International Journal of Agriculture Extension and Social Development

Methods: Cross-sectional research design and descriptive data analysis was used. Diversion of software was used to analyze my data. Simple random sampling method was used to select the respondents. Descriptive statistics were employed for summarization and presentation of data.

Results: Khat chewing was most commonly practiced among male gender (66.3%), productive age group (82.5%), Orthodox Christians (56.3%), married (71.3%), uneducated (42.5%) and low-earned (62.5%) people. Majority of them initiated by peer pressure (52.5%) for academic good performance (23.75%) and continued the practice for religious purpose (12.5%) and family habit (6.25%) and other (5%). Just from the respondents (38.8%) chewed khat daily. Most khat chewers drank alcohol (50%) after chewing khat and coffee (20%), smoked cigarette (16.25%), soft drinks (8.75%) and others substance (5%) while practicing khat chewing. Majority of the respondents reported perceived economic effects. Half of khat chewers believed that they would plan to stop the practice in the future.

Conclusions: The community, especially youth, need to be aware of negative socio-economic consequences of khat chewing through designing educational strategies to bring behavioral change.