Pastoralists Adaptation Strategies, and Resilience Capacity to Climate Change in Somalia: A Scoping Review

Abstract

Pastoralism is a livelihood practice in which people earn a living by rearing livestock such as cattle, goats, sheep, donkeys, and camels, often in arid and semi-arid lands (ASALs). Over the last few decades, severe and frequent climate changes and variations have been observed. Notably, drought is a recurrent phenomenon in localities and has adverse impacts on people’s livelihood, an ecosystem of rangeland, natural resources, and social aspects as well livestock production. This review analyses livelihood vulnerability, coping mechanisms, and adaptation strategies of pastoral communities within the context of climate change in Somalia. This scoping review entails thoroughly searching published academic articles and grey literature via PUBMED, Google, and Google Scholar. All the results were summarized and reported. This review reported Mobility, Herd diversification, Livestock off-take, and an increasing number of drought-adapting livestock as adaptation strategies, whereas Herd splitting, Household splitting, Labor migration to town, and Charcoal and fuel-wood selling as coping strategies to drought. Emergency aid, veterinary services, safety net, and credit services were some of the drought response mechanisms given by NGOs and the government. It is also reported that drought response strategies desired by pastoralists were being constrained by inadequate capital of households, lack of affordable credit services, and conflicts. Significant indicators of vulnerability to climate variability include a decline of pasture lands, livestock death, water availability reduction, livestock products and prices, environmental degradation, food insecurity, and outbreaks of human and livestock diseases. Despite the effectiveness of Pastoralist knowledge, the pastoral traditional risk management and coping strategies have increasingly become ineffective and will not be viable and sustainable in the coming years due to several underlying causes, including climate variability and prolonged hazards, lack of proper livestock policies, absence of adequate investment and intervention to address chronic social problems, natural and environmental problems affecting pastoral production.