Observations of climate change among subsistence-oriented communities around the world

Views from two mountains: exploring climate change impacts on traditional farming communities of Eastern Africa highlands through participatory scenarios

“…In the Taita Hills, participants in our study reported increasing frequency and severity of drought and floods, variability of seasons onset, rainfall irregularity and scarcity in the last decade. These local perceptions are not reflected in officials meteorological observations, contrarily to what reported for other studies (Savo et al 2016, Cuni-Sanchez et al 2018. The discrepancy may be due to inadequate cover of this area by meteorological stations.…”

“…The scenario framework offers the opportunity to tackle climate change adaptation pathways by engaging multiple stakeholders (Jurgilevich et al 2017) and by exploring potential positive opportunities deriving from changes (McDowell et al 2016). Stakeholders' engagement brings the mediating effect of indigenous knowledge, response to loca climate effects (Savo et al 2016), and the potential barriers of community capacity and willingness to adapt. The use of participatory, place-based and bottom-up scenarios frameworks for biodiversity and ecosystem services assessment within landscapes is highly recommended, though still limited (IPBES 2016, Kok et al 2017.…”

Sea ice, rain-on-snow and tundra reindeer nomadism in Arctic Russia

“…As Arctic warming has significantly exceeded that of lower latitudes in recent decades [1], indigenous peoples have reported symptoms of accelerating change, even while characterizing extreme weather events as ‘normal’ in the context of life lived on land and/or sea [2,3]. In the Eurasian Arctic, the rapid retreat and thinning of sea ice in the Barents and Kara Seas (BKS) are critical components of feedbacks to Arctic and global climate change [1,4].…”

Expanding research views

“…What is needed is research that informs policy, at all levels of governance, as well as providing climate information that helps adaptation, for example, the smallholder looking to feed their family. Tapping into local knowledge could highlight where climate change impacts are already being experienced, as illustrated in the metaanalysis of traditional ecological knowledge among subsistence-orientated communities by Valentina Savo and colleagues 3 . This Review gathered observations from 2,230 localities across 137 countries, but there are a number of African countries for which no data was available -the authors note this was "potentially due to a lack of studies, a lack of studies in English, and/or a limited stable population", all issues that were highlighted by Hendrix as obstacles that need to be overcome.…”