The impact of climate change on women subsistence farming practices in Bumula Sub-County, Bungoma County, Kenya

Abstract

Climate change is expected to adversely affect women subsistence farming practices and make their livelihoods more unsteady than their men counter parts; however, there is limited information on the impacts of climate change on women subsistence farming practices, particularly at a localized scale, yet they constitute an integral part of the population in addressing climate change. This study was designed to examine the impacts of climate change on women subsistence farming practices and their adaptation strategies. To realize the purpose of the study, a cross-sectional survey was adopted. Systematic random sampling method was used to pick desired sample of 396 households from the total of 44,922 households. Descriptive statistics in form of frequency tabulations, together with thematic analysis and image processing were employed . The findings revealed major impacts of climate change included; new variety of pests and diseases, loss of crops and livestock, drying of rivers, water and firewood shortage and increase in HIV I AIDS infections . Based on the findings, the study recommends that the ministry of agriculture should carry out intensive research to come up with effective ways of dealing with the new pests and diseases. More specifically the study recommends that the national and county government should strive to drill boreholes close to homes in order to enable women access water easily and free them more time to spend on their farms and other educative matters.