loss of grasslands. 

This briefing, produced as part of the Sentinel project, seeks to look at the impacts of farmland expansion on rural households' livelihoods in Ethiopia. It shares findings from four important questions that are salient to the farmland expansion debate: 

1) how do incomes from non-forest/forest based livelihood options differ between expanding and non expanding households?

2) How do the different incomes change if we control factors that influence expansion & income?

3) What are the impacts of agricultural expansion across time scales? 

4) How might agricultural expansion affect food security?