IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/climat/v161y2020i3d10.1007_s10584-020-02696-4.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Propensity to adapt to climate change: insights from pastoralist and agro-pastoralist households of Laikipia County, Kenya

Author

Listed:
  • Teresiah Wairimu Ng’ang’a

    (University of Nairobi
    Landscapes Governance Theme, World Agroforestry (ICRAF), United Nations Avenue)

  • Jeanne Y. Coulibaly

    (World Bank)

  • Todd A. Crane

    (Sustainable Livestock Systems, International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI))

  • Charles K. Gachene

    (University of Nairobi)

  • Geoffrey Kironchi

    (University of Nairobi)

Abstract

Climate change is a reality in Africa’s drylands. Pastoralists are engaging and embracing a range of adaptive strategies to adjust to these changes. The socioeconomic factors driving them to engage in a portfolio of multiple adaptation strategies have not been adequately addressed in the existing literature. A multivariate probit model was used to analyze them as determinants of adaptive capacity that promotes or hinders adaptation to climate change. Adaptation is represented by uptake of multiple strategies (irrigation, livestock migration, fodder production, and improved livestock breeds) by households, a demonstration of a household’s ability to diversify and adapt to the effects of climate change. The household asset base, particularly social capital represented by government assistance, stands out as it positively influenced by the uptake of four out of five adaptation strategies; that is, irrigation, livestock manure, fodder production, and improved breeds. Information heavily supports the adaptation process as it influenced all the five adaptation strategies analyzed but has a heterogeneous effect, supporting households to either adopt or reject a strategy. Crop-based information positively determines uptake of yield-enhancing strategies while relevant information for livestock activities contributes to the uptake of livestock-based strategies. These findings suggest that mainstreaming agricultural innovations, building a household asset base, and facilitating access to agronomic and climatic information will enable dryland communities to better adapt to climate change.

