This study used an integrated multi-modeling approach to assess the impact of climate change and potential adaptation strategies on crop-livestock systems in Southern Africa. The models projected increases in temperature of 1-5°C and decreases in rainfall of 5-10% for the mid-century. Without adaptation, about 60% of farms would lose income due to climate change impacts. The evaluated adaptation strategies, including drought-tolerant maize varieties, crop rotations, and micro-dosing of fertilizer, reduced the proportion of losing farms to 20% while increasing farm incomes for up to 80% of farms, though benefits were small (<20% income increases). Adaptation provided the greatest benefits for larger farms while small farms saw only modest

1. Crop-livestock intensification in the face of climate change: exploring opportunities to reduce risk
and increase resilience in Southern Africa using an integrated multi-modeling approach
Patricia Masikati1, Sabine Homann-Kee Tui1,Katrien Descheemaeker2, Olivier
Crespo3, Sue Walker4,5, Christopher J. Lennard3, Lieven Claessens6, Arthur C. Gama7,
Sebastiao Famba8 and Andre F. van Rooyen1
1. Climate change in Southern Africa 2. Study site and approach
• To capture the impact of climate change on heterogeneous
communities we used an integrated multi-modeling
approach for ex-ante impact assessment of climate
change and adaptation strategies a particular context
• The adaptation package was purposely designed for
resource limited households under low and erratic rainfall
conditions
• The package consisted of long duration maize variety,
converting 2/3 of maize land to maize-mucuna rotation and
another 1/3 to maize under micro-dose (17 kg N/ha). About
30% of crop residues were left on the field and 70% fed to
livestock.
4. Impact of climate change and benefits of adaptation strategies
6. Recommended way forward
• The tested climate change adaptations contribute to
modest income gains from intensification and
diversification
• Interventions have to go beyond food security and
climate change, and capacitate farmers towards
alternative livelihood activities
• Government and agricultural policies will have to play
a key role for promoting climate smart, resilient and
profitable agriculture, along with effective public and
private investments in research and development
• Reconfiguration pathway can be recommended
bearing in mind that proposed transitions will not only
be caused by the break through of one technology
but by sequences of multiple component-innovations
Reconfiguration pathway
3. Impact of climate change on current farming systems
5. Key messages
• On average about 60% of farmers will lose to climate change without adaptation, while only about 20% will
lose with adaptation
• Although about 80% of farmers will benefit from adaptation, the magnitude of benefits is very small (net
increases of <20%)
• Looking at the different farm types, adaptation can shift up to 20% of the large farms to higher welfare
levels, but most small and medium size farms will remain below poverty line. This means that for the
majority of rural families more drastic solutions have to be sought in and beyond agriculture.
• Rainfed agricultural production supports more than 90% of
farming families in southern Africa and this important
livelihood activity is under threat due to climate change.
• Changes in historical climate show increasing temperature
trends and temperatures are projected to increase by 1-2oC,
2-3oC and 3-5oC in the near future, mid-century and end of
century, respectively.
• Although rainfall direction and amplitude are uncertain,
averages are projected to remain within or close to baseline
variability; seasonality seems to remain unchanged, however
with low confidence though there would be possible monthly
rainfall reduction at the beginning of the rainy season.
• In the agricultural sector there is limited knowledge on the
interactions between projected increases in CO2,
temperature and precipitation variations and their combined
effects on crop and animal production, food security, poverty,
on-farm income hence adding to uncertainties surrounding
future smallholder farming systems.
E I K O R E I K O R E I K O R E I K O R
No adapt F17 F52 M U C
%Yieldchange
-150
-100
-50
0
50
100
150
Median Precipitation Change (%) for Mid-
Century RCP 8.5 in southern Africa
Median Temperature Change (%) for Mid-
Century RCP 8.5 in southern Africa
Nkayi district, Zimbabwe
• Mixed crop-livestock farming systems are predominant
in Nkayi district
• Current production is very low and most families
having only about 60% of own produced food annually,
livestock play an important role
• Households were stratified into three categories based
on cattle herd size, as this influences farmers’ wealth
status and the ability to invest in alternative
technologies Small (0 cattle), Medium (1-8 cattle) and
Large (>8 cattle), proportion in community is 43%, 38%
and 19%, respectively
• Climate projections indicate a 5 to 10% decrease
in rainfall, a small yet consistent decrease at the
onset of the rainy season (October-November)
suggesting a delayed start of the rainy season
and temperature increases of at least 3°C for the
period (2040-2070)
• 5 GCMs, CCSM4 (E), GFDL-ESM2M (I),
HadGEM2-ES (K), MIROC5 (O), MPI-ESM-MR
(R) were used to assess the impact of climate
change on crop-livestock production systems
Total number of surveyed households = 160 plus
• The impacts of climate change must be understood
and integrated into any future planning in order for
agricultural production to meet food demands of an
ever-growing population.
