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GIS-based hydrological zones and soil geo-database of Ethiopia

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Catena 104 (2013) 21–31

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GIS-based hydrological zones and soil geo-database of Ethiopia

Belete Berhanu a, c, Assefa M. Melesse b,⁎, Yilma Seleshi c
a
Ethiopian Institute of Water Resources (EIWR), Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
b
Department of Earth and Environment, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA
c
Department of Civil Engineering, Addis Ababa Institute of Technology (AAiT), Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Land and water are vital resources to maintain the environment and livelihoods of mankind. Understanding
Received 9 May 2012 the spatial variability of these resources has significant importance for planning, management, and utilization
Received in revised form 11 December 2012 thereof. Despite their importance, there is no available, coherent, and systematically organized method for
Accepted 18 December 2012
the characterization and mapping of the soil and hydrological systems in Ethiopia. A review-based research
Available online xxxx
aimed at developing a geo-database of soils for hydrological studies and generation of the hydrological
Keywords:
zones of the country based on the surface runoff potential is reported. In this analysis, data from 930 rainfall
Soil classification and 212 meteorological stations were used. Analysis based on a weighted overlay technique within ArcGIS
Hydrologic zoning using data from various sources and scales was conducted. A regression equation was used to develop the
Runoff soil geo-database, scale factors of soil, land slope and climatic layers. An iterative analysis and expert knowl-
Spatial variability edge was also used to determine the weights of the layers for the hydrological zoning. Results from this study
GIS provide valuable information about the hydrological zones of Ethiopia and an improved spatial soil database
Ethiopia at 1:250,000 scale for the first time. Generated maps and zones will improve the hydrological understanding
of the various regions of the country.
© 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Land and water are vital resources to maintain the environment
and livelihoods of mankind. These resources are the basis for survival
and economic development of agrarian society like Ethiopia. Particu-
larly, water is a central component of all developments that pledge
the concept of watershed management. As stated on GWP (2010),
water is at the center of all efforts to address food security, nutrition
security, poverty reduction, economic growth, energy production and
human health.
Although the total volume of water on Earth may be adequate to
meet all needs, variations in both the spatial and temporal distributions
of water availability remain a problem (Hawley and McCuen, 1982). Hy-
drologic extremes, including drought and flooding can result from varia-
tions in spatial and temporal distribution of water (McCuen, 1989).
Different catchments have different characteristics that influence the
flow regime (Gebrehiwot et al., 2011). Their classification is only com-
plete, if we understand why certain catchments belong to certain groups
of hydrologic behavior (Carrillo et al., 2011). Knowledge of these hydro-
logical behaviors can help for water resource planning and management
actions (Chiang et al., 2002). This calls for regionalization and classifica-
tion of catchments based on selected indicative characteristics.
The spatial variability of catchments is related to physical-based
characteristics including soil, topography, climate, and surface runoff.
⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 305 348 6518; fax: +1 305 348 6137.
E-mail address: melessea@fiu.edu (A.M. Melesse).
However, these characteristics are not well mapped and documented
in Ethiopia. Most of the hydrological studies in the country were
model-dependent and focused on the calibration and validation of ex-
ternally developed rainfall-runoff methods and models (Liu et al.,
2008; Steenhuis et al., 2009). To classify catchments into different hy-
drological regimes and conduct a hydrological characterization it is
imperative to understand the spatial distribution of soils, climatic ele-
ments and surface runoff of the country. This will necessitate for map-
ping of these data at a desired scale suitable for watershed management.
Hydrological soil type classification considers the physical proper-
ties of soils including texture, infiltration capacity, and particle size
and soil structure. These properties dictate the portion of rainfall
that is infiltrated and hence affects the catchment hydrology. While
it is recognized that the soil hydraulic conductivity, soil water storage
capacity, and the pathways of water movement through the soil are
most important, these attributes are spatially and temporally variable
making them costly and time-consuming to measure (Allan, 2010).
Hence, most of the hydrological studies in the country used the FAO
1:1 million scale soil database (Bewket and Sterk, 2005; Eric et al.,
2008; FAO, 1998; Wale et al., 2009), which is too coarse to capture
the hydrological processes at a catchment scale. However, there are
other soil studies conducted at larger scales (FAO, 2009; MoWR, 1996,
1997, 1998a,b; PDRE, 1989; WBSP, 2000, 2002). The information from
these studies is both well-organized and characterized to suit hydrologic
studies. Thus, this research also focused on the collection, organization,
characterization and spatial mapping of the available soil information
of the country to generate a spatially distributed hydrological soil

0341-8162/$ – see front matter © 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.catena.2012.12.007
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22 B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31

Table 1 Table 4
Soil Infiltration rate and hydrological soil group based on textural class. Relation and percent of influence of layers with runoff generation.

