Local creativity for adapting to climate change among rural farmers in the semi-arid region of Ghana Open Access

Climate change has emerged as an important theme in current food security discourses because of its potential negative impacts on food production among local communities. Throughout this paper, the term “climate change” refers to any change in climate over time, whether it is the product of natural factors, human activity or both. This usage is the same as that of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2007), but it differs from the usage in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (NFCC), which restricts the term to climate changes that can be directly or indirectly related to human activity that alters the composition of the atmosphere, and is additional to natural climate variability. However, the “climate variability” part of NFCC's definition is incorporated into the definition of climate change in this paper (Arku, 2012).

Although Africa produces the least amount of greenhouse gas emissions, Africans will be the most affected by climate change (IPCC, 2007; Ayers and Dodman, 2010). By 2020, it is estimated that up to 250 million people in Africa would be exposed to increased water stress due to climate change, resulting in 50 per cent reduction in rain-fed agricultural yields (IPCC, 2007).

Climate change, thus introduces another concern to the already contentious food security dialogue in Africa, South of the Sahara, and rural communities in particular where their mainstay is agriculture with emphasis on farming. However, as Arku and Arku (2010) maintain, the majority of the negative impact of climate change resulting into food insecurity are borne by rural women who mostly make sure that everybody “eats before they eat”.

Rural farmers by the use of their indigenous knowledge can adopt strategies to withstand negative consequences of climate change, so climate change adaptation has become one of the focal points in development studies (Nuorteva et al., 2010). Within the climate change literature, a notion of adaptation to climate change is embedded within a larger notion of vulnerability, defined as:

The accepted definition of adaptation to climate change (Rigg, 2006; Janssen et al., 2006; Dazé et al., 2012; Dunbar, 2010) is that of IPCC (2007) – is that the adjustments in ecological, social or human systems in response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their effects which moderates harm or exploits beneficiaries' opportunities. Thus, Smit and Wandel (2006) argue that adaptation can be a process, action or outcome in a system that helps the system to better cope with, manage or adjust to the changing conditions associated with climate change. The system can be that of ecosystem, household, community group or a country.

Arku and Arku (2010) and Rigg (2006) indicated that rural farmers diversified their livelihoods during events of climate change, especially drought periods by migrating to cities to work. Nuorteva et al. (2010) research among residents in and around Tonle Sap Lake in Cambodia has shown that during periods of drought and flood, the research participants depended on supplementary livelihood sources, such as borrowed money or rice from neighbours or relatives, selling of assets such as boats, cattle and land as important coping mechanisms. Many farmers also understood climate change when they said that it was lack of enough rainfall to grow crops. Nzeadibe et al. (2012) research among farmers within the Niger Delta in Nigeria has also shown that more farmer study participants than other participants were aware of climate change and understood climate change as a change in weather. The change in the weather according to the farmers and reported by Nzeadibe et al. (2012) was manifested in increased incidence of heat, excessive rainfall, and crop failure and low yields as a result of drought. Considering the current debate and knowledge on climate change, one may conclude that the farmers at the Niger Delta and around Tonle Sap Lake were aware of signs of climate change.

Climate change has come to be with us, and would be difficult to stop completely, even if all efforts were made to minimise it. This is because the human population will continue to increase which calls for demand for more natural and human-made resources, and the resultant use of sophisticated technologies which will continue to contribute to altering climatic conditions. Also, the existing levels of CO₂ at the moment, even if they were not to increase, will already affect global climate patterns. Since it seems impossible to completely stop climate change and its negative impacts, it is therefore essential to acclimatise to it for survival.

Although research on local people's adaptation to climate change is increasing, more research is needed to enable sharing of different coping strategies adopted by farmers at different places. This analysis can help policymakers in documenting effective coping strategies that can minimize negative impacts of climate change on rural farmers. Demonstrable effective strategies could be adopted by other farmers with similar environmental, cultural and social conditions. It is against this background that Dunbar (2010, p. 907) observed when he reviewed Ensor's and Berger's book on climate change that research on […] “community-based adaptation to climate change remains relatively new […] good practice must be developed and shared.”

