Soil erosion decreases soil fertility of the uplands and causes siltation of lakes and reservoirs; the lakes and reservoirs in tropical monsoonal African highlands are especially affected by sedimentation. Efforts in reducing loads by designing management practices are hampered by lack of quantitative data on the relationship of erosion in the watersheds and sediment accumulation on flood plains, lakes and reservoirs. The objective of this study is to develop a prototype quantitative method for estimating sediment budget for tropical monsoon lakes with limited observational data. Four watersheds in the Lake Tana basin were selected for this study. The Parameter Efficient Distributed (PED) model that has shown to perform well in the Ethiopian highlands is used to overcome the data limitations and recreate the missing sediment fluxes. PED model parameters are calibrated using daily discharge data and the occasionally collected sediment concentration when establishing the sediment rating curves for the major rivers. The calibrated model parameters are then used to predict the sediment budget for the 1994–2009 period. Sediment retained in the lake is determined from two bathymetric surveys taken 20 years apart whereas the sediment leaving the lake is calculated based on measured discharge and observed sediment concentrations. Results show that annually on average 34 t/ha/year of sediment is removed from the gauged part of the Lake Tana watersheds. Depending on the up-scaling method from the gauged to the ungauged part, 21 to 32 t/ha/year (equivalent to 24–38 Mt/year) is transported from the upland watersheds of which 46% to 65% is retained in the flood plains and 93% to 96% is trapped on the flood plains and in the lake. Thus, only 4–7% of all sediment produced in the watersheds leaves the Lake Tana Basin.
In response to the continually increasing sediment concentrations in rivers and lakes, the Ethiopian government is leading an effort where farmers are installing soil and water conservation measures to increase infiltration and reduce erosion. This paper reports on findings from a four year study in the 95 ha Debre Mawi watershed where under the government led conservation works, mainly terraces with infiltration furrows were installed halfway in the period of observation. The results show that runoff volume decreased significantly after installation of the soil and water conservation practices but sediment concentration decreased only marginally. Sediment loads were reduced mainly because of the reduced runoff. Infiltration furrows were effective on the hillsides where rain water could infiltrate, but on the flat bottom lands that become saturated with the progress of the monsoon rain, infiltration was restricted and conservation practices became conduits for carrying excess rainfall. This caused the initiation of gullies in several occasions in the saturated bottomlands. Sediment concentration at the outlet barely decreased due to entrainment of loose soil from unstable banks of gullies in the periodically saturated bottom areas. Since most uphill drainage were already half filled up with sediments after two years, long term benefits of reducing runoff can only be sustained with continuous maintenance of uphill infiltration furrows.