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THE ROLE OF TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE AND BIO-CULTURAL SYSTEMS IN ADAPTATION
TO CLIMATE CHANGE
THE CASE OF KENYA’S COASTAL COMMUNITIES
D. Mutta, P. Ongugo (KEFRI) and P Mohamed (Pwani University).
2011
Preliminary findings of the case study on the Mijikenda of the Kenya coast reveal that the
indigenous communities are experiencing the effects of climate change which are impacting
on their socio-cultural, economic, environmental and food security situation. The
communities are experiencing shifts in seasons including extreme temperatures, floods,
prolonged drought, tidal patterns and ocean storms. These changes have led to shifts in their
agricultural, forestry, livestock and fisheries practices including adaptation measures which
may include loss of practices and beliefs and revisiting the old traditions and beliefs.
Documented responses indicate a combination of traditional biocultural management and
contemporary government approaches with a view to ensure diversity, resilience and risk
reduction of, for instance, agroecosystems for food security. Marginalised over many decades
the traditional knowledge system is now becoming a source of crucial information for
agriculturalists on historical climate patterns and weather forecasting as well as a valuable
source of approaches that can assist in building resilience.
Based on interviews and focused group discussions with indigenous communities around two
sacred forests namely Kaya Fungo and Kaya Kinondo, local coastal area agroecosystems
(crop and livestock) and fisheries in Kilifi and Kwale counties, the communities have
observed notably new and worrying unpredictability of weather conditions including timing
of onset of rains. The rains are either too low and unreliable or too heavy. Previously,
droughts would occur once every ten years. Currently droughts are more frequent and
prolonged.
Documented impacts of climate change:
Forestry:
a) Prolonged drought has led to a significant decrease in survival of vegetation leading
to scarcity and local extinction of certain species, especially preferred animal and
plant species including: small mammals and birds such as gazelles, rodents, doves,
guinea fowls etc, that formed common bush meat; plant species such as Combretum
schumannii –an important house building plant; Zanthoxylum chalybeum – an
important medicinal plant; and Pepeta – a plant that produces wild edible berries; thus
diminishing supply of forestry resources for subsistence. Coupled with increasing
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population, this has brought increasing pressure on the traditional kaya forests leading
to a state where the kayas form islands of forest patches in a wholly cleared bare farm
or grazing land.
b) Long droughts result in shrinking swamps, drying rivers, diminished water supply and
formation of hard pan of the clay soils leading to low survival of plant species and
declining biodiversity. These events provide an opportunity to identify plant species
that can tolerate the conditions caused by climate change e.g. drought tolerant species.
Response
i.
These trends point to the need to strengthen traditional governance structures that
would help ensure the protection and conservation of the sacred forests and hence
contribute to socio-economic and ecological resilience. The current governance
structures that reduce the role of traditional elders have not been effective in
protecting the kaya forests. The kaya elders have pointed to the need to revive and
strengthen traditional governance systems to empower them to control plant and
animal resource harvesting using their customary laws and informal courts.
ii.
Based on the existing plant and animal biodiversity the conservation of the kaya
forests will provide a valuable source of germplasm for species that can tolerate the
current extreme weather and soil conditions including drought and salt tolerance, and
pest and disease resistance.
iii.
Other measures proposed by the government include protection, rehabilitation and
restoration of degraded forests; creation of buffer zones around the kaya forests
traditionally used as communal grazing grounds; joint vetting of cutting of trees on
farm and introduction of income generating activities.
Agriculture:
a) Owing to unpredictable weather patterns, recurrent crop failures in monoculture
systems have occurred since crops don’t receive adequate moisture to grow to
maturity. In turn this leads to poor crop yields and food insecurity.
b) Traditional cropping calendars have been severely disrupted by the changing weather
patterns. Previously specific crop plants were cultivated in defined times of the rain
guided by practices and traditional rules under the elders.
c) Following the Green Revolution and adoption of modern concepts of agriculture in an
effort to improve food production and food security, a high proportion of the
community’s population grows improved monocultural crop varieties and less
traditional variants. However, most of the indigenous community members still
maintain strong trust in the indigenous crop varieties especially of maize, millet,
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simsim and cassava and allocate a land parcel that carries the preferred traditional
variants.
Response
i.
There has been a responsive fall back to some of the traditional crop varieties that had
been systematicaly overtaken by improved modern crop varieties. These include
traditional maize varieties namely mingawa (white seeded, matures with extended
rains), Mzihana (black and white seeded, matures with medium rains),
kastoo/njerenjere (small yellow seeded, matures faster and is used when rains are not
enough), and bomba (big seeded). There is an understanding that fast and slow
maturing variants can be grown together to reduce risk of crop loss. The indigenous
communities believe that the traditional variants are: hardy and can cope better with
the unpredictable weather conditions and local pests; easy to obtain, i.e. from the last
harvest or from friends and relatives; and known to establish without the need for
inputs (fertilizer and pesticides), as required by improved modern crop varieties.
ii.