Another observation is that many of the researchers did not differentiate between men's and women's coping strategies; men and women are likely to adopt different coping strategies as some of their needs are different, also and because of gender division of labour existing in most developing countries (Arku and Arku, 2010). Accordingly, this study also investigated whether men and women embraced different coping strategies as a result of climate change.

Food shortages already occur in most rural communities in Ghana, especially during drought periods (Arku and Arku, 2010), and based on our present knowledge on climate change adaptation mechanisms, the questions that need to be answered are: how are these communities responding to the impacts of climate changes to secure livelihoods? What traditional and evolving home-grown approaches have they developed? Is there anything they are doing that is not known that will be relevant knowledge for others as well?

The aim of this research therefore was to determine how farmers in semi-arid communities in Ghana use traditional knowledge to adapt to climate changes that they foresee or that occur, and how well this local knowledge work to enhance livelihoods in this era of climate change. The objectives of the study therefore were:

• to determine what the farmers understand by climate change;

• to identify local adaptive strategies that men and women use in semi-arid regions during climate change; and

• to assess the importance of local responses on rural livelihoods during climate change.

This study is driven by sustainable livelihoods (SL) and strength – based development. The SL thinking is an attempt to break away from approaches that are narrow and reductionist and that ignore the complexity of the lives and livelihoods of rural poor people. The SL approach promotes a holistic, people-centred understanding of the poor person or poor household and its members' socioeconomic reality – a reality which tends not to conform to the arbitrary sectoral and disciplinary distinctions of academics and development practitioners.

Accordingly, in constructing livelihoods, rural people tend to draw upon a wide diversity of assets to engage in diverse activities applied through diverse strategies (Chambers and Conway, 1992; Dazé et al., 2012). The concept of SL therefore puts people first, and is based on the belief that local struggles against poverty will lead to development strategies that work (Chambers, 1987, 1995, 1997). As maintained by Pretty and Hine (2001) also, rural households' food supply should not only come from farms because they are farmers, but they can also buy food from earned income from other jobs.

Deducing from SL concept, rural farmers in times of climate change would apply different strategies that would enable them to survive and none of these strategies should be regarded as erroneous as far as it is culturally recognized as an appropriate strategy. Men's strategies may be different from those of women's (Arku and Arku, 2010), but it is likely that there may be common strategies that men and women would adopt. The overall goal of the strategies is to enhance livelihoods that are sustainable.

Related theory to SL is strength-based development. Over several decades, development studies have been undergoing a paradigm shift from problem-based approaches that is focusing on the strengths in societies and building on the capacities that exist and empowering people for their own development from the inside. The foundational principle of strength-based approaches is that, although there are both capacities and deficiencies in every community, a capacity-focused approach is more likely to empower people and mobilize citizens to create positive, meaningful and sustainable change from within (Foster and Mathie, 2001). Thus, the strength-based approach is to address the “paradox of choice” (Schwartz, 2004) among rural farmers. Using the strength-based based development lens, the strategies that rural farmers would adopt to cope with climate change calamities would be based on their capabilities with the overall goal of creating positive, meaningful and sustainable change.

The study took place in three communities in the Eastern region of Ghana. These farming communities are Adenya, Kwamoso and Adawso (Figure 1). These communities were selected because unlike other communities between Accra and Koforidua, they are farming communities^[1]. The normal rainfall pattern in the study area is double maxima enabling two farming seasons, the major and minor (Arku, 2012). The major farming season is from February to August, and the minor season is from September to November.

The main vegetation type within the study communities is moist semi-deciduous forest (Figure 1). As a result of decreasing rainfall coupled with intensive use of the land for farming, the moist semi-deciduous forest has given way to Guinea savanna woodland (Figure 1). The main crops grown are maize, cassava, plantain, oil palm and cocoa. The oil palm and cocoa are perennial crops. Maize is cultivated each of the two farming seasons. Although cassava can also be cultivated each of the farming seasons, it is not harvested until after at least a year. Plantain is also a perennial crop like cocoa and oil palm, but naturally the yield decreases yearly starting from after the first harvest. Sometimes mixed cropping is practiced – cassava is intercropped with maize. The perennial crops are also intercropped with maize and cassava at the early stages of the perennial crops.

