Basketo special woreda

Basketo is the name of one of the woreda of the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples' Region (SNNPR) of Ethiopia, named after its inhabitants, the Basketo people. Because Basketo is not part of any administrative "Zone" in the SNNPR, it is considered a "Special District" -- an administrative subdivision which is similar to an autonomous area.

The administrative center is Laska; other rural administrative centres include Donka, Saattsa, Zabba, Mandit, Obc'a, Bunibas, Gaara etc.

Basketo is bordered in the south and west by the Debub (South) Omo Zone, and in the north and east by the Gamo Gofa Zone. Rivers in this woreda include the Berso and the Zenti.

Food crops include enset, sweet potatoes, yams, taro, maize and horse beans, while coffee and the cardamom-like spice aframomum corrorima are significant cash crops. According to a 2004 report, Basketo had 27 kilometers of all-weather roads and 180 kilometers of dry-weather roads, for an average road density of 1803 kilometers per 1000 square kilometers.

Originally Basketo was part of the Semien (North) Omo Zone, and the 1994 national census counted its inhabitants as part of that Zone. However friction between the various ethnic groups in this Zone, which was often blamed on the Welayta for "ethnic chauvinism" and despite the efforts of the ruling party to emphasize the need to co-ordinate, consolidate, and unify the smaller ethnic units to achieve the "efficient use of scarce government resources", eventually led to the division of the Zone in 2000, and reorganizing Basketo as a special woreda.

Basketo was selected by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in 2004 as one of several woredas for voluntary resettlement for farmers from overpopulated areas, becoming the new home for a total of 7,000 heads of households and 28,000 total family members.

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