内容摘要：Griffin Technology could not be reached for comment. Union Computer Supplies Limited did not respond to a request for comment.

Griffin Technology could not be reached for comment. Union Computer Supplies Limited did not respond to a request for comment.

Ethiopia is thought to host about one-fifth of the world’s population of donkeys.Ethiopia is believed to host the world’s largest population of donkeys – one in five of the global total, according to the United Nations.

The humble donkey is a cornerstone of the national economy, and the Donkey Sanctuary – a free clinic run by a British charity – is crucial in Addis Ababa. Set near Merkato, the city’s sprawling open-air market, it provides care for animals that are often indispensable to their owners’ livelihoods.Several dozen donkeys stand in enclosures at the clinic – some agitatedly kicking their legs, others hungrily tucking into their food. Caregivers and veterinarians move from animal to animal, treating a range of ailments including injuries, colic and eye conditions.Among them is Guluma Bayi, 38, who had walked more than an hour and a half, leading his two donkeys to the clinic.

“It has been three weeks since my donkeys became sick,” said Guluma. “One has a leg problem and the other has a stomach issue.”Like many, Guluma depends on his donkeys for his livelihood, using them to transport jerrycans of water for sale in his community.

“After they became ill, I couldn’t buy bread for my children,” he said. “I begged a guy to bring me here.”

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, Ethiopia was home to some nine million donkeys as of 2018. In this East African nation of approximately 130 million people, donkeys play a chief economic role, ploughing fields and transporting goods – offering a low-cost alternative to vehicles at a time when the price of fuel has soared.The LRD buys seed varieties from the Coffee Board for farmers, and growers make more money than before.

Limakumzak Walling, a 40-year-old farmer, recalled how his late father was one of the first to grow Arabica coffee in 1981 on a two-acre farm on their ancestral land in Mokokchung district’s Khar village. “During my father’s time, they used to cultivate it, but people didn’t find the market,” he said. “It was more of a burden than a bonus.”Before the Nagaland government took charge of coffee development, the Coffee Board would buy produce from farmers and sell it to buyers or auction it in their headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka. But the payments, said Walling, would be made in instalments over a year, sometimes two. Since he took over the farm, and the state department became the nodal agency, payments are not only higher but paid upfront with buyers directly procuring from the farmers.

Still, profits aren’t huge. Walling makes less than 200,000 rupees per annum (roughly $2,300) and like most farmers, is still engaged in jhum cultivation, the traditional slash-and-burn method of farming practised by Indigenous tribes in northeastern hills. With erratic weather patterns and decreasing soil fertility in recent decades, intensified land use in jhum cultivation has been known to lead to further environmental degradation and greenhouse gas emissions, exacerbating climate change.“Trees are drying up and so is the mountain spring water,” Walling told Al Jazeera, pointing at the evergreen woods where spring leaves were already wilting in March, well before the formal arrival of summer. “Infestation is also a major issue and we don’t use even organic fertilisers because we are scared of spoiling our land,” he added.