The bush fallow system prevails where a plot is left to revitalize for three to five years to regain its fertility after one to three years' cultivation. After clearing the forest/grasses, it is burnt before crop is planted.

Land is invested in the family heads which are normally men. The type of inheritance within the study communities is matrilineal. Land is therefore passed on from family heads to their sisters' male children. Consequently, women's descendants are the owners of the land. Due to modernisation, however, land is being bought by both immigrants and residents from the family heads. The buyers can pass the land to any family member but most often it is passed to their children.

The chiefs and the assemblymen/women^[2] who were the opinion leaders of the study communities were contacted to help in recruiting the participants for the study. The residents of the study communities maintained that they had participated in many research studies in the past which did not result into any intervention that could improve their livelihoods, so many were not interested in participating in the research. With the help of the opinion leaders, the researcher explained to them that the research, unlike others in the past, was not an action one. With this explanation, 60 participants were recruited, comprising ten men and ten women from each of the three communities.

Focus group discussions were used to gather data from the participants regarding what they understood by climate change. In all, there were ten groups of six participants in each group; five men's and five women's groups. The men's groups were separated from the women. Focus group discussions were also used in identifying local adaptive strategies. All the strategies mentioned during the focus group discussion were ranked by the participants. This was to determine the importance of the strategies on their livelihoods. 20 stones were given to each participant to distribute among the strategies presented pictorially. The strategy with the highest number of stones was assigned with the number “5”, and the one with either the least number of stones or no stone was assigned with the number “1” to generate data that allowed the use of a Likert-scale. All the 60 study participants ranked the strategies. Semi-structured interview questions were used to gather information on bio-data of the participants. After initial analysis of the results, the researcher conducted one-on-one interviews with some of the participants to probe into some of the results.

The focus group data were recorded and presented as mentioned by the participants. Other responses to the questions including data generated through the use of a PRA tool were entered into the SPSS software. Descriptive statistics such as frequencies, cross tabulation, and percentage distributions were used to generate results on educational backgrounds, ages and marital status of the participants. In addition, the Mann-Whitney U-test was used to determine differences between the livelihood strategies preferred by men versus those preferred by women. It is a non-parametric test that can be used with ordinal (e.g. Likert-type) questions to determine if the median of one (e.g. men) differs from the other (women).

There was no rainfall data to determine the rainfall pattern over the years. However, the residents who had reasonable knowledge of the rainfall pattern were able to tell whether it is increasing, decreasing or remained the same. Even though the research is not to solve any problem the result would be shared with the study participants.

None of the participants had tertiary education. Nine (15 per cent) of the participants had no formal education and half of them were women, and seven (78 per cent) of the participants without any formal education were married and the rest who were mainly women who were unmarried (Table I). One-third (33 per cent) of the participants had primary education and 16 (80 per cent) with primary education were married, two (10 per cent) divorcees, and 5 per cent each were single and widowed. Seventy-five per cent of those who had primary education were female.

About 38 per cent (23) of the participants had education up to the junior high level, and 91 per cent (21) who had junior high school level education were married and the rest divorced, and no participant was either single or widow. Most 17 (74 per cent) of the participants who had junior high education were male. Only a few, eight (13 per cent) of them, had either senior high school or vocational education of which the majority (75 per cent) were men (Table I).

The majority of the participants were between 40 and 49 years old (inclusive) (Table II). Only two (3 per cent) of the participants were between 20 and 29 years old. Surprisingly, some of the farmers who were 70 years and above (10 per cent) still engaged in activities that earned them a living (Table II).

The men's and women's understanding of what constitutes climate change are similar; and they indicated that climate change is largely related to a change in the rainfall amount and distribution. According to the men participants, climate change is:

• delay in rainfall;

• early rains;

• sudden stop of rains;

• failure of rains during the beginning of the farming season; and

• too much sunshine.

The women maintain that climate change is:

• early rains; and

• delayed rains.

When they were asked what they thought causes climate change, they mentioned deforestation through lumbering and collection of fuelwood for household uses, competition for farmland as a result of increasing population and over-cropping. Thus, climate change according to the farmers is caused by destruction of vegetation and pressure on farmlands.

