Climate volatility and poverty vulnerability in Tanzania

Climate models generally indicate that climate volatility may rise in the future, severely affecting agricultural productivity through greater frequency of yield-diminishing climate extremes, such as droughts. For Tanzania, where agricultural production is sensitive to climate, changes in climate volatility could have significant implications for poverty. This study assesses the vulnerability of Tanzania’s population to poverty to changes in climate variability between the late 20th century and early this century. Future climate scenarios with the largest increases in climate volatility are projected to make Tanzanians increasingly vulnerable to poverty through its impacts on the production of staple grains, with as many as 90,000 additional people, representing 0.26 percent of the population, entering poverty in the median case. Extreme poverty-increasing outcomes are also found to be greater in the future under certain climate scenarios. In the 20th century, the greatest predicted increase in poverty was equal to 880,000 people, while in the 21st century, the highest possible poverty increase was equal to 1.17 million people (approximately 3.4 percent of the population). The results suggest that the potential impacts of changes in climate volatility and climate extremes can be significant for poverty in Sub-Saharan African countries like Tanzania.