Abstract
The mixed crop–livestock system is a primary source of livelihood in developing countries. Erratic climate changes are severely affecting the livelihoods of people who depend upon mixed crop–livestock production. By employing the livelihood vulnerability index (LVI), the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change LVI (LVIIPCC), and the livelihood effect index (LEI), this study evaluated livelihood vulnerability in southern Punjab, Pakistan. The study provides a range of indicators for national and local policy makers to improve resilience in the face of livelihood vulnerability. By incorporating more major components and subcomponents, this study identifies more specific challenges of livelihood vulnerability for future policy directions. It is interesting to find that credit and cash used for crop inputs are critical financial constraints for farmers. From the estimated indicators, this study also provides some specific policy recommendations for the four study districts of Punjab Province. These results are helpful in identifying and highlighting vulnerability determinants and indicators. Initiating and promoting better adaptive capacity and starting resilience projects for households are urgent actions required by donors and governments to reduce the livelihood vulnerability of mixed crop–livestock households in arid and semiarid areas.
Highlights
Climate change has exerted an adverse impact on mixed crop–livestock production systems and has become a global challenge, increasing the vulnerability of people who are involved in these systems
Measurements were performed under 3 types of sets: (i) calculation of livelihood vulnerability index (LVI) through balanced weight average, (ii) estimation of LVI based on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [3], and (iii) calculation of livelihood effect index (LEI)
Our results show that women are less involved in performing agricultural activities, especially in Multan district; MLT is found to be more vulnerable in terms of social network, which makes it more vulnerable in terms of climate change adaptation, social capital, natural capital, and finance and income due to women’s role as head of household (Table 5, Figure 5)
Summary
Climate change has exerted an adverse impact on mixed crop–livestock production systems and has become a global challenge, increasing the vulnerability of people who are involved in these systems. The agriculture sector is the most vulnerable and sensitive to climate change [7,8,9]. This is even worse in developing countries, poor and agrarian communities, where people’s livelihoods depend upon mixed crop–livestock production [10,11]. This is mainly due to the limited adaptation measures in production resources [8,12,13,14,15,16]. Climate change poses more serious challenges to local economic, social, and ecological systems [17,18]
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