TY - JOUR
T1 - Limits to adaptation to interacting global change risks among smallholder rice farmers in Northwest Costa Rica
AU - Warner, Benjamin P.
AU - Kuzdas, Christopher
AU - Yglesias, Mariel G.
AU - Childers, Daniel
N1 - Funding Information:
Funding was generously provided the C.W. & Modene Neely Charitable Foundation, Organization for Tropical Studies National Science Foundation grants (#s 0553925 and 1132840 ), and the GISER Integrative Society and Environment Research Program . Thanks are also extended to the farmers who gave their time to be involved in this research in the hope that it would inform sustainable development. Our gratitude is extended to Hallie Eakin and Joshua Abbott for extremely constructive comments on multiple drafts of the manuscript, and to Carolina Murcia for her vision and support of this research. Finally, we would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2014 Elsevier Ltd.
PY - 2015/1/1
Y1 - 2015/1/1
N2 - In this paper, we discuss the theoretical relationships among interacting global change risks, valued livelihood goals, and adaptation limits. We build from research on the impacts of multiple and interacting global change risks in lesser-developed countries and seek to understand household adaptation limits in agrarian communities. We ask: What are valued livelihood goals among smallholder farmers in Northwest Costa Rica? How do socio-economic determinants of adaptive capacities determine their ability to meet these goals in the face of the impacts of interacting global change risks? Our data were based on focus groups, interviews, survey responses from 94 smallholder farmers, government statistics, and published literature. We analyzed our data using qualitative content analysis and quantitative logistic regression models. Our analysis showed that farmers perceived rice production as an identity, and that they were being forced to consider limits to their abilities to adapt to maintain that identity. We found that farm size, cattle ownership, years spent farming, and household income variety were determinants of their abilities to remain in rice production while maintaining sufficient levels of livelihood security. We also showed that for those households most vulnerable to water scarcity, their ability to successfully adapt to meet valued livelihood goals is diminished because adaptation to water scarcity increases vulnerability to decreased rice-market access. In this way, they become trapped by the inability to reduce their vulnerability to risks of the interaction between global changes and therefore abandon valued identities and livelihoods.
AB - In this paper, we discuss the theoretical relationships among interacting global change risks, valued livelihood goals, and adaptation limits. We build from research on the impacts of multiple and interacting global change risks in lesser-developed countries and seek to understand household adaptation limits in agrarian communities. We ask: What are valued livelihood goals among smallholder farmers in Northwest Costa Rica? How do socio-economic determinants of adaptive capacities determine their ability to meet these goals in the face of the impacts of interacting global change risks? Our data were based on focus groups, interviews, survey responses from 94 smallholder farmers, government statistics, and published literature. We analyzed our data using qualitative content analysis and quantitative logistic regression models. Our analysis showed that farmers perceived rice production as an identity, and that they were being forced to consider limits to their abilities to adapt to maintain that identity. We found that farm size, cattle ownership, years spent farming, and household income variety were determinants of their abilities to remain in rice production while maintaining sufficient levels of livelihood security. We also showed that for those households most vulnerable to water scarcity, their ability to successfully adapt to meet valued livelihood goals is diminished because adaptation to water scarcity increases vulnerability to decreased rice-market access. In this way, they become trapped by the inability to reduce their vulnerability to risks of the interaction between global changes and therefore abandon valued identities and livelihoods.
KW - Adaptation limits
KW - Costa Rica
KW - Interacting risks
KW - Transformative adaptation
KW - Valued livelihood goals
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U2 - 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.11.002
DO - 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.11.002
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84919688052
VL - 30
SP - 101
EP - 112
JO - Global Environmental Change
JF - Global Environmental Change
SN - 0959-3780
ER -