Texture class Effective water capacity Infiltration rate Hydrologic soil Layer Scale Relation of the scale factor Percent of influence
(Cw) (f) grouping factor with runoff generation assigned
(mm) (mm/hour)
Annual rainfall 1 to 7 Direct 40
Sand 8.89 210.1 A Annual ETo 1 to 6 Indirect 30
Loamy sand 7.874 61.2 A Soil textural class 1 to 7 Direct 20
Sandy loam 6.35 25.9 A Slope class 1 to 6 Direct 10
Loam 4.826 13.2 B
Silt loam 4.318 6.9 B
Sandy clay loam 3.556 4.3 C Valley and Western Lowlands. The elevation ranges between two ex-
Clay loam 3.556 2.3 D tremes from 125 m below sea level (bsl) Denakil Depression to 4620 m
Silty clay loam 2.794 1.5 D above sea level (asl) Ras Dejen (Dashen) peak. The wide range of topo-
Sandy clay 2.286 1.3 D
Silty clay 2.286 1.0 D
graphic variation together with its climatic diversity creates the variabil-
Clay 2.032 0.5 D ity in the country's land and water resources.

Table 2
2.2. Spatial soil database
Soil texture and slope class with scale factor.
The spatial soil information of the country is developed using the
Soil texture class Scale factor Slope class Slope range Scale factor
geo-database tools and spatial analysis capability of ArcGIS. Existing
(%)
soils data from various sources was collected and organized in vector
Sand 1 Flat or almost flat 0–3 1
and raster data format. The soils information was collected from var-
Sandy loam 2 Gently sloping 3–8 2
Loam 3 Sloping 8–15 3 ious global and national data sources that include the Harmonized
Silt loam 4 Moderately steep 15–30 4 World Soil Database (FAO, 2009), Woody Biomass Study Project in
Clay loam 5 Steep 30–50 5 Amhara, Oromiya, SNNPR and Tigray Regional States (WBSP, 2000,
Silt clay, clay 6 Very steep >50 6 2002), Integrated River Basin Master Plan Studies, carried out during
Heavy clay 7
1989–2007 (MoWR, 1996, 1997, 1998a,b; PDRE, 1989) and different
Source: Assistance to soil and water conservation program, Phase III, Field Document project based feasibility studies.
No. 19 ETH/85/016. CFSCDD, MOA, FAO, October 1998.

2.2.1. Soil texture

database and hence delineate hydrologic zones taking into account soils,
rainfall, topography, evapotranspiration and surface runoff.
The overall objective of this study is to characterize the spatial vari-
ability of soils, climate and surface runoff of the country for the develop-
ment of hydrological zones. The specific objectives are to (1) develop
the soil geo-database of the country for hydrological modeling and
(2) generate the hydrological zone of the country based on the sur-
face runoff potential.
2. Methodology
2.1. Study area
Ethiopia is located in the northeastern corner of Africa between
latitude 3° and 15° North and longitude 33° and 48° East. The country,
the second most populous and the 9th largest in Africa, has an area of
about 1.13 million km2 of which 1.12 million km2 is land area and the
remaining 7444 km2 is water area (rivers, lakes, ponds etc.). The general
terrain of the country has high plateau with central mountain range di-
vided by the Great Rift Valley which creates three major relief regions:
the Western Highlands, the Eastern Highlands, and the low-lying Rift
Soil texture is a soil property used to describe the relative proportion
of different grain sizes of particles and indicate the general nature of soil
physical properties (Brady and Well, 2002). The textural class of the dif-
ferent soil types in the country is determined using the textural triangle
and the respective percentage of sand, silt and clay.
Soil information from the above sources was grouped according to
their texture (i.e., clay, silt, and sand). The harmonized soil database
(FAO, 2009) provides the percentage of the sand, silt, clay and gravel
for each soil type units. Using these percentages, the soil textural class
is determined by the soil textural triangle (Brady and Well, 2002)
overlaid in the ArcGIS environment to improve the spatial scale of
the information. The required attributes of soil properties for different
hydrological analysis were also compiled and computed using differ-
ent computational methods.
2.2.2. Hydrological soil group
Originally, hydrologic soil groups were assigned to soil series by soil
scientists based on their interpretation of the published criteria. The soil
scientists' interpretation of the published criteria has varied across time
and between states or regions. Thus, the hydrologic group criteria are
not applied consistently (Hjelmfelt et al., 2001). This system relates

