Pastoralism and Climate Change Adaptations

The sustainability of the pastoral mode of production in the face of the currently pressing phenomenon of global environmental change is a crucial policy issue in the development of African dryland areas. Pastoralism as a livelihood system is often regarded as having evolved into the most resilient adaptive land use strategy crafted by herder societies in response to long-term climatic variability in dryland environments. Nevertheless, the magnitude of the current problem appears to be well beyond the adaptive capacities of traditional pastoralist strategies and response mechanisms, as these capacities have been continuously undermined by detrimental non-climatic factors of economic and socio-political origin. The chapter examines the current and significant topic of global climate change in light of prevailing concerns regarding its potential adverse impacts on the sustainability of dryland pastoralism. It first briefly touches on the climate change-violent conflict nexus, a common concern in the context of dryland pastoral livelihood systems. Another important topic of discussion in this chapter is climate change adaptation in the context of pastoralism. We also emphasize the crucial point that the impact of global climate change on people in peripheral dryland environments should be considered alongside the influence of interacting non-climatic factors, including dynamic internal processes and misguided government interventions. All these are broadly discussed with a central focus on empirical evidence from Borana pastoralism. Over the last six decades, the Borana pastoral economy has been repeatedly hit by a series of crises, increasingly triggered by natural and human-made shocks. The adaptation response strategies of Borana pastoralists, some of which may have involved maladaptation, are detailed in the chapter, supported by robust statistical evidence from the region.