Abstract:
The aim of this research is to examine the contextual environment in which farmers operate
so as to improve our understanding of the factors shaping vulnerability to climate risk. A key
focus is on the livelihoods of sugarcane farmers, using a case study of small-, medium-scale
(emerging) and large-scale sugarcane farmers in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands area of Eston
and its surrounds. A social vulnerability assessment was undertaken under the Sustainable
Livelihoods Framework (SLF) to test the hypothesis that climate risk is considered a major
contributing factor to the vulnerability of commercial farmers in KwaZulu-Natal and needs to
be effectively managed. This involved an investigation into the multiple stresses (both
external and internal, on-farm and off-farm, climatic and non climatic) acting on the system.
It is clear that climate change risk and variability is a major, but not the sole contributing
factor to the vulnerability of commercial farmers in this part of KwaZulu-Natal. Climate
change does need to be effectively managed but it will be best done in conjunction with the
management of the other multiple and interacting threats and stresses identified in this study.
Climate change and vulnerability, as well as the other multiple stresses, are acting on an
already vulnerable system, exacerbating and compounding present risks.
This research also explored a number of coping and response strategies that commercial
farmers have adopted in response to the threats and stresses and investigated particularly,
what elements enhance or restrict these strategies (both on-farm and off-farm). These
strategies posses potential as possible future adaptation options. It was found that the issues of access to livelihood assets (social, financial, natural/environmental, physical, human,
knowledge assets and capital under the SLF) are key to the adaptive capacity and the
adaptation strategies that farmers employ. Institutions (both formal and informal) play a
pivotal role in this access to livelihood assets both enabling and restricting access.
In conclusion, this work determined that a focus on only one element, such as climate change,
will not significantly reduce the vulnerability of commercial farmers. There is an interactive,
dynamic and multifaceted network present with a number of factors acting within and from
outside the system. Political, biophysical, social and economic factors interact and combine to
compound vulnerability, requiring more integrative and multiple response strategies.
