2016 ICT4D Conference

One of the main socioeconomic activities practiced in Eastern Africa, and at large Sub-Saharan Africa, is crop farming. Crop farming is regarded as weather sensitive, especially on the cultivation of staple crops which are highly relied upon by subsistence farmers. In the light of climate change, staple crop farming faces both challenges and also opportunities due to their entire reliance on climate conditions (rainfall and temperature). The study explores an approach to identify the risks and opportunities of climate change to subsistence farmers through vulnerability assessment using Geo-information technology in four Eastern Africa countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The vulnerability assessment adopts the start point approach (Benjamin et al., 2011), by using spatial multi-criteria evalution on 3 proxy determinants: Exposure (of stable crops to climate change); sensitivity (of farmers to climate change); and coping capacity (of farmers to climate change), to identify areas at risk and areas of opportunity in the presence of climate change.