| 1. |
- Brogaard, Sara, et al.
(author)
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Scaling up social capital - A prerequisite for community based adaptation in the Lake Victoria basin?
- 2010
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Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The capacity of communities to reduce negative impacts of climate change on their lives and livelihoods is a function of socio-economic conditions, infrastructure, government accountability and institutional responsiveness and not the least social capital. Africa’s most densely populated region, the Lake Victoria basin (LVB), home to over 30 million people, is one example of a likely future climate change hotspot where the low inherent adaptive capacity of the rural population can be traced to the combination of low asset stock of natural, physical, financial and human capitals, and institutions poor or even non-existing in responding to high climate vulnerability. This leaves social capital as one key asset to invest in. Based on empirical data from Nyanza, Kenya and Mara, Tanzania, using a multi-stakeholder approach, this paper will examine the importance and possibilities of bridging and linking social capital within and between actors in the LVB to initiate and facilitate community based adaptation.
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| 2. |
- Gabrielsson, Sara, et al.
(author)
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Living without buffers-illustrating climate vulnerability in the Lake Victoria basin
- 2013
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In: Sustainability Science. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1862-4057 .- 1862-4065. ; 8:2, s. 143-157
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity are essential, albeit theoretically vague, components of climate vulnerability. This has triggered debate surrounding how these factors can be translated into, and understood in, an empirical context subject to present and future harm. In this article, which draws on extensive fieldwork in the Lake Victoria Basin of Kenya and Tanzania, we illustrate how exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity play out in the context of climate vulnerability and discuss how they interact in situ. Using a mixed methods approach including survey data, rainfall data and a suite of participatory methods, such as focus groups and interactive mapping of seasonal calendars, we identify how climate-induced stressors affect smallholder farmers' well-being and natural resources. Drawing on the seasonal calendar as a heuristic, and climate vulnerability terminology, we illustrate when, where and how these climate-induced stressors converge to constrain farmers' livelihoods. Our analysis indicates that farmers in the basin face a highly uncertain future with discernible, but differentiated, adaptation deficits due to recurring, and potentially worsening, patterns of hardship.
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| 3. |
- Gabrielsson, Sara, et al.
(author)
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Seasonal pattern of climate vulnerability and adaptation in the Lake Victoria basin – Identifying needs and opportunities using a multi-stakeholder approach. The American Association for the Advancement of Science, Annual Conference, San Diego
- 2010
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Conference paper (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Important factors behind high levels of vulnerability and low adaptive capacity to climate variability and change in the developing world are direct reliance on natural resources, poverty and limited abilities to adapt financially and institutionally. In this study, focusing on the Lake Victoria Basin, a multitude of stressors on livelihoods, including climate related factors, are faced by the rural communities. The aim of the study is to disclose the annual pattern of these combined stressors, under both typical as well as more extreme climate conditions in order to reveal periods of particular hardship as well as recovery in the studied communities in Kenya and Tanzania. Data has primarily been collected through focus group interactions around seasonal calendars during fieldwork in September 2009 and a regional stakeholder meeting planned for January 2010. Key themes of the calendars consisted of climate and health patterns, agricultural and animal husbandry activities, on- and off-farm household incomes as well expenditures. A considerable increase in adaptive capacity was found among those farmers involved in formalized village groups based on their pooling of labor and assets, agro-forestry activities, and the village savings and loans. The planned stakeholder meeting aims at exploring important local to national links that can strengthen existing adaptation and identify new cooperation possibilities.
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| 4. |
- Andersson, Elina, et al.
(author)
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'Because of poverty, we had to come together': collective action for improved food security in rural Kenya and Uganda
- 2012
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In: International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1473-5903 .- 1747-762X. ; 10:3, s. 245-262
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Agricultural productivity in East African smallholder systems is notoriously low and food production faces multiple challenges, including soil degradation, decreasing land availability, poor market integration, disease burdens and climate change impacts. However, recent evidence from an in-depth study from two sites in Kenya and Uganda shows signs of new social dynamics as a response to these multiple stressors. This paper focuses on the emergence of local social institutions for collective action, in which particularly women farmers organize themselves. Although previous research on collective action has largely focused on common-pool resource management, we argue that collective action is one potential pathway to livelihood and sustainability improvements also in a setting of private land ownership. Trust building, awareness raising and actions to improve livelihood security through risk sharing and pooling of labour and other limited assets have given people more time and resources available for diversification, preventative activities, experimentation and resource conservation. It thereby strengthens farmers' capacity to cope with and adapt to change, as well as contributes to the agency at the local level.
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| 5. |
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| 6. |
- Gabrielsson, Sara
(author)
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Uncertain Futures : Adaptive capacities to climate variability and change in the Lake Victoria Basin
- 2012
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Doctoral thesis (other academic/artistic)abstract
- The Lake Victoria basin (LVB) in East Africa can be considered a climate change hotspot because of its large rural population dependent on rain-fed farming. Drawing on extensive fieldwork (2007-2011) in rural communities along the shores of Lake Victoria in Kenya and Tanzania, I explore adaptive capacities to climate variability and change and discuss how they interrelate in situ. Using multiple methods, tools and techniques, including survey and rainfall data, individual and group interviews, interactive mapping of seasonal calendars and a multi-stakeholder workshop, I locate the place-based effects and responses to a number of converging climate induced stressors on smallholder farmers’ wellbeing and natural resources. Research findings show that adaptive capacities to climate variability and change in the LVB are complex, dynamic and characterized by high location-specificity, thereby signifying the value of using an integrative and place-based approach to understand climate vulnerability. Specifically, the study demonstrates how increased unpredictability in rainfall causes chronic livelihood stress illustrated by recurring and worsening periods of food insecurity, growing cash dependency and heavy disease burdens. The study also reveals that food and income buffers increase when and where farmers, particularly women farmers, collectively respond to climate induced stressors through deliberate strategies rooted in a culture of saving and planning. Nevertheless, the study concludes that smallholders in the LVB are facing a highly uncertain future with discernible, yet differentiated adaptation deficits, due to chronic livelihood stress driven by unequal access to fundamental adaptive capacities such as land, health, cash and collective networks.
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| 7. |
- Gabrielsson, Sara, et al.
(author)
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Widows: agents of change in a climate of water uncertainty
- 2013
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In: Journal of Cleaner Production. - : Elsevier BV. - 0959-6526. ; 60, s. 34-42
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The African continent has been severely affected by the HIV and AIDS pandemic and as a consequence, development is being obstructed. Agriculture and food production systems are changing as a result of the burden of the pandemic. Many farming families are experiencing trauma from morbidity and mortality as well as facing labour losses and exhaustion. To further exacerbate the situation, climate variability and change reduce the available water supply for domestic and productive uses. This article describes how these multiple stressors play out in Nyanza province in Western Kenya and explores livelihood responses to water stress in Onjiko location, Nyanza. In this community, widows and divorced women affected by HIV and AIDS have become agents of positive change. Data from local surveys (2007), mapping of seasonal calendars (September 2009) and numerous focus group meetings and interviews with women in Onjiko (October 2008, January 2010, January 2011), reveal that despite a negative fall-back position, widows are improving their households' water and food security. This adaptation and even mitigation to some of the experienced climate impacts are emerging from their new activities in a setting of changing conditions. In the capacity of main livelihood providers, widows are gaining increased decision making and bargaining power. As such they can invest in sustainable innovations like rain water harvesting systems and agroforestry. Throughout, they worlc together in formalized groups of collective action that capitalize on the pooling of natural and human resources as well as planned financial management during hardship periods. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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