Geography, Geo-Informatics and Climate Sciences

Rainfall is one of the most critical climatic factors for smallholder farmers in Uganda whose farming activities are dominantly rain-fed. However, changes in rainfall patterns are threatening these smallholder farmers' livelihoods. This study was conducted to appraise the farmers' perceptions about the changes in rainfall patterns and their effects on agricultural production and livelihoods in Bududa and Manafwa districts, Uganda. A descriptive study involving focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews was conducted to determine farmers' perceptions about the nature, effects and adaptation to changes in rainfall patterns. Results indicate that majority (98%) of the farmers had noticed changes in rainfall patterns. The seasons were reportedly becoming shorter due to late onset and early cessation of rains The amount of rain was also considered more than normal and was concentrated in a short period at the beginning or end of the season. Farmers' perception...

Over the last twenty years, Uganda has experienced sustained economic growth, increasing urbanization and a sizeable transformation of economic output from agriculture to services. However, this shift in the sources of wealth in the economy has not been accompanied by a shift in employment out of agriculture to the other sectors. This reflects an inability of the more modern sectors of the economy to provide adequate employment for the many Ugandans entering the workforce every year. The relative underperformance of agriculture largely explains why very high income inequalities still persist between rural and urban areas. The government of Uganda recognizes these disparities and has consistently prioritized agricultural and rural development in all of its master development plans. It has also provided significant resources for road construction to better link rural Ugandans to urban market centers. However, the ability of government to effectively implement programs to attain its pr...

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Crop production in Mt. Elgon region (Uganda) generates a significant amount of crop residues (CR) that have for a long time been considered as 'trash' or agricultural waste. This neglect is due, in part, to the absence of a clear institutional framework governing utilization of CR. This paper presents a case for understanding of institutions that govern practices of CR utilization. It adopts the Institutional Analysis and Development framework to trace the evolution of institutional mechanisms governing utilization of CR; review the role of current institutional arrangements in influencing CR utilization among farming households; and recommend options that bolster household actions towards the utilization of CR. A synthesis of colonial institutional frameworks including bylaws showed that farmers were encouraged to engage in several soil conservation practices. Strict enforcement of these laws weakened after independence and almost collapsed with successive regimes. There is still a lack of an appropriate institutional framework at local level to influence the utilization of CR in Mt. Elgon region. The paper argues that proper institutional frameworks that penalize improper land use and incentivize better land use practices; build the capacity of farmers through awareness raising programs; and encourage better technologies for CR handling and storage should be strengthened.

The level of development of a society can be measured not only in terms of quantity of goods and services but also from the energy consumed. The importance of energy security derives from the critical role that it plays in all aspects of livelihoods of any society. The Government of Uganda is committed to well-planned urbanization and effective management of urban growth. This brings issues of low income settlements to the forefront of the national development agenda under one umbrella, but the provision of energy services to meet demand in low income settlements remains a critical challenge. Low income settlements in the four urban areas in Uganda were identified and a survey of energy demand patterns was conducted. This paper adopts ordered logistic regression modelling integrated with factor analysis (principal components analysis) to explore: 1) the relative importance of variable factors in determining household energy utilization, and 2) how they shape adaptation to energy insecurity within and across low-income settlements in selected urban centres in Uganda. Results indicate that, although charcoal use is uniform across all households, a large percentage of the slum population is heavily dependent for its energy services on multiple energy sources. Furthermore, households are burdened with relatively high retail prices for energy, electricity instabilities and wood shortages and wasteful/inefficient energy use. The logistic model indicates that household size, the share of adults in the household and gender in combination explain the utilization of firewood and electricity. Furthermore, adaptation strategies to energy insecurity coalesce around self-generation and use of improved energy technologies, adjustments in cooking practices and energy substitutions, and adjustments in sleeping schedules. Urban areas in Uganda are the residences of the future and efforts aimed at building energy security are very important.

Although Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Movement (NRM) has dominated Uganda's political scene for over three decades, the capital Kampala refuses to submit to the NRM's grip. As opposition activism in the city has become increasingly explosive, the ruling elite has developed a widening range of strategies to try and win urban support and constrain opposition. In this paper, we subject the NRM's strategies over the decade 2010-2020 to close scrutiny. We explore elite strategies pursued both from the 'top down', through legal and administrative manoeuvres and a ramping up of violent coercion, and from the 'bottom up', through attempts to build support among urban youth and infiltrate organisations in the urban informal transport sector. Although this evolving suite of strategies and tactics has met with some success in specific places and times, opposition has constantly resurfaced. Overall, efforts to entrench political dominance of the capital have repeatedly failed; yet challenges to the regime's dominance have also been unable to weaken it in any sustained way. We examine why each strategy for dominance has produced limited gains, arguing that together these strategies reproduced a situation of intensely contested control, in which no single group or elite can completely dominate the city.

