Adaptation of Wetlands Based Livelihoods to Climate Variability | Community Vulnerability and Adaptation to the Impacts of Climate Variability and Extremes on Simiyu Wetlands, Tanzania. Este artículo no está disponible.Adaptation of Wetlands Based Livelihoods to Climate Variability | Community Vulnerability and Adaptation to the Impacts of Climate Variability and Extremes on Simiyu Wetlands, Tanzania

This study aimed at assessing community vulnerability and adaptation to the impact of climate variability and extremes on wetlands and its implication for livelihoods in Simiyu catchment, Southwest of Lake Victoria,Tanzania. Rainfall anomalies were used to characterize wet and dry seasons. Questionnaire surveys and focus group discussions were used to establish the impacts and coping strategies used during extreme events of floods and droughts. The results showed high rainfall fluctuations between seasons and from one year to the other. They further indicated that normally the October November December (OND) and MarchApril May (MAM ) seasons do not have the same strength and sign of anomalies, that is there are seasonal variation within the same year. Communities living around the Simiyu wetlands are vulnerable to seasonal fluctuations as their socio-economic activities are highly dependent on rainfall since 87%of respondents practice rainfed agriculture.Incidences of climate variations are increasing and have implications for wetland based lovelihoods

Madaka Tumbo is Assistant Lecturer at the Institute of Resource Assessment University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania.She has more than 5 years of experience of consulting research in the area of water environment. Madaka is currently working towards her Ph.D at the Institute for Water Research Rhodes University in South Africa.