ESE: Collaborative Research: Spatial Resilience of Agriculturalists to Coupled Ecological and Hydrological Variability in Rural Zambia

ESE：合作研究：赞比亚农村地区农民对生态和水文耦合变化的空间复原力

• 批准号: 1026334
• 负责人: Kelly Caylor
• 金额: $ 35万
• 依托单位: Princeton University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2010-10-01 至 2015-03-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1026334&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: ESE; Collaborative; Research; Spatial; Resilience

Rural livelihoods in many parts of the world are dramatically affected by climate variability and its corresponding impact on water availability and provision of ecosystem services. This is particularly the case in the semi-arid tropics (SAT), which contain 22% of the world's population and high concentrations of chronic poverty and inadequate food consumption. Much of the vulnerability of smallholders within the SAT is driven by surface hydrological dynamics; both directly through rainfall variability and indirectly through additional human- or climate-induced land and water degradation. When crop yields decline due to insufficient or in some cases excessive precipitation, households adopt various coping strategies to survive, many of which have an explicitly spatial dimension. Tom Evans from the Department of Geography at Indiana University and Kelly Caylor in the Department of Civil Engineering at Princeton University examine the resilience of smallholders in Zambia to climate variability by examining the spatial patterns of water availability and agricultural decision-making. The project particularly focuses on the diversity of coping strategies that smallholders in different locations employ to survive periods of crop failure such as skipping meals, seeking off-farm work opportunities or relying on food aid. The decision and option to choose different coping mechanisms depends on a complex set of social and ecological conditions such as precipitation patterns, surface topography, the spatial distribution of land holdings, social norms within a community and the regional availability of food aid. This project will examine these complex dynamics in two regions of Zambia that present a range of hydrological/climate regimes and socio-economic conditions. Specifically, we will focus on one province with low annual precipitation and relatively frequent periods of drought, and a second province with moderate annual rainfall and less severe seasonal drought.This research will lead to new understanding of the relationship between hydrological dynamics and the ability of smallholders to respond to climate variability in the semi-arid tropics. While a substantial amount of research has addressed the resilience of systems to understand how societies cope with social or ecological disturbances, the spatial dimensions of resilience have not been fully explored. The results from this research will identify what coping strategies smallholders use in different land use and hydrological contexts and articulate the spatial dimensions of those coping strategies. This project will also develop new methods to identify 'hotspots' of vulnerability given specific scenarios for future climate variability that has implications for development initiatives and food aid distribution activities.

世界许多地区的农村生计受到气候变化及其对水资源供应和生态系统服务提供的相应影响的严重影响。 半干旱热带地区 (SAT) 的情况尤其如此，该地区人口占世界人口的 22%，长期贫困和粮食消费不足的情况高度集中。 SAT 内小农的脆弱性很大程度上是由地表水文动态造成的；直接通过降雨量变化，间接通过人类或气候引起的土地和水退化。当农作物产量因降水不足或在某些情况下过多而下降时，家庭会采取各种应对策略来生存，其中许多策略具有明确的空间维度。 印第安纳大学地理系的汤姆·埃文斯和普林斯顿大学土木工程系的凯利·凯勒通过研究水资源可用性和农业决策的空间模式来研究赞比亚小农对气候变化的适应能力。 该项目特别关注不同地点的小农户为度过农作物歉收时期而采用的应对策略的多样性，例如不吃饭、寻求非农工作机会或依赖粮食援助。 选择不同应对机制的决定和选择取决于一系列复杂的社会和生态条件，例如降水模式、地表地形、土地所有权的空间分布、社区内的社会规范以及粮食援助的区域可用性。 该项目将研究赞比亚两个地区的复杂动态，这两个地区呈现出一系列水文/气候状况和社会经济条件。 具体来说，我们将重点关注年降水量较低且干旱相对频繁的省份，以及年降水量适中且季节性干旱较轻的省份。这项研究将对水文动态与干旱能力之间的关系产生新的认识。小农户应对半干旱热带地区的气候变化。 虽然大量研究已经解决了系统的复原力问题，以了解社会如何应对社会或生态干扰，但复原力的空间维度尚未得到充分探索。 这项研究的结果将确定小农在不同的土地利用和水文环境中使用哪些应对策略，并阐明这些应对策略的空间维度。 该项目还将开发新方法来识别脆弱性“热点”，考虑到未来气候变化的具体情景，这对发展举措和粮食援助分配活动有影响。