The Kilombero wetland in Tanzania is affected by advancing land use and land cover changes (LULCC), where we observe a conflict between development interests and the necessity of conservation measures to maintain the functionalities of the ecosystem. Thus, assessing patterns of LULCC is crucial to foresee potential future developments and to develop sustainable future management strategies. In this study, we use a multi-method scenario approach to assess the spatial implications and underlying driving forces of potential change by (1) developing a System Dynamics Causal Loop Diagram (CLD) to disentangle the underlying socio-economic and ecologic driving forces, (2) deriving a qualitative business-as-usual (BAU) and a conservation scenario from participatory narratives elaborated during a stakeholder workshop, and (3) quantifying the spatial implications of these scenarios with the Land Change Modeler (LCM). Results indicate that under the BAU assumption only 37% of the natural vegetation is expected to persist until 2030 in the wetland. In contrast, strict enforcement of protected areas (conservation scenario) halts further conversion of the wetland. However, both scenarios pinpoint considerable expansions of cropland in the western highlands with potentially serious impacts on catchment-wide hydrological processes. The produced qualitative and quantitative outputs reveal hotspots of possible future change and starting points for advisable further research and management interventions.

Although various studies on climate change and food production have been conducted, information on how households in Tanzania respond to climate change for sustainable food production is scarce. This paper investigates climate change adaptation practices in enhancing sustainable food production in Rombo District, Tanzania. The study adopted a cross- sectional research design. Quantitative data were analysed by using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences software, while the qualitative data were analysed through factual and logical interpretation of the findings. Results show that drought was the main effect of climate change as reported by 65.7% of the respondents in the study area. Furthermore, the findings show that 81.4% of the respondents applied artificial fertilizers to their farms in efforts to adapt to climate change. Study results also show a significant association between the education level of the respondents and use of improved seeds (P = 0.08) and soil water conservation (P = 0.09) as adaptation measures to climate change. In adapting to the changing climate, respondents also experienced some challenges such as lack of resources in terms of financial, material and human labour. Proper knowledge on the adaptation measures is recommended to be given to farmers through various methods.

No abstract