Table 3
Annual rainfall and ETo classification.

Standard name LGP⁎ Annual RF⁎⁎ Scale factor Thermal zone Temperature range (°C) Annual ETo (mm) Scale factor
(in days) (mm)

Arid (A) b45 b302 1 Hot >27.5 >2159 1

Semi-Arid (SA) 46–60 302–350 2 Warm 27.5–21 1737–2159 2
Sub-Moist (SM) 61–120 350–566 3 Tepid 21–16 1431–1737 3
Moist (M) 121–180 566–835 4 Cool 16–11 1124–1431 4
Sub-Humid (SH) 181–240 835–1189 5 Cold 11–7.2 895–1124 5
Humid (H) 241–300 1189–1711 6 Very cold b7.5 b895 6
Per-Humid (PH) >300 >1711 7
⁎ Source: Agro-ecological zones of Ethiopia, Natural Resources Management and Regulation Department of MOA, March 1998, Addis Ababa.
⁎⁎ Source: Agro-ecological land resource assessment for agricultural development planning: A case study of Kenya, Resources database and land productivity main report,
Technical annex 2, 1992.
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B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31 23

Fig. 1. Soil type classification of Ethiopia.

the soil physical and hydrologic properties to the published criteria and this study is improved and uses the soil–water characteristics that in-
produces the appropriate group assignment for the soils (Nielsen and clude transmission rate of water, texture, structure, and degree of swell-
Hjelmfelt, 1998). Hence, the assignment of soil hydrological group in ing when saturated, which will have similar runoff responses. Following

Table 5
Area coverage of different soil types in Ethiopia.

Soil type Area Soil type Area Soil type Area

(km2) (km2) (km2)

Lithic Leptosols 208,882.4 Haplic Nitisols 6169.2 Leptosols 192.6

Humic Nitisols 134,722.0 Calcaric Fluvisols 5306.3 Luvic Calcisols 171.9
Eutric Vertisols 115,207.5 Cambic Arenosols 5120.7 Solonetz 165.4
Eutric Leptosols 71,268.6 Eutric Regosols 4733.6 Dystric Nitisols 134.2
Chromic Luvisols 58,748.6 Vitric Andosols 3854.0 Sodic Solonchaks 132.7
Haplic Calcisols 53,117.6 Dystric Vertisols 3437.1 Fluvisols 94.1
Petric Calcisols 51,510.5 Mollic Andosols 3185.4 Rhodic Ferralsols 72.4
Eutric Cambisols 50,268.4 Haplic Phaeozems 2937.3 Gleysols 63.7
Haplic Gypsisols 46,305.2 Fibric Histosols 2776.2 Rhodic Nitisols 61.6
Rendzic Leptosols 44,315.0 Haplic Lixisols 1954.0 Haplic Acrisols 27.8
Eutric Fluvisols 42,256.9 Calcic Vertisols 1905.1 Solonchaks 14.7
Petric Gypsisols 39,481.7 Salic Fluviosls 1841.9 Calcisols 8.6
Chromic Cambisols 38,710.5 Luvic Phaeozems 1714.5 Cambisols 5.3
Haplic Luvisols 28,224.5 Calcic Chernozems 1427.9 Umbric Leptosols 4.1
Humic Alisols 21,299.0 Calcaric Cambisols 1188.6 Haplic Xerosols 3.2
Haplic Solonchaks 19,285.1 Haplic Arenosols 878.5 Ferric Luvisols 2.6
Vertic Cambisols 15,968.0 Vertic Luvisols 851.4 Dystric Regosols 2.2
Dystric Leptosols 13,446.4 Orthic Solonchaks 519.0 Dystric Cambisols 1.4
Haplic Alisols 11,376.6 Gleyic Solonchaks 393.9 Water bodies 7643.8
Calcaric Regosols 8031.8 Calcaric Arenosols 343.0
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24 B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31

