Households Vulnerability Food Insecurity And Risk Coping Strategies Under The Changing Climate In The Semi-arid Highlands Of Eastern Tigray Northern Ethiopia

The main objective of this research is to analyze farm households’ perceptions, livelihoodrnvulnerability, and risk coping strategies to the changing climate and variability. The multistagernsampling method was applied to collected data from 358 rural households in Hawzen and Irobrndistricts corresponding with the 1983-2016 meteorological data of rainfall and temperature. Thernnon-parametric Mann-Kendall test and the Sen’s slope estimator, principal component analysis,rnand Foster-Greer-Thorbecke techniques were employed to analyze rainfall and temperaturerntrends, household’s vulnerability, and decompose food security status. The econometric modelrnutilized includes Heckman probit selection, three-step Feasible Generalized Least Square, andrnmultivariate probit regression. The results revealed that nearly 95 and 89 percent of farmersrnperceived a decreased annual rainfall and an increasing temperature consistent with thernmeteorological data in Hawzen and Irob districts, respectively. Farmers' choice of soil and waterrnconservation adaptation strategy is significantly influenced by age, household size, access tornextension services, off-farm activities, weather information, and rainfall trend. The HouseholdrnVulnerability Index reveled that households from Hawzen were relatively less vulnerable thanrnIrob. Besides, 27 percent of households were categorized under highly vulnerable group. Holdingrnthe food poverty line the number of households with high vulnerability to food insecurity (93 percent)rnwas higher than the current food-insecure (84 percent).Expected future food consumptionrnexpenditure was increased with dependency ratio, livestock size, irrigation potential, livestockrndeath, energy cost, and positive annual rainfall trend in Degamba Kebele. The multivariate probitrnregression model showed complementary and substitutability among the three risk copingrnstrategies to smooth food consumption fluctuation. The likelihood of choosing these risk copingrnarrangements significantly increases among male-headed households, access to credit, motorrnroad, input-output market, community-based health insurance, TV/radio ownership, and annualrnrainfall trend in Irob. Thes results have important policy implications such as promoting updatedrnweather information through extension services to create resilience livelihood. The policy shouldrnfocus not only on current food insecurity but also on those households more likely to be foodrninsecure soon and encouraging the role of rural local institutional arrangements.

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