Livelihood resilience to environmental changes in areas of Kenya and Cameroon: a comparative analysis

Climate change is a major challenge for the agricultural sector worldwide. Smallholder farmers are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change owing to their high dependence on agriculture for livelihood sustenance. Building smallholder farmers' livelihood resilience to the adverse effects of environmental change is critical to addressing their vulnerabilities. This paper comparatively assessed livelihood resilience of smallholder farmers in Isiolo County, Kenya and Northwestern Cameroon in the face of environmental changes. The results are based on household surveys of 339 farmers in Kenya and 350 farmers in Cameroon. Findings showed that using the same measures of livelihood resilience, farmers' resilience were significantly different in the Kenyan and Cameroonian study areas (p<0.05), with farmers in Cameroon being relatively more resilient than farmers in Kenya. In both study sites, a statistically significant causal relationship (p<0.05) existed between farmers' resilience and livelihood capital assets such as human capital (number of household members between 18 to 55 years, education level), natural capital (number of farms, size of farmland, number of agroforestry trees on the farm), financial capital (access to bank account, ownership of livestock, ownership of farmland, trees, and farm equipment), social capital (participation in agricultural group), and physical capital (use of irrigation). However, some livelihood capital assets were more important for building resilience in Isiolo County, Kenya while others were more important in Northwestern Cameroon. On the basis of these findings, it is recommended that climate change adaptation interventions and policies should take a critical look at the determinants of resilience in order to come up with effective plans of action that can enhance farmers' resilience to environmental changes occurring in Kenya and Cameroon, and elsewhere.