Table 6 where KUSLE is the soil erodibility factor, M is the particle size parameter,
Textural classification of Ethiopian soils and their percent coverage. OM is the percent organic matter, CSoilstr is the soil structure code used
Soil Area Area Soil texture Area Area in soil classification and Cperm is the profile permeability class. Williams
texture coverage coverage coverage coverage (1995) also proposed an alternative equation for estimating the erod-
(km2) (%) (km2) (%) ibility factor as
Clay 234,514.2 20.86 Sand 6342.2 0.56
Clay loam 1082.4 0.10 Sandy clay 1956.6 0.17 KUSLE ¼ f csand f clsi f orgc f hisand ð2Þ
Heavy clay 61.6 0.01 Sandy loam 342,958.5 30.51
Loam 33,9372.0 30.19 Silty clay 1427.9 0.13
Loamy sand 196,406.5 17.47 No soil/water 7643.8 0.68 where fcsand is a factor that gives a low soil erodibility value for soils
with high coarse-sand contents and high values with less sand, fci–si is
a factor that gives a low soil erodibility value for soils with high clay
these studies, a relation developed by Rawls et al. (1982), which gives to silt ratios, forgc is a factor that reduces the soil erodibility for soils
the relation among soil texture, soil hydrological groups and other with high organic carbon content, and fhisand is a factor that reduces
soil–water properties (Table 1), is used to assign soil hydrological the soil erodibility for soils with extremely high sand contents.
groups for Ethiopian soils. Soil attributes which include soil root zone, soil bulk density (BD),
soil available water content (AWC), soil carbon contents (CBN), soil
2.2.3. Soil erodibility factor (K) albedo, and soil conductivity exchange (CE) are computed using dif-
Soil erodibility factor (K) is an important soil parameter mostly re- ferent pseudotransfer studies that correlate these factors with soil
quired in the hydrological analysis, particularly in the estimation of ero- texture class (Rawls et al., 1982; Saxton et al., 1986).
sion and sediment yield. Direct measurement of the erodibility factor is
time consuming and costly. Wischmeier et al. (1971) developed a gen- 2.3. Hydrological zoning
eral Eq. (1) to calculate the soil erodibility factor as
Hydrological processes in tropical watersheds are strongly influenced
  by particular climatic, topographic and soil conditions (Bonell, 2005).
1:14
0:00021 M ð12−OMÞ þ 3:25ðCsoilstr −2Þ þ 2:5 Cperm −3 Particularly, it is more influenced by the combined effects of rainfall char-
KUSLE ¼ ð1Þ
100 acteristics (rainfall amount), soil physical conditions (texture), slope

Fig. 2. Textural classification of Ethiopian soils.

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B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31 25

