Severity of household food insecurity and coping strategies in Analemmo Woreda, Hadiya Zone, Southern Ethiopia

Hunger and undernourishment are the main challenges of today’s world. The objective of this study is to assess severity of household food insecurity and local coping strategies in the study area. Three-stage sampling technique was used to select sampled household in Analemmo woreda Hadiya Zone. A total of 200 households were selected by using systematic random sampling with proportional to population size. Both primary and secondary data were collected. Both descriptive and econometric models were used to analyze the collected data. Household calorie acquisition was employed to categorize into severely food secure and severely food in secure. For econometric analysis ordered probit model were used to identify determinates of severity of household food insecurity in the study area. The survey results show that severity food insecurity 36%, 18%, 13% and 33% food secure, mild, moderately and severely food insecure respectively. Thus, based on the results of ordered probit model agro-ecology of land, age and education level of household head, number of oxen, drought-tolerant seeds, soil and water conservation, credit amount, productive safety net program participation, access to climatic information, access to extension service and off-farm activities and non- farm activity determine severity of household food insecurity in study area. Different common coping strategies was used to cope food .It was recommended that government should provide productive saftent program participation, capacity building on age and educational level household head,  providing climatic information for farmers, providing drought-tolerant seed, provision of veterinary service for oxen health,  providing  training on soil and water conservation. Key words: Analemmo, coping strategies, food insecurity, ordered probit model.