• Energy Research

Hydropower is sustainable and environmentally friendly source of energy worldwide. Driven by streamflow, it is vulnerable to climate change and land use change. The hydropower production from the two existing run-of-river hydropower projects on the Sondu Miriu River is vulnerable to rainfall variability and requires strategies for building resilience for the local communities. The objective of this study was to identify appropriate and sustainable strategies for integrating climate change adaptation into hydropower development within the Sondu Miriu River Basin. The methodology involved review of existing climate change adaptation strategies to identify appropriate strategies for integrating climate change adaptation in hydropower developments within the Sondu Miriu River Basin. The results indicate that no clear climate change adaptation strategies are being implemented within the basin. A framework is needed to implement appropriate climate change adaptation strategies within the basin. Climate Change act of 2016 created linkage with other existing policies for effective support of integration of climate change adaptation into hydropower development in Sondu Miriu River Basin. Strengthening community resilience to climate change impacts is one of the benefits to be derived from the hydropower projects by supporting appropriate adaptation strategies.

Mapping of land use/ land cover (LULC) dynamics has gained significant attention in the past decades. This is due to the role played by LULC change in assessing climate, various ecosystem functions, natural resource activities and livelihoods in general. In Gedaref landscape of Eastern Sudan, there is limited or no knowledge of LULC structure and size, degree of change, transition, intensity and future outlook. Therefore, the aims of the current study were to (1) evaluate LULC changes in the Gedaref state, Sudan for the past thirty years (1988–2018) using Landsat imageries and the random forest classifier, (2) determine the underlying dynamics that caused the changes in the landscape structure using intensity analysis, and (3) predict future LULC outlook for the years 2028 and 2048 using cellular automata-artificial neural network (CA-ANN). The results exhibited drastic LULC dynamics driven mainly by cropland and settlement expansions, which increased by 13.92% and 319.61%, respectively, between 1988 and 2018. In contrast, forest and grassland declined by 56.47% and 56.23%, respectively. Moreover, the study shows that the gains in cropland coverage in Gedaref state over the studied period were at the expense of grassland and forest acreage, whereas the gains in settlements partially targeted cropland. Future LULC predictions showed a slight increase in cropland area from 89.59% to 90.43% and a considerable decrease in forest area (0.47% to 0.41%) between 2018 and 2048. Our findings provide reliable information on LULC patterns in Gedaref region that could be used for designing land use and environmental conservation frameworks for monitoring crop produce and grassland condition. In addition, the result could help in managing other natural resources and mitigating landscape fragmentation and degradation.

AbstractClimate change threatens African countries’ economic development and affects agriculture and food security. Ethiopia is especially vulnerable to the negative effects of climate change because its economy is dependent on climate-sensitive livelihoods that have limited potential for adaptation. Emerging evidence indicates that climate-smart agriculture (CSA) can help smallholder farmers adapt to climate change and increase agricultural productivity, thereby enhancing household income and food security. In the study area, different CSA practices have been adopted to mitigate the negative effects of climate change and improve agricultural productivity, income, and food security. Therefore, this study examines the impact of CSA practices on household income and food security in southern Ethiopia. A total of 385 households were selected using multistage sampling. Primary and secondary data were used, and propensity score matching with different types of matching algorithms, such as nearest neighbor, kernel, and radius matching, was employed to quantify the conditional impacts of CSA intervention on farm income and food security. In comparison with non adopters farmers that have adopted CSA practices had a higher food consumption score between 6.27 and 8.15, which was statistically significant at the 1% level. Overall, 34.55% of interviewed households had acceptable food consumption scores, 44.68% had borderline, and 20.77% had poor food consumption scores. Furthermore, households that adopted CSA practices had a 20.30% higher average annual farm income per hectare than non-adopters. The study suggests that effective extension services, accurate climate information, and sound policy support are required to promote and scale up CSA measures in the study area to improve farmers’ adaptive capacity, farm income, and food security.

AbstractThe progress of science is tied to the standardization of measurements, instruments, and data. This is especially true in the Big Data age, where analyzing large data volumes critically hinges on the data being standardized. Accordingly, the lack of community‐sanctioned data standards in paleoclimatology has largely precluded the benefits of Big Data advances in the field. Building upon recent efforts to standardize the format and terminology of paleoclimate data, this article describes the Paleoclimate Community reporTing Standard (PaCTS), a crowdsourced reporting standard for such data. PaCTS captures which information should be included when reporting paleoclimate data, with the goal of maximizing the reuse value of paleoclimate data sets, particularly for synthesis work and comparison to climate model simulations. Initiated by the LinkedEarth project, the process to elicit a reporting standard involved an international workshop in 2016, various forms of digital community engagement over the next few years, and grassroots working groups. Participants in this process identified important properties across paleoclimate archives, in addition to the reporting of uncertainties and chronologies; they also identified archive‐specific properties and distinguished reporting standards for new versus legacy data sets. This work shows that at least 135 respondents overwhelmingly support a drastic increase in the amount of metadata accompanying paleoclimate data sets. Since such goals are at odds with present practices, we discuss a transparent path toward implementing or revising these recommendations in the near future, using both bottom‐up and top‐down approaches.