Suggested Citation

  • Teresiah Wairimu Ng’ang’a & Jeanne Y. Coulibaly & Todd A. Crane & Charles K. Gachene & Geoffrey Kironchi, 2020. "Propensity to adapt to climate change: insights from pastoralist and agro-pastoralist households of Laikipia County, Kenya," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 161(3), pages 393-413, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:161:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-020-02696-4
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02696-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-020-02696-4
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10584-020-02696-4?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Samuel Mburu & Steffen Otterbach & Alfonso Sousa-Poza & Andrew Mude, 2017. "Income and Asset Poverty among Pastoralists in Northern Kenya," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(6), pages 971-986, June.
    2. Muhammad Ashraf & Jayant Routray & Muhammad Saeed, 2014. "Determinants of farmers’ choice of coping and adaptation measures to the drought hazard in northwest Balochistan, Pakistan," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 73(3), pages 1451-1473, September.
    3. Asfaw, Solomon & McCarthy, Nancy & Lipper, Leslie & Arslan, Aslihan & Cattaneo, Andrea & Kachulu, Mutie, 2014. "Climate variability, adaptation strategies and food security in Malawi," ESA Working Papers 288980, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Agricultural Development Economics Division (ESA).
    4. Mwangi, Esther, 2006. "The footprints of history: path dependence in the transformation of property rights in Kenya's Maasailand," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 2(2), pages 157-180, August.
    5. W. Neil Adger, 2003. "Social Capital, Collective Action, and Adaptation to Climate Change," Economic Geography, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 79(4), pages 387-404, October.
    6. Paul Collier & Gordon Conway & Tony Venables, 2008. "Climate change and Africa," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 24(2), pages 337-353, Summer.
    7. Donald Kgathi & Barbara Ngwenya & Julie Wilk, 2007. "Shocks and rural livelihoods in the Okavango Delta, Botswana," Development Southern Africa, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 289-308.
    8. Oecd, 2009. "Climate Change and Africa," OECD Journal: General Papers, OECD Publishing, vol. 2009(1), pages 5-35.
    9. Ndambiri, Hilary K. & Ritho, Cecilia N. & Mbogoh, Stephen G., 2013. "An Evaluation Of Farmers’ Perceptions Of And Adaptation To The Effects Of Climate Change In Kenya," International Journal of Food and Agricultural Economics (IJFAEC), Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, Department of Economics and Finance, vol. 1(1), pages 1-22, July.
    10. Gbetibouo, Glwadys Aymone, 2009. "Understanding farmers' perceptions and adaptations to climate change and variability: The case of the Limpopo Basin, South Africa," IFPRI discussion papers 849, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    11. Roncoli, Carla & Okoba, Barrack & Gathaara, Violet & Ngugi, Jane & Nganga, Teresiah, 2010. "Adaptation to climate change for smallholder agriculture in Kenya: Community-based perspectives from five districts," Project notes 2, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    12. Gerardo Damonte & Sandra Rodríguez, "undated". "Collective Land Tenure Regimes and Vulnerability Reduction in Pastoralist Societies of the Andean Altiplano," Boletín Análisis & Propuesta y:2016:i:31:p:1-4, Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jennifer Cole & Mutiat A. Adetona & Afisu Basiru & Wasiu A. Jimoh & Somrat Abdulsalami & Rodhiat O. Ade-Yusuf & Karimat A. Babalola & Victoria O. Adetunji & Akeem O. Ahmed & Ismail A. Adeyemo & Abiola, 2024. "Climate Change, Land Use, and the Decline in Traditional Fulani Cattle Practices: Drivers of Antimicrobial Resistance in Kwara, Nigeria," Challenges, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-19, October.
    2. William Mun & Erica Garroutte & Iyabo Obasanjo, 2023. "Rising Temperature and the Spatiotemporal Patterns of Foot and Mouth Disease of Livestock in Mongolia," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(8), pages 1-13, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alejandro del Pozo & Nidia Brunel-Saldias & Alejandra Engler & Samuel Ortega-Farias & Cesar Acevedo-Opazo & Gustavo A. Lobos & Roberto Jara-Rojas & Marco A. Molina-Montenegro, 2019. "Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Strategies of Agriculture in Mediterranean-Climate Regions (MCRs)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-16, May.
    2. Bryan, Elizabeth & Behrman, Julia A., 2013. "Community–based adaptation to climate change: A theoretical framework, overview of key issues and discussion of gender differentiated priorities and participation," CAPRi working papers 109, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    3. Kahsay, Goytom Abraha & Hansen, Lars Gårn, 2016. "The effect of climate change and adaptation policy on agricultural production in Eastern Africa," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 54-64.
    4. Abid Hussain & Golam Rasul & Bidhubhusan Mahapatra & Shahriar Wahid & Sabarnee Tuladhar, 2018. "Climate change-induced hazards and local adaptations in agriculture: a study from Koshi River Basin, Nepal," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 91(3), pages 1365-1383, April.
    5. Thennakoon, Jayanthi & Findlay, Christopher & Huang, Jikun & Wang, Jinxia, 2020. "Management adaptation to flood in Guangdong Province in China: Do property rights Matter?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    6. Seydou Zakari & Germaine Ibro & Bokar Moussa & Tahirou Abdoulaye, 2022. "Adaptation Strategies to Climate Change and Impacts on Household Income and Food Security: Evidence from Sahelian Region of Niger," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-18, March.
    7. Justus Ochieng & Lilian Kirimi & Joyce Makau, 2017. "Adapting to climate variability and change in rural Kenya: farmer perceptions, strategies and climate trends," Natural Resources Forum, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(4), pages 195-208, November.
    8. Alistair Munro, 2020. "Using experimental manipulation of questionnaire design and a Kenyan panel to test for the reliability of reported perceptions of climate change and adaptation," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 162(3), pages 1081-1105, October.
    9. Daniela Salite, 2019. "Explaining the uncertainty: understanding small-scale farmers’ cultural beliefs and reasoning of drought causes in Gaza Province, Southern Mozambique," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 36(3), pages 427-441, September.
    10. Maryam Aslany & Shannon Brincat, 2021. "Class and climate‐change adaptation in rural India: Beyond community‐based adaptation models," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 571-582, May.
    11. Popular Gentle & Rik Thwaites & Digby Race & Kim Alexander & Tek Maraseni, 2018. "Household and community responses to impacts of climate change in the rural hills of Nepal," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 147(1), pages 267-282, March.
    12. Shiva Salehi & Ali Ardalan & Gholamreza Garmaroudi & Abbas Ostadtaghizadeh & Abbas Rahimiforoushani & Armin Zareiyan, 2019. "Climate change adaptation: a systematic review on domains and indicators," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 96(1), pages 521-550, March.
    13. Wolfram Laube & Benjamin Schraven & Martha Awo, 2012. "Smallholder adaptation to climate change: dynamics and limits in Northern Ghana," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 111(3), pages 753-774, April.
    14. Dilshad Ahmad & Mohammad Afzal & Abdur Rauf, 2021. "Farmers’ adaptation decisions to landslides and flash floods in the mountainous region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa of Pakistan," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(6), pages 8573-8600, June.
    15. Asfaw, Solomon & Scognamillo, Antonio & Caprera, Gloria Di & Sitko, Nicholas & Ignaciuk, Adriana, 2019. "Heterogeneous impact of livelihood diversification on household welfare: Cross-country evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 278-295.
    16. Stuart Bryce Capstick, 2013. "Public Understanding of Climate Change as a Social Dilemma," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 5(8), pages 1-18, August.
    17. Jane Kabubo-Mariara & Richard Mulwa, 2019. "Adaptation to climate change and climate variability and its implications for household food security in Kenya," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 11(6), pages 1289-1304, December.
    18. Dian Spear & Angela Chappel, 2018. "Livelihoods on the Edge without a Safety Net: The Case of Smallholder Crop Farming in North-Central Namibia," Land, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-11, June.
    19. Aisha Dasgupta & Angela Baschieri, 2010. "Vulnerability to climate change in rural Ghana: Mainstreaming climate change in poverty-reduction strategies," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(6), pages 803-820.
    20. Fahad, Shah & Wang, Jianling, 2018. "Farmers’ risk perception, vulnerability, and adaptation to climate change in rural Pakistan," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 301-309.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:161:y:2020:i:3:d:10.1007_s10584-020-02696-4. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.