Table 7 developed for the four geographic information system (GIS) layers:
Average soil–water properties per texture class of soil in Ethiopia. rainfall, soils, topography, and potential evapotranspiration.
Texture Average soil Average available Average soil Average The scale factors of the soil and slope classes are created with
bulk density water content carbon content conductivity seven and six classes, respectively, using the land capability classifica-
exchange tion tool as the base for their classification (Eszobedo, 1998). In this
Sand 1.7005 98.9899 0.4929 0.1000 classification, the land slope classification is done using 90-m resolu-
Loamy sand 1.6269 116.7984 0.4747 0.8757 tion digital elevation model (DEM) data of the country and classified
Sandy loam 1.5976 38.5790 1.1810 0.0039
into six classes with different slope ranges starting from flat to steep
Sandy clay loam 1.4297 98.6290 0.6845 0.1000
Loam 1.3936 146.4479 1.3006 0.5451 slope classes. Similarly, the soil classes are classified into seven soil
Clay loam 1.3663 31.4634 0.5612 0.0951 classes based on texture and infiltration capacity (Table 2). Sand tex-
Silty clay 1.2400 150.0000 2.1000 0.4000 ture is assigned with one for high infiltration capacity, or low runoff
Clay 1.2282 118.4569 1.6425 0.0986 generation potential, and a class of seven is assigned for heavy clay
Heavy clay 1.1700 150.0000 2.5000 0.1000
soil, or water bodies with very low infiltration capacity, and high sur-
face runoff.
Long-term annual average rainfall data of about 930 rainfall sta-
gradients, and vegetation types. Using the relationship of mean annual tions distributed over the country was collected from National Mete-
evapotranspiration and vegetation cover, the vegetation characteristics orological Agency (NMA) and interpolated using the Inverse Distance
of catchments can be represented by the spatial variability of mean an- Weighted (IDW) method in the ArcGIS environment to analyze the
nual evapotranspiration (Zhang et al., 2001). Based on this understand- spatial variability of rainfall in the country. The rainfall data was clas-
ing, the hydrological zoning of Ethiopia is determined by using spatially sified into seven scale factors based on the length of the growing
distributed raster layers of rainfall, soils, topography, and potential period's classification of Ethiopian Agro-ecological zones (Kassam et
evapotranspiration. A weighting overlay approach, with different scale al., 1992); one for the smallest annual rainfall, and seven for the
and influence factors of the layers within ArcGIS, is selected as the highest annual rainfall (Table 3).
basic tool for the development of qualitative hydrological zone classifi- The minimum and maximum monthly temperature data of 212
cation of the country. Different scale factor classes in raster format are meteorological stations were used as input for the CROPWAT 8; a

Fig. 3. Hydrological soil group (HSG) classification of Ethiopian soils.