Les environnements de montagne en Afrique de l'Est connaissent des augmentations de température plus rapides que les basses altitudes, ce qui, associé à l'évolution des régimes de précipitations, affecte souvent négativement la production de café.Toutefois, on sait peu de choses sur les stratégies d'adaptation utilisées par les petits producteurs de café en Afrique.En utilisant le prisme de l'adaptation quotidienne, des entretiens semi-structurés ont été réalisés avec 450 petits agriculteurs vivant près des montagnes Bale en Éthiopie (n = 150), du mont Kenya au Kenya (n = 150) et des hautes terres de Kigezi en Ouganda (n = 150).Nous rapportons des similitudes dans les stratégies d'adaptation utilisées (par exemple, utilisation accrue de semences, d'intrants et de techniques de conservation des sols améliorés), mais aussi des différences entre les régions et au sein de celles-ci (par exemple, irrigation, abandon de la culture du café), liées à différents facteurs biophysiques, économiques et socioculturels. Dans toutes les régions, l'accès à la terre, aux fonds et aux possibilités limitées d'apprentissage mutuel entre les agriculteurs et les autres agents de changement a limité les options d'adaptation.Les populations locales ont la capacité et les moyens de déterminer la meilleure façon de s'adapter au changement climatique, et les agences gouvernementales et les ONG pourraient mettre en œuvre un engagement plus participatif avec les petits producteurs de café, à l'écoute des opportunités et des contraintes du quotidien vie pour faciliter l'adaptation aux changements climatiques prévus. Los entornos de montaña en África Oriental experimentan aumentos de temperatura más rápidos que las elevaciones más bajas, lo que, junto con los cambios en los patrones de lluvia, a menudo afecta negativamente a la producción de café. Sin embargo, se sabe poco sobre las estrategias de adaptación utilizadas por los pequeños productores de café en África. Utilizando la lente de la adaptación cotidiana, se llevaron a cabo entrevistas semiestructuradas con 450 pequeños agricultores que viven cerca de las montañas Bale en Etiopía (n = 150), el monte Kenia en Kenia (n = 150) y las tierras altas de Kigezi en Uganda (n = 150). Reportamos similitudes en las estrategias de adaptación utilizadas (por ejemplo, un mayor uso de mejores semillas, insumos, técnicas de conservación del suelo), pero también diferencias entre regiones y dentro de ellas (por ejemplo, riego, abandono del cultivo de café), relacionadas con diferentes factores biofísicos, económicos y socioculturales. En todas las regiones, el acceso a la tierra, los fondos y las limitadas oportunidades de aprendizaje mutuo entre los agricultores y otros agentes de cambio limitaron aún más las opciones de adaptación. Las personas locales tienen la capacidad y los medios para determinar la mejor manera de adaptarse al cambio climático, y las agencias gubernamentales y las ONG podrían implementar un compromiso más participativo con los pequeños agricultores de café, en sintonía con las oportunidades y limitaciones en la vida cotidiana vida para facilitar la adaptación a los cambios pronosticados en el clima. Mountain environments in East Africa experience more rapid increases in temperature than lower elevations, which, together with changing rainfall patterns, often negatively affect coffee production.However, little is known about the adaptation strategies used by smallholder coffee farmers in Africa.Using the lens of everyday adaptation, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 450 smallholder farmers living near the Bale Mountains in Ethiopia (n = 150), Mount Kenya in Kenya (n = 150), and Kigezi Highlands in Uganda (n = 150).We report similarities in adaptation strategies used (e.g., increased use of improved seeds, inputs, soilconservation techniques) but also differences across and within regions (e.g., irrigation, coffee-farming abandonment), related to different biophysical, economic, and sociocultural factors.In all regions, access to land, funds, and limited mutual-learning opportunities between farmers and other agents of change constrained further adaptation options.Local people have capacity and means to determine how best they can adapt to climate change, and government agencies and NGOs could implement more participatory engagement with smallholder coffee farmers, attuned to the opportunities and constraints in everyday life to facilitate adaptation to predicted changes in climate. تشهد البيئات الجبلية في شرق إفريقيا زيادات أسرع في درجات الحرارة من الارتفاعات المنخفضة، والتي غالبًا ما تؤثر سلبًا على إنتاج القهوة، جنبًا إلى جنب مع أنماط هطول الأمطار المتغيرة. ومع ذلك، لا يُعرف سوى القليل عن استراتيجيات التكيف التي يستخدمها صغار مزارعي القهوة في أفريقيا. باستخدام عدسة التكيف اليومي، تم إجراء مقابلات شبه منظمة مع 450 من صغار المزارعين الذين يعيشون بالقرب من جبال بيل في إثيوبيا (العدد = 150)، وجبل كينيا في كينيا (العدد = 150)، ومرتفعات كيغيزي في أوغندا (العدد = 150). نحن نبلغ عن أوجه التشابه في استراتيجيات التكيف المستخدمة (على سبيل المثال، زيادة استخدام البذور المحسنة والمدخلات وتقنيات الحفاظ على التربة) ولكن أيضًا الاختلافات عبر المناطق وداخلها (على سبيل المثال، الري، والتخلي عن زراعة البن)، فيما يتعلق بالعوامل الفيزيائية الحيوية والاقتصادية والاجتماعية والثقافية المختلفة. في جميع المناطق، أدى الوصول إلى الأراضي والأموال وفرص التعلم المتبادل المحدودة بين المزارعين وعوامل التغيير الأخرى إلى تقييد المزيد من خيارات التكيف. لدى السكان المحليين القدرة والوسائل لتحديد أفضل السبل التي يمكنهم من خلالها التكيف مع تغير المناخ، ويمكن للوكالات الحكومية والمنظمات غير الحكومية تنفيذ مشاركة أكثر تشاركية مع صغار مزارعي البن، بما يتماشى مع الفرص والقيود في الحياة اليومية الحياة لتسهيل التكيف مع التغيرات المتوقعة في المناخ.