Livestock farmers' perception of climate change and adaptation strategies in the Gera district, Jimma zone, Oromia Regional state, southwest Ethiopia

The aim of this study is to assess livestock farmers' perception of climate change (CC)/variability and adaptation strategies in the Gera district. Rainfall and temperature were the variables taken in the CC perception study. A total of 190 smallholder livestock farmers were sampled for the survey. Primary data were collected through semi-structured questionnaire interviews, focus group discussions (FGDs) and meteorological data series of 2001–2020. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 20.0 was used to analyze the data. The results revealed that 79.17% of respondents perceived climate change over the past 20 years. About 84.9% and 82.9% of respondents perceived increasing temperature and decreasing rainfall over the past 20 years, respectively. Farmers' perception was consistent with meteorological data of the area, which also showed increasing trend in temperature and decreasing trend in rainfall. Farmers' perceived that anthropogenic action and natural processes, anthropogenic action, natural processes, and God's anger against human sins were the main causes of CC, in decreasing order. No statistical difference (p > 0.05) was found between AEZs regarding effects of CC except for incidence of trypanosomiasis. Decreased quality and quantity of feeds, water availability, milk production, and animal fertility, and increased calving interval, number of services per conception, incidence of animal disease, and parasite were perceived as the major impacts (indicators) of CC on livestock production and productivity in their order of importance. Diversification of mixed crop-livestock, diversification of livestock species, feed conservation, reducing herd sizes, water harvesting, provision of supplementary feeds, and forage production were the most practiced adaptation strategies. Lack of technical know-how about water harvesting, shortage of land for forage production, lack of improved forage seeds, lack of supplementary feed, poor livestock management skill, lack of feed conservation practices and poor access to market were the most important barriers to CC adaptation. It is concluded that there is a need for policy makers and livestock development stakeholders to formulate and implement intervention that promote farmers' perception and adaptation abilities to CC impacts and address the identified barriers for improving livestock productivity in the study area.