The farmers share seeds of various crop varieties and hence enhance species diversity
on most farms (i.e. they avoid concentrating specific crop varieties in certain areas
only) with the view to spread the risk and ensure the survival of the crops even when
there is total crop failure in some parts of the community area.
iii.
Farmers admit that old methods may not exclusively lead them to sustainability for
food security. They insist that certain traditional crop varieties, practices and concepts
must be maintained and synchronized with the modern knowledge system and
practices. Owing to the high cost of modern practices, maintaining traditional crop
varieties and farming practices forms an important survival strategy for the rural poor.
Livestock Farming
a) Unpredictable rains have led to rivers and water sources remaining dry most of the
year and affecting grazing lands and availability of pasture for livestock. Owing to the
extended drought certain preferred grass species disappear causing livestock farmers
to move to greener areas and causing soil erosion.
Response
i.
Livestock farmers relocate to greener pastures and permanent rivers as a survival
strategy. They follow the traditional practice of sharing their animals with friends and
relatives in other parts of the settlement that have a different source of water and
pasture and lower disease incidences. This helps to minimize chances of losing the
whole stock if placed in one place where conditions may get worse leading to loss of
livestock. The animals are re-collected back to the owner when favorable conditions
resume.
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ii.
Traditional approaches included setting aside a land parcel for communal grazing but
these are difficult to sustain owing to increasing privatization of ranches and
increasing population pressure for agriculture expansion.
iii.
The government is encouraging farmers to grow fodder plant species alongside reseeding of rangelands with pasture seeds. The government is also promoting cross
breeds and reducing number of animals per farm to get farmers to focus on fewer
animals for quality rather than quantity of products. The cross-bred animals are better
suited on this objective.
Fisheries
a) Marine biodiversity was once very rich but climate change has led to a declining
population of some fish species namely paramamba and mkizi as confirmed by
dwindling landing statistics except in marine protected areas. Data from 1970s to
2000s, show that fish catch is decreasing such that truck carriage used earlier has now
been replaced with baskets as the carrying containers from landing sites. Shallow
water fishing used to be adequate, but now fishermen have to fish in deeper waters.
Respondents indicate that the favourable fishing conditions have decreased e.g. waters
are rougher, mangrove forests have been degraded and beach lines eroded.
b) The destruction of coral reefs through bleaching has damaged breeding grounds and
habitats for specific fish species such as mkizi, octopus, calamari etc.
c) Climate change has brought the beaching of species such as dolphins which are
brought in by rough seas.
Response:
i.
The government has established Beach Management Units as a governance structure
to manage fisheries activities. However, the leadership of the BMUs comprise of
youth and have left out traditional elders which mean that useful TK and customary
practices that could countribute to conservation may not be considered or integrated in
decision making and planning.
ii.
Emphasis is being placed by Government ministries, donors and NGOs on
environmental conservation including rehabilitation of mangroves to protect
shorelines and breeding grounds for fish, placing control measures on endangered fish
species, reintroducing the traditional practice of zoning off areas from foreign
fishermen, and documenting traditional knowledge on fisheries.
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Conclusions and Recommendations
1. Traditional systems that counter the climate change phenomenon do exist but their
implementation requires external support. This is exemplified with the desire to bring
in traditional controls based on social beliefs and customary norms that are enforced
through communal responsibility. It is important that the traditional governance
structures are strengthened to ensure that biocultural resources that could help in
adaptation to climate change are more effectively protected and conserved.
2. Some of the contemporary agricultural strategies work against the traditional
systems, e.g. the efforts to introduce improved seeds go against the traditional seeds.
This may be very risky given that the latter are another possible life line for survival
in the unpredictable future of changed climate. Government efforts should be directed
towards strengthening of traditional community seed banks for traditional crop
varieties to complement the current government’s focus on modern crop varieties
3. Further detailed research on the role of TK and biocultural systems in adaptation is
necessary to capture wider coastal community groups and involve more stakeholder
groups such as other research and academic institutions. The research will focus on
traditional knowledge as a valuable source of information on drought and salt tolerant
animal and plant species including wild food plants that indigenous communities have
relied upon during previous famines. These species can be selected for focused
development as food crops for food security. The research on phenology of
indigenous plant species as indicators of weather events e.g. onset of rains will also be
valuable to complement modern weather forecasting methodologies at the local level.
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