Determinants of Household Food Security Status and Challenges of Building Resilience to Climate Variability and Change Posed by Drought in Tharaka Nithi, Kenya

Abstract

Climate change and variability pose momentous severe threats to agricultural development and consequently to economic growth and increased poverty levels. In reference, this paper examines the determinants of household food security status and assesses the challenges of building resilience to climate variability and change posed by drought in Tharaka Nithi, Kenya. The study coverage is Tharaka North and Tharaka South sub-counties which are semiarid and cover an area of 1,569 square kilometers (km²) with a total population of 158,023 people; this is about 65% of Tharaka Nithi County (Kenya). The sub-counties have three main livelihood zones (LZs). These are marginal mixed farming at 52%, mixed farming at 38%, and rain-fed cropping at 10%.

The area is exposed to climate change, aggravated by minimal adaptive capacity. Climate variability and climate change threaten food production leading to about 20–30% of the population being in poor and borderline food consumption score. The year 2017 describes one of the cyclical drought situations with low productivity and depleted range land conditions exposing approximately 30,000 persons in need of humanitarian assistance. This study reflects on challenges of building resilience to climate variability and change posed by drought using a transdisciplinary approach. The problems of the household food security status were poor rainfall performance, high temperatures, low livestock prices, high food prices, poor crop production, poor pasture and browse quality, and inadequate water for both domestic and livestock use. The solutions to the above-listed issues lie in the increased advocacy, rainwater harvesting structures, marketing linkages, timely early warning knowledge management, and eco-based farming practices. The study also found that there was a significant relationship between the household level of education, family size, household income, and household head age with food security. Findings of this study will form a platform for policy makers.