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Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study

Climate change poses severe threats to the social, cultural, and economic integrity of indigenous smallholder subsistence farmers, who are intricately linked with their natural ecosystems. Sauria Paharia, a vulnerable indigenous community of Jharkhand, India, are smallholder farmers facing food and...

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Autores principales: Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna, Kapoor, Ridhima, Ghosh, Upasona, Singh, Archna, Downs, Shauna, Fanzo, Jessica
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7613000/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35811836
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2021.667297
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author Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna
Kapoor, Ridhima
Ghosh, Upasona
Singh, Archna
Downs, Shauna
Fanzo, Jessica
author_facet Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna
Kapoor, Ridhima
Ghosh, Upasona
Singh, Archna
Downs, Shauna
Fanzo, Jessica
author_sort Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna
collection PubMed
description Climate change poses severe threats to the social, cultural, and economic integrity of indigenous smallholder subsistence farmers, who are intricately linked with their natural ecosystems. Sauria Paharia, a vulnerable indigenous community of Jharkhand, India, are smallholder farmers facing food and nutrition insecurity and have limited resources to cope with climate change. Eighteen villages of Godda district of Jharkhand inhabited by Sauria Paharia community were randomly selected to conduct a mixed methods study. In 11 out of 18 study villages, we conducted focus group discussions (FGDs) to examine the perception of this indigenous community regarding climate change and its impact on agroforestry and dietary diversity. In all 18 villages, household and agricultural surveys were conducted to derive quantitative estimates of household food consumption patterns and agroforestry diversity, which were triangulated with the qualitative data collected through the FGDs. The FGD data revealed that the community attributed local climatic variability in the form of low and erratic rainfall with long dry spells, to reduced crop productivity, diversity and food availability from forests and waterbodies. Declining agroforestry-produce and diversity were reported to cause reduced household income and shifts from subsistence agricultural economy to migratory unskilled wage laboring leading to household food insecurity. These perceptions were supported by quantitative estimates of habitual food consumption patterns which revealed a predominance of cereals over other food items and low agroforestry diversity (Food Accessed Diversity Index of 0.21 ± 0.15). The adaptation strategies to cope with climate variability included use of climate-resilient indigenous crop varieties for farming, seed conservation and access to indigenous forest foods and weeds for consumption during adverse situations and lean periods. There were mixed views on cultivation of hybrid crops as an adaptation strategy which could impact the sustained utilization of indigenous food systems. Promoting sustainable adaptation strategies, with adequate knowledge and technology, have the potential to improve farm resilience, income, household food security and dietary diversity in this population.
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spelling pubmed-76130002022-07-07 Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna Kapoor, Ridhima Ghosh, Upasona Singh, Archna Downs, Shauna Fanzo, Jessica Front Sustain Food Syst Article Climate change poses severe threats to the social, cultural, and economic integrity of indigenous smallholder subsistence farmers, who are intricately linked with their natural ecosystems. Sauria Paharia, a vulnerable indigenous community of Jharkhand, India, are smallholder farmers facing food and nutrition insecurity and have limited resources to cope with climate change. Eighteen villages of Godda district of Jharkhand inhabited by Sauria Paharia community were randomly selected to conduct a mixed methods study. In 11 out of 18 study villages, we conducted focus group discussions (FGDs) to examine the perception of this indigenous community regarding climate change and its impact on agroforestry and dietary diversity. In all 18 villages, household and agricultural surveys were conducted to derive quantitative estimates of household food consumption patterns and agroforestry diversity, which were triangulated with the qualitative data collected through the FGDs. The FGD data revealed that the community attributed local climatic variability in the form of low and erratic rainfall with long dry spells, to reduced crop productivity, diversity and food availability from forests and waterbodies. Declining agroforestry-produce and diversity were reported to cause reduced household income and shifts from subsistence agricultural economy to migratory unskilled wage laboring leading to household food insecurity. These perceptions were supported by quantitative estimates of habitual food consumption patterns which revealed a predominance of cereals over other food items and low agroforestry diversity (Food Accessed Diversity Index of 0.21 ± 0.15). The adaptation strategies to cope with climate variability included use of climate-resilient indigenous crop varieties for farming, seed conservation and access to indigenous forest foods and weeds for consumption during adverse situations and lean periods. There were mixed views on cultivation of hybrid crops as an adaptation strategy which could impact the sustained utilization of indigenous food systems. Promoting sustainable adaptation strategies, with adequate knowledge and technology, have the potential to improve farm resilience, income, household food security and dietary diversity in this population. 2021-06-17 /pmc/articles/PMC7613000/ /pubmed/35811836 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2021.667297 Text en https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Article
Ghosh-Jerath, Suparna
Kapoor, Ridhima
Ghosh, Upasona
Singh, Archna
Downs, Shauna
Fanzo, Jessica
Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title_full Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title_fullStr Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title_full_unstemmed Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title_short Pathways of Climate Change Impact on Agroforestry, Food Consumption Pattern, and Dietary Diversity Among Indigenous Subsistence Farmers of Sauria Paharia Tribal Community of India: A Mixed Methods Study
title_sort pathways of climate change impact on agroforestry, food consumption pattern, and dietary diversity among indigenous subsistence farmers of sauria paharia tribal community of india: a mixed methods study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7613000/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35811836
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fsufs.2021.667297
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