Reconfiguration pathway : Symbiotic innovations,
which developed in niches, are initially adopted in
the regime to solve local problems. They
subsequently trigger further adjustments in the
basic architecture of the regime (Geels and Schot, 2007)
Universidade Eduardo
Mondlane
• The use of low rates of inorganic and organic fertilizer and inclusion of forage legume crops of high-quality
feed biomass can substantially reduce the effects of climate change on crop and livestock production
• Adaptation reduces the proportion of households vulnerable to climate change from about 60% to 20%. Even
though up to 80% of the farms will possibly benefit from adaptation, the benefits will be relatively small (< 20%
increases in farm net returns and per capita incomes).
• The benefits also differ by types of farms. Small farms will make small benefits from climate change
adaptations (<200 USD farm net returns); while medium and better off farms can make up to 500 and 1200
USD higher per farm net returns, respectively but they also face higher risk.
1 International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), P O Box 776, Matopos, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe
2 Plant Production Systems, Wageningen University, PO Box 430, 6700 AK Wageningen, The Netherlands
3 Climate System Analysis Group, Environmental and Geographical Science Dept., University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa
4 Crops For the Future Research Centre, Semenyih, Selangor Darul Ehsan, Malaysia
5 Department of Soil, Crop and Climate Sciences, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa
6 International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), P.O. Box 39063, 00623 Nairobi, Kenya
7 Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, P.O. Box 21,9 Lilongwe, Malawi
8 Universidade Eduardo Mondlane, Edificio no. 1-C.P. 257 - Maputo, Mozambique
E I K O R
Maizegrainyieldkg/ha
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
1600
1800
2000
Base Base
Crop production Livestock production
• Climate change does not exert a big influence on maize and milk where yields will be reduced by <10 %.
• A substantial number of farms will lose from climate change. The magnitude of losers however varies across
the different GCMs. Under worst projections (GCMR) 61% of the farms are projected to lose under current
production systems, while under higher rainfall assumptions (GCMK) only 32% of the farms will lose, for
current as well as for future production systems
• Gains and losses from climate change are limited from the perspective of entire farms. Across the climate
scenarios the changes range between -3 and 7% per capita income, -5% and 9% farm net returns and -3
and 1% poverty rates.
Mid-century temperature and precipitation
changes at Nkayi from 20 GCMs under RCP 8.5
Crop production Livestock production
-2000
-1500
-1000
-500
0
500
1000
1500
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Opportunitycosts(USD/farm)
Percentage farm popula on
K 0 ca le K < 8 ca le K > 8 ca le
R 0 ca le R < 8 ca le R > 8 ca le
% non-adopters
% adopters
Climate data
Historical (1980-2010):
Mid century
(2040-2070):
RCP 8.5 (CMIP5)
20 GCMs
Projected changes in
temperature,
precipitation
Crop Model
APSIM + DSSAT
5 GCMs
Farmer practice
17kgN/ha
52kgN/ha
Maize-Mucuna rotation
Effects on on-farm
maize and Mucuna
production
Livestock model
Livsim
Feed gaps
On-farm feed production
(crop residues, forages)
Effects on livestock
production (milk, off-
take, mortality rates)
Economic model
TOA-MD
HH survey data (n=160)
Relative yields
Prices, costs
Economic trade-offs of
climate change and
adaptation strategies
on entire farms
Economic
impacts
Poverty rates
Income
Heterogeneous
populations
Integrated
assessment study of
climate impact
and adaptation
0
20
40
60
80
100
Adopters Increase in net returns
Magnitude of benefits (%)
Adopters Increase in net returns
Non adopters Adopters Increased net
returns per farm
Farmers who
benefit
Non adopters Adopters