During the focus group discussions, men mentioned the following coping strategies:

• working as hired labours on irrigated farms;

• working on their own irrigated farms where they cultivated vegetables (okra, pepper, cabbage, carrot and garden eggs);

• practicing trades, including masonry, carpentry and blacksmithing; and

• rearing animals, for example, goats and sheep, for consumption and sale.

The coping strategies that women mentioned are:

• petty trading^[3] in Adawso (Figure 1) and national capital markets (the national capital is about 60 kilometres from the study communities);

• working as hired labourers to process gari^[4];

• engaging in irrigated farming to grow vegetables; and

• rearing animals, such as goats and sheep.

They dug wells to meet the water table and the water is used to irrigate the crops.

The participants were asked to rank the importance of the strategies to their livelihoods during the focus group discussions. The Mann-Whitney U-test revealed that the importance of the strategies to men and women varied (Table III). The analysis shows that women ranked petty trading as their most important strategy, followed by irrigated farming and then animal rearing. The women ranked practicing of their profession as the least important strategy. It is not surprising that women ranked practicing a profession as the least important strategy because they did not mention practicing of their professions during the focus group discussions as one of their coping strategies. The Man-Whitney U-test revealed that working on irrigated farms as casual labourers was the most important strategy for men, followed by animal rearing and the least important strategy was petty trading.

Although men engaged in irrigated farming and was ranked according to the Man-Whitney U-test as their third most important strategy, working on others' irrigated farms was ranked as their best strategy. The researcher therefore probed the reason why they ranked working on their neighbours' farms instead of theirs as the best strategy, and one participant said:

The researcher further interviewed a few women on a one-on-one basis to determine why petty trading was ranked so high, and these were what some of them had to say: “[…] it brings quick returns which enable me to take care of my family”, “[…] my mother taught me petty trading”, “[…] the Adawso [one of the study communities, see Figure 1] market is close to me”, and “it is a women's profession”. When the men were asked why they did not rank petty trading high, many of them maintained that although they knew that returns from petty trading is faster than farming, petty trading is for women.

Animal rearing as a coping strategy was rated high by both men and women. They maintained that although they kept a few animals when the rainfall was normal to grow crops, they have increased the number as a result of the change in the rainfall pattern. This is because demand for the domestic animals and prices are high during drought periods, and they did not have to feed the animals; the animals had to search for their own food.

When the participants were asked whether the strategies they engaged in during periods of climate change (drought periods) affected meeting their households' needs, the responses were affirmative. Only 10 per cent and about 7 per cent of the women and men, respectively, maintained that the strategies did not meet their household needs (Table IV). About 67 per cent of the women indicated that the strategies met their needs, about 73 per cent of men said so. About 23 and 20 per cent of women and men, respectively, maintained that the strategies were more than enough in meeting their household needs.

For example, this is what a woman had to say:

A male-participant maintained that:

The participants of this research understood climate change as change in rainfall amount and distribution. Thus, they mentioned that delay in rainfall, insufficient rainfall during the farming seasons and sometimes too much sunshine are what climate change is about.

Similarly, Nzeadibe et al. (2012) has shown that farmers in Niger Delta understand the signs of climate change as excessive heat, excessive rainfall and lack of rainfall. Unlike, Niger Delta's farmers who experienced both extreme rainfall and drought, participants of this study experienced only drought. It therefore seems that although there are many signs of climate change, people's perception of climate change has to do with the negative impacts that climatic conditions have on their mainstay. Since the participants of this study are farmers, and depend on rainfall to cultivate crops, a change in rainfall amount and distribution other than any other climatic element, for example, temperature, is regarded as climate change.

The nature of men's and women's activities and gender division of labour within the households can influence coping strategies that men and women embrace when climatic condition(s) change(s). For example, women in this study indicated that petty trading is their most important coping strategy while men ranked it as their least important coping strategy. It is ranked to be women's most important strategy because according to the gender division of labour within the study communities, women are hypothetically to sell in markets. And as maintained by one woman, petty trading “[…] is a women's profession” which was confirmed by the men.

