Water, Food Security, and Climate Change in Africa - Edward R. Carr Department of Geography University of South Carolina
←
→
Page content transcription
If your browser does not render page correctly, please read the page content below
Water, Food Security, and Climate Change in Africa Edward R. Carr Department of Geography University of South Carolina
Representing Africa: Crisis narratives • ―Population growth will greatly increase the amount of food needed to adequately feed sub-Saharan Africa's people…Sub-Saharan Africa’s population is projected to more than double from 856 million today to about 2 billion in 2050‖ (Population Reference Bureau, Population and Food Security: Africa's Challenge) • More than one in four Africans — close to 218 million people in 2006–2008 — are undernourished, and food security is precarious. Until the situation improves, the lives, livelihoods and human development prospects of millions of Africans will remain at risk (Africa Human Development Report 2012, http://www.afhdr.org/AfHDR/documents/chapter1.pdf)
Water and Climate Change:
Complicating Crisis
• The ―looming threat of climate
change‖ (Making Development Climate
Resilient: A World Bank Strategy for Sub-
Saharan Africa World Bank, Sustainable
Development Department. 2009. p.xvii)
• Intersection with crisis
narratives
– Exacerbating existing stresses
• Majority of African livelihoods
are natural resource/climate
dependent
– Impacting the most vulnerableChallenging the Crisis Narrative: Think
about the evidence
• Crisis narratives reference very uncertain empirical observations
– IPCC AR5: main finding is that empirical observations of rainfall trends are
highly variable, even within sub-regions of Africa
• Crisis narratives reference very uncertain models
– No consensus among the 17 GCMs used in AR4 on the direction of
precipitation change in SSA
– GCMs work at global/regional scale, not local
• Better for temperature than precipitation
– To downscale requires local data
• Absence of empirical observational data
• FEWS-NET in East Africa
Our evidence for future crisis (or not) largely proceeds from
uncertain models populated by absent or contradictory empirical dataChallenging the Crisis Narrative: Think
about timescales
• Crisis narratives often reference 50-100 year
timelines
– By 2020–2049, an increase in mean annual maximum
temperature would reach 2.3°C under scenario B2 and
2.6°C under A2 in Sahel (Republic of Niger, 2009).
• The uncertainty in the models on this time horizon
is huge, even at global scales
– At the regional scale, uncertainty is tremendous
• Not effective for planningChallenging the Crisis Narrative: The
global poor aren’t stupid
• Most crisis narratives are predicated on static human/social responses
– Farmers adjust
– Expectations change Perhaps the most important
– Markets shift thing we can work on right now
– Technology changes
• Very poor understandings of events on the ground
– We simply don’t know what people are doing
– We know little about what drives livelihoods/adaptation decision-making
– WEIRD assumptions (white, educated, industrialized, rich, democractic)What is happening on the ground?
• Data we have is over-aggregated
– Most panel survey data is by household
– Single member reporting
• Hugely distorted resultsWhat we can’t see, we can’t address • Over-aggregated data obscures different vulnerabilities – National – Community – Household • Programs (inadvertently) pick winners and losers • Programs fail to address critical problems
Mali’s Agrometerological Program
• Established in 1982
– Government of Mali
– Swiss Cooperation
• Goal
– Improve agricultural
outcomes
• Deliver climate and weather
information to farmers
• Deliver agroecological
information
• Couple with local
extension/outreachMali’s Agrometerological Program
• Targeted five key crops
– Maize
– Millet
– Sorghum
– Peanuts
– Cotton
• Forecasts coupled with
ground truthing
– Localize
agrometeorological
advisoriesMali’s Agrometerological Program
• Targeted…farmers
– The audience was
generic
• Implicitly male
– The assumption was that
more information was
better
• Not much discussion of
how or for whoWater availability the largest problem for
junior men and senior women, third biggest
for junior
Variable women,
rainfall not a problem
not listed for senior
as a problem men
by anyone
Niagassoba
YM OM YW OW
Maize 2 1 1
Millet 2 1
Sorghum 2 1
Water
Variable
availability
rainfallsecond
the biggest
biggest
problem
problem for junior Peanuts 2
women, 3rd biggest
for senior men and forwomen,
senior men,
not anot
problem
a problem for Cotton
Chili;Pepper
junior
for junior
men ormensenior
andwomen.
women
Cowpea
Ginger 5 5
Lobogoula
Okra 1
YM OM YW OW Potatoes 4 5
Maize 2 2 2 2 Rice 1 2 1
Millet 2 4 Tiger;Nuts
Sorghum 2 4 2 2
Peanuts 4 2
Yamaco 5
Cotton 5
Chili;pepper 5
Cowpea 2
Ginger
Okra
Potatoes
Rice 2 2 2 2
Tiger;Nuts 5 5 2
YamacoWater availability not a problem for anyone
Variable rainfall is the biggest problem
for senior women, not a problem for
anyone else
Water availability is the 4th
Variable rainfall is for
biggest challenge thejunior
biggest
problem
women, notfor senior
a problemwomen,
for
the 2nd biggest
anyone else for junior
men, and not a problem for
anyone elseMali’s Agrometerological Program
• The challenges of social
research > the
challenges of climate
science
– Significant climate
science challenges
– Perfect science cannot
address imperfect
understandings of
vulnerabilityWhy are people doing what they do?
• To address
challenges/, we have
to explain their causes
– This requires time on
the ground
– This requires getting
beyond WEIRDVulnerability
Context (exposure)
Historical activities Problematization
Global markets
Livelihoods
Discourse Local markets
Local institutions Ethnic/cultural
Mobilization
Coercion
of Identity expectations
Historical
expectations
State laws Local markers of status
Livelihoods
OutcomesWater, Climate, and Food Security in Africa • We have limited capacity to see what is coming next • We still don’t fully understand the vulnerabilities at play now • We have little understanding of what people do to manage those vulnerabilities now – And why they are managed in that way
Water, Climate, and Food Security in
Africa
• Three options:
– Crawl into the fetal position, go into a different line of
work
– Plow ahead with uncertain/incorrect data and largely
incorrect assumptions about events on the ground
– Work aggressively on understanding and augmenting
what people do to manage vulnerability now
• The future is already hereYou can also read
