Abstract:
This paper assessed climate change future effects and determined the perception of
sustainability of adaptive capacity resources among smallholder farmers in Manyoni District,
Tanzania. The paper adopted a cross-sectional study design. A multistage sampling was used
to select four wards randomly from which two villages were randomly selected in each ward
to make a total of eight villages. Using simple random sampling guided by lottery method, 30
respondents were selected from each village. The specific objectives were to identify the future
climate change effects; to determine the perceived sustainability of adaptive capacity resources
and to analyse the weights of perceived sustainability resources. Data collection was done
through a household questionnaire survey, focus group discussion and key informant
interviews. Descriptive analysis was used for analysis using SPSS. Kruskal-Wallis Test was
performed to test the perception of adaptive capacity resources in relation to age. It was found
that the expected future effects are: fall of grain production, acute water shortage, washing
away of fertile soil, reduced motivation to cultivating, increased food insecurity and soil
erosion. Furthermore, 60.4% of the smallholder farmers were found to have low perception on
the sustainability of adaptive capacity resources. Based on the findings the study concludes that
climate change will pose more serious effects in the future as indicated by the majority who
perceive sustainability of their adaptive capacity resources to be low being more worried of
these effects. Furthermore, the study concludes that, the critical adaptive capacity resources are
governance and human capital. The study recommends that smallholder farmers in collaboration with the District Agricultural Department devise proactive measures to address
the anticipated effects. Similarly, smallholder farmers and the local government should set
plans to strengthen a more sustainable access to and use of adaptive capacity resources.