Drylands occupy 44% of Uganda's land surface and provide livelihood to a cross-section of both rural and urban folks. However in the face of population pressure, drylands are increasingly in the path of conversion and degradation. This study therefore, performed an assessment of the effect of land use/cover change on biomass stock in olio sub-county from 1973 to 2001. A series of systematically corrected Orthorectified Landsat imageries of 1973, 1986 and 2001 obtained from the Landsat website were used. The images were analysed using unsupervised approach in Integrated Land and Water Information System version 3.3 and validated using field observations and historic memories of village elders. Findings indicate that land use/cover change is driven by small-scale farming. Between 1973-1986 significant declines were identified among small-scale farming (23.2%), grasslands (8.7%) and large scale-farming (9.9%). Further, declines were also registered between 1986-2001 in Bushland (12.1%), woodlands (13.9%) and wetlands (8.2%) while dramatic gains were registered in small-scale farming by 19.4%. These declines led to losses in the available biomass stock by 2001 within bushlands, wetlands and woodlands loosing 29.1 million tons, 669.1 metric tons and 87.3 million tons respectively. We conclude that small-scale farming by resource poor farmers is rapidly transforming the vegetation landscape. Therefore, there is need for increased use of remote sensing and GIS to quantify change patterns at local scales for essential monitoring and assessment of land use and or/cover change effects and human interference on the landscape. @JASEM

A great deal of work has been done on the nature of rights and the definitions of citizenship. However, little work has been done that explores how people perceive their citizenship rights and how they act on these perceptions especially in growing cities. High and low intensity protests have inscribed their presence and voice in Kampala city's streets, thereby becoming integral components of the city landscape. The paper uses critical urban theory, insurgent urbanism and citizenship as its conceptual framework to: 1) examine the terrain of struggle and militancy and, how Kampala residents engage with the state beyond formal processes; and, 2) assess government surveillance actions aimed at (de) constructing of citizenship in the city. The paper illuminates these questions and elaborates the notion of insurgent urbanism using Mabira forest demonstrations, September 2009 Buganda riots, and Walk-to-Work' (W2W) protests in Kampala City. The paper argues that the currents of militancy are very active across the city and the institutionalization and planning for insurgent claims and associated government responses in the broader urban policy terrain across the country.

Smallholder farmers in Namutumba district draw on a combination of adaptation strategies to respond to effects of climate variability. However, there is limited scholarly evidence and explanation that has been conducted on the factors that influence the choice of alternative sets of strategies that smallholder farmers use in response to climate variability specific stress and literature that disentangles climatic stressors specific adaptation options. A multi-stage sampling procedure was employed to select the study area and household respondents. The study used cross-sectional research design to collect both quantitative and qualitative data. Household data was collected from 160 respondents with a structured questionnaire supported by key informant interviews. Multinomial logit modeling (MNL) was used to determine the relative influence of selected household socio-demographic factors on the choice of adaptation strategies against the dry spell. Principal Components Analysis (PCA) was used to create weighted adaptation index for categorizing various similar adaptation strategies. In order to respond to the impact of climate variability stresses, smallholder farmers have adapted growing drought-resistant crops (12.2%), extension of the agricultural frontier into wetlands during the dry spells (37%), whereas use of crop rotation (9.8%) is the most dominant strategies used to manage pest and diseases, similarly soil and water conservation (15.3%) and climate-smart planning basin (11%) are the most dominant adaptation strategies use to manage flood. Empirical results from multinomial logit modeling showed that predictor variables gend-

