Analysis of Smallholders’ Livelihood Vulnerability to Drought across Agroecology and Farm Typology in the Upper Awash Sub-Basin, Ethiopia

Husen Maru,Tesfaye Zeleke,Befikadu Esayas,Amare Haileslassie

doi:10.3390/su13179764

Abstract

Assessing the magnitude of smallholder farmers’ livelihood vulnerability to drought is an initial step in identifying the causal factors and proposing interventions that mitigate the impacts of drought. This study aimed to assess smallholders’ livelihood vulnerability to the drought in the upper Awash sub-basin, Ethiopia. Household (HH) and climate data were used for indicators related to sensitivity, exposure, and adaptive capacity that define vulnerability to drought. The vulnerability of farmers’ livelihood to drought was compared among the studies agroecological zone (AEZ) and farm typologies. The result illustrated a diverse magnitude of vulnerability index (VI) ranging from −1.956 to −4.253 for AEZ. The highest magnitude of VI was estimated for livelihood in the lowland AEZ, while the lowest magnitude of VI was estimated in midland AEZ. This could be accounted for by the fact that lowland farmers shown the highest exposure (0.432) and sensitivity (0.420) and the lowest adaptive capacity (0.288). A closer look at farmers’ livelihood typology, in each of the AEZ, showed substantial diversity of farmers’ livelihood vulnerability to drought, implying potential aggregations at AEZ. Accordingly, the vulnerability index for livestock and on-farm-income-based livelihood and marginal and off-farm-income-based livelihood typologies were higher than the intensive-irrigation-farming-based smallholders’ livelihood typology. Based on the result, we concluded that procedures for smallholders’ livelihood resilience-building efforts should better target AEZ to prioritize the focus region and farmers’ livelihood typology to tailor technologies to farms. Although the result emphasizes the importance of irrigation-based livelihood strategy, the overall enhancement of farmers adaptive capacity needs to focus on action areas such as reducing the sensitivity and exposure of the households, improving farmers usage of technologies, diversify farmers’ livelihood options, and, hence, long-term wealth accumulation to strengthen farmers’ adaptive capacity toward drought impacts.

Highlights

IntroductionClimate change is an occurring phenomenon that is constantly affecting livelihoods, especially in developing countries where the livelihood of smallholder farmers depends on subsistence agriculture [1,2,3]
The core components that contributed to the high score of exposure were related to drought risks and the impacts of long-term climate change
At the scale of farm typology, the vast majority of the households in the sub-basin who are in livestock and on-farm-income-based livelihood typology were more sensitive to drought, compared to the intensive-irrigation-farming-based farmers

Summary

Introduction

Climate change is an occurring phenomenon that is constantly affecting livelihoods, especially in developing countries where the livelihood of smallholder farmers depends on subsistence agriculture [1,2,3]. Smallholder farmers’ livelihood vulnerability to climate change ( drought) stems both from their geographic location in the tropical regions and the difference in socioeconomic and policy trends that limit their adaptive capacity to the changing climate [4]. Farmers who depend solely on the naturally available rainfall for crop and livestock production are among the most vulnerable to the impacts of Sustainability 2021, 13, 9764. Sustainability 2021, 13, 9764 climate change [5]. A household-level drought vulnerability analysis will help to understand livelihood challenges, as well as alternative mitigation and adaptation measures [6]

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Conclusion