Assessment of Vulnerability of Pastoralists to the Adverse Impacts of Climate Change: a Case Study of West Pokot County, Kenya

Abstract

The IPCC report of 2017 noted that climate change is expected to worsen the existing vulnerabilities of natural resource-dependent communities while at the same time imposing new risks beyond the range of existing experiences. This study examined how vulnerable pastoralists are to the adverse impacts of climate change by analyzing climate variables (temperature as well as rainfall) and the characteristics of pastoralists that reflect their exposure, sensitivity as well as adaptive capacity based the definition of vulnerability as a function of high level of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. The study sought to examine the spatial-temporal variability of climate, determine the characteristics of pastoralists and their vulnerability, and evaluates the existing adaptation and mitigation strategies of pastoralists from West Pokot County. The spatial-temporal variability of climate in West Pokot County was determined using trend and seasonal analysis of data for temperature and rainfall from climate hazard infrared temperature station data (CHIRTS) and climate hazard infrared precipitation station data (CHIRPS) for the period of 1981-2019. Questionnaires were administered to households to determine the characteristics of pastoralists in west Pokot County and the existing adaptation and mitigation mechanisms. The findings show that temperature was increasing in the county but at different rates in different sub counties with Pokot Central Sub County having significant increasing trend followed by Pokot North Sub County during October-November-December (OND) season. On the other hand, rainfall showed a partial increasing trend both in OND and (March-April-May) seasons. The study revealed that the pastoralists in west Pokot were mainly characterized by high level of illiteracy (66.7%), their main source of income coming from livestock (56.0%), their main occupation being livestock keeping (72.9%), higher household size ranged from 6-10 members (58.5%) and low monthly income ranged from Ksh. 1,000 to Ksh. 5000 (52.2%). These livelihood characteristics of pastoralists revealed that pastoralists were seriously exposed to climate change effects with high sensitivity to the negative consequences since it interferes with their only livelihood. Low literacy levels and the low level of monthly income indicated that those pastoralists were having low adaptive capacity. Pokot central was the most exposed community to climate change effects followed by Pokot north Sub County. The frequency of droughts in these sub counties had a yearly increasing impact where majority of the respondents (77.6%) reported that they had experienced yearly increasing death of animals as a major effect to their livelihoods because they felt that death of animals deprived them the main source of income. The coping mechanisms employed by vi

pastoralists west Pokot County included; migration (58.6%), cutting of tree leaves (23.2%), Paddocking (1.7%) Livestock off-take (1.4%) and reserving grazing lands (6.8%). Migration as a coping mechanism was not sustainable and cutting of trees was not environmentally friendly as it destroyed the forest cover which could help sequestrate carbon (iv) oxide. Pastoralists opted to these coping strategies not because they were the best but as a desperate move, having no other option. Recommendations for study included Diversifications of livelihoods to enhance pastoralists’ resilience to climate change shocks in West Pokot County, more resilience interventions such as increasing irrigation schemes be implemented in Pokot central and other pastoral livelihoods areas of similar characteristics, capacity building of pastoralist to embrace climate smart livestock rearing and livestock breed diversification in order to build their resilience to climate extremes shocks