Climate change perception and impacts on cattle production in pastoral communities of northern Tanzania

This study examines pastoralists’ perception on climate change and impacts on cattle production from ten study villages of Monduli District in Tanzania. This study drew empirical data from 130 cattle owners and 81 participants from focus group discussions in the study villages. Descriptive statistics and thematic analysis were used to analyze the data respectively. Findings from this study indicate that pastoralists are well aware of the general climate trends in their location, its variability and the impacts of extreme weather events on cattle production. The main climate changes perceived by pastoralists include more erratic and reduced amounts of rainfall, rise in temperature and prolonged and frequent periods of drought. Pastoralists mainly view population pressure and tree cutting as the major causes of climate change. Further, this study found that there are no existing climate risk programmes and early warning systems across the district. Importantly, pastoralists reported the negative impacts of climate change on cattle production. The severe recurrent drought periods result in shortage of forage and water, leading to cattle starvation and malnutrition. Pastoralists reported massive cattle deaths and outbreaks of diseases such as contagious bovine pleuropneumonia and tick-borne diseases. Further, reduction in milk production and poor livestock market prices were also reported as negative impacts on cattle production. Given the range of negative impacts of current climate change and extreme weather events on cattle production, the implications of climate change must be taken into account to ensure longer-term survival and sustainability of pastoralist communities through strengthening of climate risk awareness programs and early warning systems across the district. Further, this study recommends that government and non-governmental organizations should improve institutional support to pastoralists in order to help them deal with the negative impacts of climate change on livestock production.