Associations between Climate Variability and Livestock Production in Botswana: A Vector Autoregression with Exogenous Variables (VARX) Analysis

Abstract

The changing climate has a serious bearing on agriculture, particularly livestock production in Botswana. Therefore, studying the relationship between climate and livestock, which at present is largely missing, is necessary for the proper formulation of government policy and interventions. This is critical in promoting the adoption of relevant mitigation strategies by farmers, thereby increasing resilience. The aim of this research is to establish associations between climate variability and livestock production in Botswana at the national level. The paper employs time series data from 1970 to 2020 and the Vector Autoregression with Exogenous Variables (VARX) model for statistical analysis. The trend shows that both cattle and goat populations are decreasing. The VARX model results reveal that cattle and goat populations are negatively associated with increasing maximum temperatures. Cattle respond negatively to increased minimum temperatures as well, while goats tend to respond positively, implying that livestock species react differently to climatic conditions due to their distinct features. The results of the roots of the companion matrix for cattle and goat production meet the stability condition as all the eigenvalues lie inside the unit circle. The study recommends further intervention by the government to deal with increasing temperatures, thereby addressing the dwindling populations of goats and cattle, which have significant contributions to the household economies of smallholders and the national economy, respectively.