Impacts of Climate Change on Food Security: A Literature Review in Sub Saharan Africa

Abstract

Background: In Sub Saharan African countries, fast GDP growth has created a great opportunity to improve developmental indicators including food security but showed only limited improvements. There is scientific consensus on the climate change and expected to have substantial impact on food security significantly. Therefore, it is recommended new advocacy and public health movement to reduce the effect of climate change on food security and malnutrition. So this literature review is used to assess the impacts of climate change on food security in Sub-Saharan Africa. Methods: A literature review was conducted from different sources using a Google scholar searching strategy that are written within 10 years period in English language. Result: Documents related to impacts of climate change on food security were reviewed. Literatures indicate climate components like temperature, precipitation, CO2 concentration and extreme climate events have an effect on food security components. Sub Saharan Africa is one of the most severely affected regions to climate change where most of the population is dependent on climate sensitive economic activities. The most direct effect and well researched component of climate change on food security is food availability by reducing net crop production. It is also found that climate change has an impact on food accessibility and utilization but not well studied due to its complexity. Projections indicate that this problem will be more severe in the future than today unless climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies are done. Conclusion: This review concludes that climatic conditions are changing in SSA countries and is affecting food availability, food accessibility and utilization. The problem will be severe in the future unless the current adaptation and mitigation efforts do not improve. Therefore to reduce the problem, the region should use its potential to adopt climate change.