Arku's et al. (2008, p. 374) study of subjective wellbeing among people of Volta region in Ghana also shows that petty trading is reserved for women. For example, a respondent maintains that:

It seems while women are willing to add more activities to activities that are supposed to be for men, for example farming, in Twi culture, in order to diversify their livelihoods, men are not willing to engage in activities (petty trading) that are “supposed” to be for women. Traditionally men are expected to farm and women only assist them, but women now engage in vegetable farming to the extent that it is ranked the second most important strategy after petty trading. Perhaps, the saying that women make sure that “everybody eats before they eat” contributed to women adding more roles. If so, are women's workloads not too much? (Arku and Arku, 2009). The implication of this from gender perspective is that although women workloads continue to increase, their enthusiasm to take more challenging roles could result into women becoming household heads in the future. At present, men are customarily heads within married households in most developing countries.

According to Chambers and Conway (1992), in constructing livelihoods, rural people tend to draw upon a wide diversity of assets to engage in diverse activities. And also, the poor build their capabilities based on their strength (Foster and Mathie, 2001). This study has also shown that as a result of drought, the farmers spread sources of livelihood. Instead of growing their usual crops such as maize, cassava, and plantain, they diversified their livelihoods based on their indigenous capacities when the rainfall is not enough and well distributed to cultivate these crops. Thus, they engage in irrigation farming, rear animals, work for others to earn money, practice their learned occupations and engage in petty trading.

What differentiates this study from that of Arku's and Arku's (2010) and Rigg's (2006) is that, unlike their studies, the people within these three communities do not have to migrate to cities to work and bring food and money home. They do not also have to borrow foodstuffs from neighbours and relatives, unlike Nzeadibe's (2012) study among people of Niger Delta. The findings of this study therefore support SL thinking and strength-based development approach that people should make use of their resources and capabilities to enhance their livelihoods.

Although the coping strategies of the study participants could be short term ones, they could also be long term ones. For example, selling of animals may be a long term coping strategy as well. The farmers could engage in large-scale poultry and livestock farming when the need arises. They might only need capital and training on rearing of animals on large-scales to be added to their local knowledge on rearing animals on small-scales. The animal rearing would therefore become part of their permanent occupation not only during the periods of climate change. Thus, the coping strategies may eventually lead to adaptation (Dazé et al., 2012).

The study participants' understanding of climate change is a change in rainfall amount and distribution that negative affects their crop production. Thus, their opinion of climate change is a change in any of the climatic elements that directly and indirectly affects their mainstay – farming. These farmers adapted to negative consequences of climate change by diversifying their sources of livelihoods to the extent that the change in the rainfall amount and distribution did not adversely impact meeting their household needs. However, the deleterious effect of diversification of their livelihoods is that women are engaging in more activities than men which, is likely to increase women's workloads.

Since the study has revealed that local creativity can help to improve rural farmers' livelihoods during periods of climate change, these farmers should be supported, encouraged and trained to effectively use their indigenous knowledge and local resources effectively.

Despite the fact that local knowledge, if effectively used, should enable rural farmers to meet their needs, efforts should still be made, especially in developed countries which contribute largely to climate change, to reduce the occurrence of climate change. This is because the farmers of this study have to dig wells for water to irrigate their crops; and if the rainfall amount continues to decrease, eventually the water table will be too deep to reach.

Frank S. Arku is passionate about improving the quality of life of the poor in the developing countries. He does so with an appreciation of the psychological and sociological influences on how individuals define their aspirations for various elements of quality of life, and how each of them speaks to their well-being. He has a background in geophysics, physical and human geography and rural political and socio-economic development. His research interests are community participation, rural community revitalization, climate change, water and sanitation and sustainability planning, within a gender and multi-disciplinary perspective. He is a Senior Lecturer and also Faculty Co-ordinator with the Faculty of Development Studies, Presbyterian University College, Ghana, Akuapem Campus. Frank S. Arku can be contacted at: fsarku@gmail.com

The author is grateful to the Research Assistants of Presbyterian University College, Ghana and their lead, Edwin Lartey, for assisting to collect the primary data.