What role for local organisations in climate change adaptation? Insights from South Africa

Regional Environmental Change - With increasing funding directed towards climate change adaptation (CCA) in developing countries, there is a growing need to understand how this support is landing...     

Adapting to climate variability: Pumpkins, people and policy

Understanding of how best to support those most vulnerable to climate stress is imperative given expected changes in climate variability. This paper investigates local adaptation strategies to climate variability, focusing on agricultural decision‐making in a communal irrigation scheme in Vhembe District, Limpopo Province, South Africa. Research done through interviews, surveys and participatory methods demonstrates that adaptation strategies within a community are socially differentiated and present differing objectives and priorities. These results highlight the need for intervention and policy that support a heterogeneous response to a wide range of stresses. Evidence for climate change is clear and the need for adaptation is urgent. However, adaptation measures have to be sensitively integrated with ongoing development pathways to ensure they are sustainable and relevant to local priorities.     

How changing fire management policies affect fire seasonality and livelihoods

There is a long history of fire management in African savannas, but knowledge of historical and current use of fire is scarce in savanna-woodland biomes. This study explores past and present fire management practices and perceptions of the Khwe (former hunter-gatherers) and Mbukushu (agropastoralists) communities as well as government and non-government stakeholders in Bwabwata National Park in north-east Namibia. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were used in combination with satellite data (from 2000 to 2015), to investigate historical and current fire management dynamics. Results show that political dynamics in the region disrupted traditional fire practices, specifically a policy of fire suppression was initiated by colonial governments in 1888 and maintained during independence until 2005. Both the Khwe and Mbukushu communities use early season (i.e. between April and July) fires for diverse interrelated historical and current livelihood activities, and park management for managing late season fires. The Mbukushu community also use late season burns to prepare land for crops. In this study, we use a pyrogeographic framework to understand the human dimension of fires. This study reveals how today’s fire management practices and policies, specifically the resurgence of early season burning are entrenched in the past. Understanding and acknowledging the social and cultural dynamics of fire, alongside participatory stakeholder engagement is critical for managing fires in the future.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-020-01351-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Understanding vulnerability in southern Africa: comparative findings using a multiple-stressor approach in South Africa and Malawi

Within southern Africa, many households are facing increasing pressures as they deal with multiple challenges such as low employment, high levels of disease, environmental resources under pressure and changing political landscapes. To respond to the needs of different individuals and households, it is important to define the nature of their vulnerability. An increasing amount of theoretical and empirical work on the concept of ‘vulnerability’ has led to a range of definitions, indicators and measurement tools, which have come to characterise this field of study. As a result, there is no one general consensus. This paper presents the results from the latest in a series of applied studies conducted since 2004 by a network of scientists working in southern Africa, aimed at refining the definition and application of the concept of vulnerability. The study employed a recently developed multiple-stressor model to guide the collection and analysis of data from three sites in South Africa and Malawi. In this paper, we identify and explore five key ‘symptoms’ of vulnerability emerging from our multi-country data and reflect on the usefulness of the model employed.     

Vulnerability interventions in the context of multiple stressors: lessons from the Southern Africa Vulnerability Initiative (SAVI)

This paper describes an initiative to develop a model for understanding the multi-faceted nature and effects of vulnerability. The model is designed to enable analysis and assessment of interventions that address vulnerability, a concept that is widely used across disciplines and in development planning in Africa, particularly in southern Africa. The model is being developed to accommodate analyses of ‘multiple stressors’ and to identify the intersection and interaction of stressors in different contexts. Using three case studies related to vulnerability reduction and HIV/AIDS, we show how multiple processes interact and can influence the outcomes of vulnerability interventions in ways that may not be readily apparent when focusing on one stressor alone.