 Author's personal copy
26 B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31
model to compute the monthly potential evapotranspiration (ETo). In
order to increase spatial coverage of the ETo, information on the an-
nual ETo of the stations are correlated with the altitude of the stations
using Eq. (3) as
AETo ¼ 2350−0:383 Altitude ð3Þ
where AETo is the annual potential evapotranspiration in mm, and Al-
titude is the elevation of a rain gage station above sea level in meters.
Eq. (3) gave a very good result with coefficient of determination (R 2)
of 0.91 satisfactorily relating AETo with elevation. Using this regression
equation and the elevation information of 90-m DEM, the spatially dis-
tributed ETo is computed. The spatially distributed ETo information
was also classified into six classes based on the thermal zone classifica-
tion of the agro-ecological classification of Ethiopia (NRMRD-MOA,
1998) using one for the smallest annual ETo and six for the largest an-
nual ETo class.
Finally, the hydrological zones of the country were developed using
the weighted overlay method of ArcGIS Spatial Analyst tool and the rela-
tion of the rainfall, evapotranspiration, soil texture and slope with surface
runoff generation potential. Since no similar work on the development of
the hydrological zones using ArcGIS weighted overlay method exist, the
weight of influence of the four source layers and their relation is deter-
mined after a number of iterations (Table 4).
Fig. 4. Soil erodibility factors of Ethiopian soils.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Soil type classification
Soil classification is the systemic arrangement of soils into catego-
ries and classes on the basis of their characteristics. Broad groupings
are made on the basis of general characteristics and subdivisions on
the basis of more detailed differences in specific properties (Brierley
et al., 2001). With this broad classification concept, the land mass of
Ethiopia is classified into 60 soil types with an area coverage ranging
from 1.4 to 208,882 km 2 and organized as spatial soil database with
19,865 records of GIS polygons (Fig. 1). Comparison of the newly gen-
erated soil database of the country with the previously available FAO
soil database (FAO, 1998) shows that the soil database from this study
has more detail classification than the FAO soil data base, which clas-
sified the country's land mass into only 45 soil types. Although their
coverage proportion varies, both databases place Lithic Leptosols, Humic
Nitisols and Eutric Vertisols as the major three soil types with large area
coverage. According to the newly generated soil database, the area cover-
age proportion of Lithic Leptosols is 18.46% followed by Humic Nitisols
(11.90%), and Eutric Vertisols (10.18%) (Table 5).
3.2. Soil textural classification
Soil texture is the entry point to avail all information that is required
for the hydrological analysis of any catchment. Thus, in this spatial
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B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31
hydrological soil database, the textural classification of the country's soils
is identified. Accordingly, the analysis shows ten soils textural classes in
the country with different range of areal coverage (Table 6 and Fig. 2).
Compared to the previous FAO soil database, efforts have been made
to ensure the current soil database has the required detailed textural
classification of the country.
Soil texture is the dominate factor in the soil–water potential–
content relationship (Saxton et al., 1986). Cosby et al. (1984) also
clearly demonstrated that soil texture could be related to hydraulic
characteristics. Hence, the soil–water characteristics of the new soil
database also help in compiling the different soil–water parameters
which have significant role in hydrological modeling of catchments.
Table 7 presents the average values of soil bulk density, soil available
water content, soil carbon content and hydraulic conductivity ex-
changes of the soils in Ethiopia.
3.3. Hydrological soil group
Hydrologic soil groups (HSG), along with land use, management
practices, and hydrologic conditions, determine soil cover complexes
and their associated runoff curve numbers. Based on the method de-
scribed earlier the soil hydrological group of the country was comput-
ed as shown in Fig. 3. Results indicate that the HSG-A dominates with
48.2% areal coverage followed by HSG-B (30%) and HSG-D with areal
coverage of 21.6%. As described in USDA-NRCS (2009), when thor-
oughly wet, the soils in HSG-A and HSG-B have low and moderately
Fig. 5. Slope class of Ethiopia.
27
low runoff potential, respectively. Water is transmitted freely through
the soil in HSG-A and its transmission through the soil in HSG-B is
unimpeded. These results indicate that most of the soils in Ethiopia
are not major factors for runoff generation. Rather, the soils have a
potential to infiltrate large portion of precipitation.
3.4. USLE-K factor
The erodibility of a soil is an expression of its inherent resistance
to particle detachment and transport by rainfall. It is determined by
the cohesive force between the soil particles and may vary depending
on the presence or absence of plant cover, the soil's water content, and
the development of its structure (Wischmeier and Smith, 1978). The
erodibility factor (K) of the different soil types of the country was com-
puted and the values range from 0 to 0.18. This result shows that the
erodibility of the country is relatively low. These results are similar to
Nyssen et al. (2007), who found that erodibility of the fine earth fraction
of Tigray's soils in northern Ethiopia is relatively low. Similarly, a study
by Shiferaw (2011) estimated the soil loss rates for soil conservation
planning in the Borena area of south Wollo highlands, Ethiopia, and
found to be similar with other studies in the country. This low value
of erodibility of soils in Ethiopia indicates the influence of the soil factors
in the erosion process of the country is relatively lower than other fac-
tors. The K-factor of the soils in Ethiopia is compiled as one attribute
in the current soil database, which was not addressed in the previous
FAO soil database (Fig. 4).
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28 B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31
3.5. Ethiopian soil database
Finally, the spatial soil database of the country showing various pa-
