The potential effects of climate change on subsistence farmers’ wellbeing in tropical (sub)montane homegardens. A case study on Mount Kilimanjaro

Abstract

Tropical agroforestry systems support the wellbeing of millions of subsistence farmers. Owing to their ecosystem services, these agricultural systems are often advocated in government, policy, and literature as a potential adaptation to climate change measure despite emerging evidence that agroforestry systems could succumb to climate change. While the agroecological impacts of climate change on tropical agroforests are becoming increasingly apparent, few studies investigate the impacts on farmers’ wellbeing. This study empirically analyses how a potentially warmer and drier future climate could affect the wellbeing of subsistence farmers in a homegarden agroforestry system.

We employed a space-for-time climate analogue analysis approach based on the variation in altitude proxying for changes in climate on the lower southeast slopes of Mt Kilimanjaro to examine the climate effect on provisioning ecosystem services and farmers' wellbeing. To guide our study, we developed an interdisciplinary framework for understanding how changes in climate pressures can impact farmers within tropical agroforests by considering effects on the system's social and ecological components, ecosystem services, and farmers' wellbeing. A mixed-method approach was used to statistically analyse the variation in farming households' wellbeing in the homegardens and qualitatively understand the underlying mechanisms.

Overall, the change in climate conditions reduced the homegarden's natural capital stock, e.g., livestock fodder, and productivity, negatively affecting farmers' wellbeing. For example, farmers under the warmer and drier climate conditions were less likely to consume the three daily meals required for a good life (OR = 0.441, P < 0.05). Farmers who supplemented their homegarden crop production using dryland agriculture were less vulnerable to climate effects. However, this strategy relies on farmers' sustained access to expensive productive assets, i.e., agrochemicals and farmland, which could become challenging under climate change. Our findings are significant because 1) they indicate that farmers' wellbeing could decline under climate change, and 2) they evidence that tropical agroforestry systems can still be vulnerable to climate effects despite their advocacy in climate adaptation scholarship. We suggest that policymakers utilise current climate financing oppertunities to assist farmers in adapting their homegarden to climate change, for example, by establishing climate-resilient fodder and crops.