Managing the water cycle in Kenyan small‐scale maize farming systems: Part 2. Farmers’ use of formal and informal climate forecasts

Abstract

Forecasts can be an important component of water cycle management and farm decision making, particularly where rainfall is uncertain. In Kenya, the use of informal or indigenous forecasting (IF) is known to be widespread, but farmers also use more formal seasonal forecasting (SF) to make decisions in relation to the water cycle. A review of literature indicates that local knowledge is adaptable and often mixes indigenous knowledge and external information. In most cases, IF focusses on more local features and relates more to practical farm activities. Based on extensive interviews and focus groups of farmers in two study areas in Kenya, a majority of farmers from each area used IF, even though SF was also used. There were few farmer characteristics that explained the difference in the use of IF and SF. However, there were differences between the two study areas in how farmers interpreted SF and whether they used a combination of SF and IF. Furthermore there were differences in the local IF indicators used by farmers to identify the onset of the rainy season. To improve the acceptance of SF and increase its use, the information provided in SF needs to be easily incorporated into farmers’ current working knowledge, which might also include IF. This means that SF tools should be developed using participatory approaches to ensure the engagement of local farmers. WIREs Water 2016, 3:127–140. doi: 10.1002/wat2.1121 This article is categorized under: Human Water > Water as Imagined and Represented

Understanding the Role of User Needs and Perceptions Related to Sub-Seasonal and Seasonal Forecasts on Farmers' Decisions in Kenya: A Systematic Review

“…Mode of dissemination through radio is a key factor through which farmers receive weather information in Machakos (Vervoort et al, 2016;Apgar et al, 2017;Ndavula and Lungahi, 2018), while local meetings also influence farmers' need for WCI (Kitinya et al, 2012). The radio is an important factor for adoption of WCI, since it is an effective communication tool for influencing the use of WCI and triggering action among smallholder farmers in Kenya (Mwaniki et al, 2017).…”

Techniques and skills of indigenous weather and seasonal climate forecast in Northern Ghana

“…Some scholars have explored the value of indigenous knowledge in natural resource management, water resource management, fisheries and aquatic conservation, risk and disaster management, health, among others (Cabrera et al, 2006;David & Ploeger, 2014;Desbiez et al, 2004;Gray & Morant, 2003). In this study, we focused on IK for weather and seasonal climate forecasting which has been referred to by Vervoort et al (2016) as indigenous forecast (IF). Here, we define "indigenous" as native or local and "forecasting" in its elementary form as a prediction of a future occurrence or condition.…”

Sensing weather: scientific and experiential modes of knowledge production for small-scale farming in western Kenya

“…Here, knowing the weather involves a different set of entities to be observed and other interpretative techniques in order to determine future states of the atmosphere. Calls to conceptualize weather knowledge from the perspective of its users and to recognize non-scientific knowledge have especially been voiced with regards to often marginalized rural communities in the Global South, including Ethiopian pastoralists (Balehegn et al, 2019;Iticha and Husen, 2019), as well as farmers in northern Ghana (Nyadzi et al, 2021), southern Uganda (Orlove et al, 2010) and various communities in Kenya (Ouma et al, 2013;Vervoort et al, 2016). Although not challenging scientific knowledge per se, Rice et al (2015) more explicitly critique the hegemonic knowledge politics of those sciences that marginalize other ways of knowing.…”

“…This has been addressed by Balehegn et al (2019) who show that Afar pastoralists do not use a single indicator to predict weather but draw information from a wide variety of sources, both traditional and scientific. Similarly, Vervoort et al (2016) demonstrate how farmers in Kenyan communities use weather information flexibly, drawing on several local and external sources in agricultural decision-making. As Orlove et al (2010) point out in their study of indigenous climate knowledge among farmers in southern Uganda, farmers are not only consumers of weather information but also share their experiential knowledge to actively engage as producers in programs that draw on climate science for climate change adaptation.…”