Maize farming in resettlement areas of Chirumanzu District of Zimbabwe is vulnerable to climatic variations. The Government of Zimbabwe encourages maize farmers in resettlement areas to adapt to climate variability through conservation farming and diversification among other measures. It is envisaged that the measures will improve maize farmers’ resilience and ability to safeguard food and nutrition security in the country. However, the process of adaptation is dynamic, complex, and multifaceted in nature. Several problems and dangers accompany the process of adaptation. The problems and dangers are associated with intangible and indirect costs. The focus of this chapter is to explore intangible and indirect costs associated with measures adopted by maize farmers in resettlement areas of Chirumanzu in Zimbabwe. Fifty-four maize farmers from four resettlement wards provided the data through semi-structured interviews. Diversification, changing planting dates, use of drought tolerant varieties were some of the measures adopted. Several problems and dangers accompanied the adaptation measures adopted. Intangible costs such as pain and suffering, embarrassment, ridicule, and stereotyping were experienced. Indirect costs including additional and unplanned costs were also encountered. This chapter concludes that intangible and indirect costs associated with adaptation may result in reduced adaptive capacity and resilience of maize farmers. Therefore, national governments should exercise extreme caution and desist from only encouraging farmers to adapt. Rather, they should consider intangible and indirect costs involved while providing solutions to reduce them to avoid situations where farmers are worse off while facilitating sustainable adaptation.
Evidence is unequivocal that rural and urban areas in South Africa are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change; however, impacts are felt disproportionately. This difference in vulnerability between rural and urban areas is presently unclear to guide context-based climate policies and frameworks to enhance adaptation processes. A clear understanding of the differences in vulnerability to climate change between rural and urban areas is pertinent. This systematic review aimed to explore how vulnerability to climate change varies between rural and urban areas and what explains these variations. The approach was guided by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vulnerability framework incorporating exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity dimensions integrated into the Sustainable Livelihood Framework. The review used 30 articles based on the search criteria developed. The findings show differences in vulnerability to climate change between rural and urban areas owing to several factors that distinguish rural from urban areas, such as differences in climate change drivers, infrastructure orientation, typical livelihood, and income-generating activities. We conclude that vulnerability varies with location and requires place-based analyses. Instead of blanket policy recommendations, localized interventions that enhance adaptation in specific rural and urban areas should be promoted.
Adaptation reduces the harmful effects of climate change. Nonetheless, the process of adaptation is associated with costs. If these costs are not managed accordingly, they have the potential to deter adaptation thereby impacting on its sustainability. Estimating adaptation costs to climate change provides vital information for decision-making among resource constrained smallholder maize farmers and enhances sustainable adaptation. However, there is no method for estimating adaptation costs that caters for the needs of smallholder maize farmers. Therefore, it was imperative to develop a context-specific tool for estimating adaptation costs for smallholder maize farmers using a bottom-up approach. Principles of quantification of theoretical constructs including conceptualization, operationalisation and attribute development were adopted in developing the tool for estimating adaptation costs to climate change. The tool is composed of three evaluation tools and three adaptation costs equations for the pre-, during- and post-adaptation phases, a total adaptation costs equation and a Summated Rating Scale for sustainability of adaptation activities. The tool is user-friendly, relatively easy to use, can be interpreted easily and modified to suit different smallholder farmers. It is hoped that the tool will assist smallholder maize farmers to consider all factors of critical importance before implementing adaptation plans and ensure reduced adaptation costs while enhancing sustainability.
Maize farming in resettlement areas of Chirumanzu District of Zimbabwe is vulnerable to climatic variations. The Government of Zimbabwe encourages maize farmers in resettlement areas to adapt to climate variability through conservation farming and diversification among other measures. It is envisaged that the measures will improve maize farmers’ resilience and ability to safeguard food and nutrition security in the country. However, the process of adaptation is dynamic, complex, and multifaceted in nature. Several problems and dangers accompany the process of adaptation. The problems and dangers are associated with intangible and indirect costs. The focus of this chapter is to explore intangible and indirect costs associated with measures adopted by maize farmers in resettlement areas of Chirumanzu in Zimbabwe. Fifty-four maize farmers from four resettlement wards provided the data through semi-structured interviews. Diversification, changing planting dates, use of drought tolerant varieties were some of the measures adopted. Several problems and dangers accompanied the adaptation measures adopted. Intangible costs such as pain and suffering, embarrassment, ridicule, and stereotyping were experienced. Indirect costs including additional and unplanned costs were also encountered. This chapter concludes that intangible and indirect costs associated with adaptation may result in reduced adaptive capacity and resilience of maize farmers. Therefore, national governments should exercise extreme caution and desist from only encouraging farmers to adapt. Rather, they should consider intangible and indirect costs involved while providing solutions to reduce them to avoid situations where farmers are worse off while facilitating sustainable adaptation.
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