rameters and attributes is compiled. Unlike the previous available soil
information of the country, the current database has attributes like hy-
drological soil group, soil water holding capacity, total carbon content,
bulk density, erodibility factors, albedo, and conductivity exchange of
the soil. The soil database compiled in GIS format shows the spatial het-
erogeneity of the soil physical and chemical properties, which mainly
describes the soil–water relations. In addition, the newly developed
spatial soil database was able to improve the scale to 1:250,000, an im-
provement by a factor of 8 from the FAO soil database, the most com-
monly used available soil information at a national scale.
3.6. Slope class classification
The land mass of the country was further characterized using slope
class classification resulting in six slope classes. Most of the low land
area, especially the low lands of the eastern parts of the country, has
low gradients. In the contrary, the central and western highlands have
steep and very steep gradients (Fig. 5).
3.7. Climatic variability
Among various climatic variables, precipitation is an important factor
that is essentially required for a number of applications, particularly in
Fig. 6. Mean annual rainfall class of Ethiopia.
runoff generation and hydrological modeling (Ashiq et al., 2010). Under-
standing its temporal and spatial distribution is also important for under-
taking various studies (Ashiq et al., 2010). The mean annual precipitation
varies over space ranging from almost zero in some very extreme arid re-
gions to a value of 11,680 mm, with an average land surface annual value
of about 800 mm (Taher and Alshaikh, 1998). Similarly, the mean annual
rainfall of Ethiopia ranges from 141 mm at the arid area of eastern and
north eastern borders of the country to 2275 mm at the south western
highlands (Fig. 6). Although the spatial rainfall distribution depends on
various topographic and climatic factors, it is believed that elevation is
the key factor affecting both the quantity and distribution of precipita-
tion, especially in the mountainous regions (Taher and Alshaikh, 1998).
This study also finds similar results on the effect of elevation on the spa-
tial distribution of Ethiopian rainfall.
Potential evapotranspiration (ETo) is also an important component
of the watershed water budget with high spatiotemporal variability. It
is also a critical variable for understanding regional hydrological pro-
cesses (Lu et al., 2005) and is mainly controlled by climatic factors.
Changes in these climatic variables will affect evapotranspiration and
result in changes in catchment water yield (Shao et al., 2012). In order
to understand the effect of climatic variables on runoff, the mean annual
potential evapotranspiration of Ethiopia is computed and it was found
that the mean annual ETo of the country ranges from 620 mm in the
central highlands to 2350 mm in the southeastern and northeastern
lowlands of the country. As shown in Fig. 7, the spatially distributed
ETo is in contrast to the mean annual rainfall of the country (Fig. 6).
 Author's personal copy
B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31
Fig. 7. Mean annual evapotranspiration (ETo) class of Ethiopia.
From these results, it can be concluded that it is possible to get high run-
off in areas where lower ETo overlay with high rainfall.
3.8. Hydrological zoning
Several regional approaches have attempted to relate the un-gauged
catchments to gauged catchments. Perhaps the most common regional
approach to estimate watershed runoff is through the use of runoff
maps (Vogel et al., 1999). Results from this study shows the weighted
overlay analysis method in ArcGIS is one of the best techniques to map
different runoff regions. This study used the four source layers; rainfall,
potential evapotranspiration, soil class, and slope class map of the coun-
try, to classify the country into different hydrological zones. Five hydro-
logical zones (no runoff, low runoff, moderate runoff, high runoff and
very high runoff) were identified and mapped (Fig. 8). This analysis
also shows that 40.4% of the country lies in the high runoff zone, followed
by moderate and low runoff zone with 26.8% and 17.2% areal coverage,
respectively (Table 8). With this qualitative based classification, the
high runoff generation area of the country has large coverage, indicating
the availability of high surface water potential. Additionally, the results
showed that the runoff distribution in the western and central highlands
of the country is high and these areas flow to the Blue Nile River system.
Thus, the contribution of this work in the understanding the upper Blue
Nile River hydrologic system is significant.
29
4. Conclusion
This study was conducted with the objective of improving the spatial
soil database of the country for hydrologic studies. Improvement on spa-
tial scale and attributes of soil parameters for hydrological modeling was
considered. In addition, using spatial layers of rainfall, evapotranspira-
tion, slope and runoff generation, hydrological zones were generated
and characterized. Based on results of the study, it can be concluded
that the outputs of this study (i.e., the spatial soil database and hydrolog-
ical zones) for Ethiopia are of paramount of importance in understanding
and characterizing the country's land and water resource bases. The
advancement in recent years on the use of GIS and computer based hy-
drological models make it easier to compile the most essential soil pa-
rameters in a single spatial database with improved details and scale.
This is a step forward for a country striving to improve its hydrological
database to better understand its hydrologic systems. Results of this
study can be used as the basis for further analysis of the surface water
potential of the country, soil erosion rate and watershed degradation
susceptibility, which have significant contribution in the watershed
management effort of the country.
The use of ArcGIS weighted overlay analysis has shown very good
capability to achieve spatially distributed classification with the scale
factors and weights for each input layers qualitatively. The authors be-
lieve that this is a good starting point for further refining of the study
 Author's personal copy

30 B. Berhanu et al. / Catena 104 (2013) 21–31

Fig. 8. Hydrological zone map of Ethiopia.

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