Doctoral Dissertation Vulnerability, Impact and Adaptation to Climate Change: Livelihoods of Chepang Community in the Rural Mid-Hills of Nepal Luni PIYA Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation Hiroshima University September 2012 Vulnerability, Impact and Adaptation to Climate Change: Livelihoods of Chepang Community in the Rural Mid-Hills of Nepal D095259 Luni PIYA A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation of Hiroshima University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy September 2012 We hereby recommend that the dissertation by Ms. Luni PIYA entitled “Vulnerability, Impact and Adaptation to Climate Change: Livelihoods of Chepang Community in the Rural Mid-Hills of Nepal” be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY. Committee on Final Examination: Keshav Lall MAHARJAN, Professor Chairperson Shinji KANEKO, Professor Kensuke KAWAMURA, Associate Professor Koki SEKI, Associate Professor Akinobu KAWAI, Professor The Open University of Japan Date: Approved: Date: Akimasa FUJIWARA, Professor Dean Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation Hiroshima University Dedicated to my first learning institution, my parents: Iswar Kumar Shrestha and Mana Maya Shrestha Without the firm academic foundation that you have built for me right from my childhood, I could have never achieved this academic milestone today Summary of the dissertation Occurrence of climate change is no longer a contested issue. Whilst many researches have focused on the biophysics of climate change, the social dimensions have been neglected at least until recently. This research focuses on the socio-economic aspects of climate change. Such types of studies are more important for policy implications compared to the bio-physical studies as factors like temperature and rainfall are beyond the immediate influence of the policy makers. Climate change is a global phenomenon; however its manifestations, impacts, adaptation capacities, preferences, and strategies vary locally. Effective planning for climate change adaptation requires an assessment of local vulnerabilities, adaptation practices, and preferences so as to bridge the gap between community needs at the micro level, and policy processes at the macro level. Even at the local level, the poorest rural communities relying dominantly on natural resources for their livelihoods are the ones who are the most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate risks. In order to gain relevant policy insights to help such communities cope with the climate risks, it is important to capture the ground level realities of the livelihoods of these communities. In this direction, this study focuses on the Chepang community, one of the highly marginalized indigenous nationalities of Nepal. Although their native area is surrounded by the major highways, feeder roads into the area are few. Literacy rate among this community is low, which has hampered their representation in the administrative and political spheres. As a result, despite being geographically near to Kathmandu, they are still marginalized from the mainstream of development of the country. Chepang thus qualify as an appropriate representative of the marginalized people in Nepal. Subsistence rain-fed agriculture, livestock, forestry and wage laboring form the major livelihood sources for this community. This study aims to analyze the livelihoods of Chepang community from the i perspectives of vulnerabilities, impacts and adaptation to climate change and extreme events. More than 95% of the total Chepang population resides in Chitwan, Makwanpur, Dhading and Gorkha districts. To ensure representativeness of the sample selected, all the four districts have been covered by this study. One Village Development Committee (VDC) from each district is selected based on the dominance of Chepang population. This study is based on the primary data collected by household survey conducted in two phases: February-March 2010 and May-June 2011; and covers 221 Chepang households. This study also uses secondary weather data of monthly minimum temperature, maximum temperature, and rainfall over the period 1975-2008 obtained from the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology (DHM) in Nepal. Analysis of the livelihoods portfolio of the Chepangs identify eleven different sources of livelihoods: agriculture, livestock, wage laboring, forestry, salaried job, skilled non-farm job, remittance from abroad, petty business, transfers (old age allowance), honey, and handicrafts. Agriculture is the major activity adopted by all the households, followed by forestry, livestock, and wage laboring. It was found that all households tend to diversify the livelihoods sources. Income is comparatively higher from salaried job, skilled non-farm job and remittance, however most of the households are constrained from adopting these remunerative sources owing to interlinked factors comprising of low education – landholding - livestock holding; lack of citizenship certificates - land registration certificates; and unfavorable land policies. It is important for the policy makers and development agencies to recognize the complementary relationship among farming, forestry, and non-farm livelihood strategies in sustaining their livelihoods. How the local people perceive the ongoing climate change determines how they formulate strategies to cope with those changes. The perceptions of the community ii regarding changes in rainfall and temperature over the last decade were collected by the household survey, which was then cross-checked with the recorded data. Average minimum and maximum temperature and total rainfall data for the time period of 1975- 2008 was considered. Trend analysis of historical climate data was done for two time- periods: long-run of 34 years (1975-2008) and short-run of 8 years (2001-2008). The analysis of community perception was focused for the last decade since longer time frame would be difficult for the respondents to remember and be subjected to recall bias. Nearly one-third of the respondents are able to perceive the changes in line with the recorded data, meanwhile there are many respondents who do not perceive any changes. The determinants of household perceptions were analyzed by univariate probit model. Access to information, and extension services (as indicated by ownership of radio and membership in groups) are the most important factors facilitating perceptions of both temperature and rainfall changes. Cultivation of cash crops also facilitates perceptions of rainfall significantly. On the other hand, formal education and engagement in non-farm income sources reduce the ability to perceive the climatic changes. Priority must be placed on the dissemination of relevant information at the community level and updating the educational curriculum to include the issues related to climate change. Climate related studies at a micro-scale in rural areas of Nepal are hampered by the lack of climate data. Establishment of local hydrological stations and training the community to obtain daily readings would generate datasets on local climate, and also facilitate awareness and adaptation. The vulnerability analysis was done based on indices constructed from selected indicators for exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. Historical changes in climate variables and occurrence of extreme climatic events are taken as indicators of exposure. The temperature and precipitation at the household level was interpolated for 32 years iii (1977-2008) from the station level data (49 temperature stations and 218 precipitation stations) using the latitude-longitude-altitude information of the households by ordinary kriging method. Livelihood impacts of climate disasters and share of natural and non- natural sources to the total household income were taken as the sensitivity indicators. Adaptive capacity of a household is taken to be the property of the five livelihood asset- categories viz., physical, human, natural, financial, and social as given in the sustainable livelihoods framework. The indicators are weighted using stepwise Principal Component Analysis. The weighted indicators were aggregated to calculate the final index. Inter-VDC analysis of the vulnerability index indicate that exposure is most dominant determinant of vulnerability in a locality. Inter-household analysis of vulnerability indicate that poor households with low adaptive capacity are vulnerable anywhere, irrespective of where they are located. Out of the three components, only adaptive capacity is under the immediate influence of policy makers. Improving household adaptive capacity can also help in reducing sensitivity. Therefore the major policy focus must be to improve the adaptive capacity while ensuring the post-disaster emergency relief measures for localities with higher exposure. The poorest households should be the primary target of any interventions. The most commonly reported climatic hazards are landslides, droughts and hailstorms. Respondents opine that droughts have become more frequent, and short- duration droughts during maize-growing season coupled with uncertain timing of rainfall have hampered maize cultivation. Hailstorms have been occurring frequently over the last few years during the April-May that hampers pears, oranges, and maize. Most of the respondents mark the late onset of post-winter rain, thereby delaying the maize-sowing and consequently