Climate Variability in West Africa: A Case Study in Vulnerability and Adaptation on the Northern Central Plateau, Burkina Faso

Abstract

Purpose

This chapter presents a case study on smallholder vulnerability and adaptation to long-term desiccation in the West African Sahel. Climatologists recognize Sahelian desiccation as a long-term multi-decadal dry period that persisted from roughly 1968 to 1995. This study draws on fine-scale ethnographic and daily rainfall data to elucidate local perspectives on this broad regional process. As such, this provides a window on the local lived experience of regional climate variability.

Methodology/approach

This study draws on multiple periods of ethnographic fieldwork in two different Mossi areas in north-central Burkina Faso (West Africa). Fieldwork consisted of key informant interviews, household surveys, and participant observation. The authors incorporate daily precipitation data from two meteorological stations provided by the General Directorate of Meteorology of Burkina Faso. Researchers assembled this data and graphed daily rainfall totals for individual rainfall seasons in the years preceding each period of fieldwork. The qualitative and quantitative data are analyzed by using a Sustainable Livelihoods (SL) framework.

Findings

The study finds that local perceptions of increased rainfall variability correspond to patterns evident in daily rainfall records for individual stations. Additionally, the authors document how rural producers are negatively affected by both intra-seasonal and multi-decadal rainfall variability. Mossi smallholders have adapted through new cropping patterns, livelihood diversification, and investments in agricultural intensification. These adaptations have been largely successful and could be adopted by other Sahelian groups in their efforts to adapt to climate change.

Research limitations

Fieldwork took place over several years in two different departments and five localities. The two anthropologists used a common livelihoods analytical framework but different research protocols over this time span. Thus, the data collection was not systematic across all locations and time periods. This limits the degree to which results are representative beyond surveyed localities at their respective points in time.

Originality/value

This study presents local views and perceptions of regional climate variability and ecological change. It is a rare bottom-up perspective supplemented with precipitation data.

Citation

West, C.T., Roncoli, C. and Yaka, P. (2016), "Climate Variability in West Africa: A Case Study in Vulnerability and Adaptation on the Northern Central Plateau, Burkina Faso", The Economics of Ecology, Exchange, and Adaptation: Anthropological Explorations (Research in Economic Anthropology, Vol. 36), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 57-76. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0190-128120160000036003