Since climate change shocks and stresses cannot be fully prevented, building resilient urban areas is gaining more attention in the global community. By building resilience, the negative impacts of climate change shocks and stresses can be alleviated. Several indices have been developed to measure urban resilience. Yet, most of these indices focus more on objective methods which require robust bio-physical and socio-economic data sets which are generally lacking in many developing countries. To reduce this challenge, the use of subjective methods has recently been suggested. This study proposed and tested a Municipality Resilience Index (MRI) which employed a subjective method to assess the resilience of Mbale municipality in Eastern Uganda against climate change shocks and stresses. The proposed MRI includes 46 variables describing the physical, social, economic and institutional dimensions. The MRI can be applied in any municipality in developing countries facing climate related shocks and stresses and with limited survey data. The application of this index to Mbale municipality shows that the municipality has a low resilience index of 0.2. Similarly, most variables in the four dimensions of resilience reflected very low resilience scores with other divisions being more resilient than the others. Furthermore, the social dimension has the lowest score as compared to the physical, economic and institutional dimensions. The findings indicate a spatial variability in the contribution of the resilience dimensions within this small geographic confine. Moreover, the findings show the strengths and weaknesses in the different dimensions of the proposed MRI. This can act as a guide for policy and practitioners on which sectors to target in order to enhance the resilience of Mbale municipality.

Resilience has been raised as a core task within disaster risk reduction frameworks, yet it remains difficult to implement these global ideas in local communities. This study used Community Based Resilience Analysis Approach to investigate the components that are perceived as important in resilience and the extent to which these components have been achieved. It explored the trend of resilience and beneficial interventions for building resilience as perceived by interviewed participants in Mbale Municipality in Eastern Uganda. The study results indicate that access to education, healthcare, employment, peace and security were the most important components of resilience. Respondents perceived to have progressed in accessing credit, building productive farms and sustaining peace and security by July 2017. However, they assessed a lack of diverse incomegenerating activities, access to insurance, food security, employment and health care. Moreover, the study showed that respondents from marginalised parts of the municipality experienced decreasing resilience while respondents in other divisions had increased resilience. These results provide contextspecific components of resilience by the local people. This can inform the formulation of resilience indices and bear relevance for policy-makers and practitioners to understand areas to invest more resources to achieve resilience.

Purpose As climate change shocks and stresses increasingly affect urban areas in developing countries, resilience is imperative for the purposes of preparation, recovery and adaptation. This study aims to investigate demographic characteristics and social networks that influence the household capacity to prepare, recover and adapt when faced with prolonged droughts or erratic rainfall events in Mbale municipality in Eastern Uganda. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional research design was used to elicit subjective opinions. Previous studies indicate the importance of subjective approaches for measuring social resilience but their use has not been well explored in the context of quantifying urban resilience to climate change shocks and stresses. This study uses 389 structured household interviews to capture demographic characteristics, social networks and resilience capacities. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used for analysis. Findings The ability of low-income h...

African cities are largely less-built with agile informal settlements and multiple ecologies that harbor different pathways for resilience to climate change. We undertook a qualitative systematic review of academic and policy evidence, to address the question of what interventions are emerging at neigbourhood to city scale to enhance resilience to climate change in Africa. Resilience at neigbourhood scale often stems from harnessing the local resource base and technologies for urban agriculture and forestry; alternative energy from wastes; grassed drainages for protection against erosion; recreation along dry riverbeds; fog-water harvesting; and adjustments in irrigation schedules. At city scale, planning is targeted at buildings, mobility and energy service delivery as the objects to be made resilient. The review established that evidence on comparisons across regions is mainly on East, West and South African cities, and much less on cities in Northern and Central Africa. Ecological comparisons are majorly on coastal and inland cities, with minimal representation of semi-arid and mountainous cities. Resilience efforts in capital cities are the most dominant in the literature, with less emphasis on secondary cities and towns, which is necessary for a deeper understanding of the role played by inter-municipal and inter-metropolitan collaborations. African cities can bring contextsensitivity to global debates on climate resilience, if theoretical perspectives are generated from emerging interventions across case studies. We conclude with suggestions on what future research needs to take on, if evidence on resilience to climate change in African cities is to be strengthened.

Climate change affects both men and women which, in turn, shapes their varied and contrasting perceptions of climate variability and change. This paper examined the gendered perceptions of climate variability and change among local communities in Queen Elizabeth National Park in Uganda.The objectives are threefold: - identify climatic shocks faced by the local communities; examine the perceptions of men and women of climate variability and change; and to compare their perceptions with empirical meteorological data. This study employed both qualitative and quantitative methods, with data collected from 215 respondents using survey, interviews and focused group discussions. From the findings, indicators of climate variability and change included reduced flooding events, occurrence of human diseases, increasing crop pests and diseases, dry spells and intensity of rains. There was increasing significant temperatures while rainfall was declining. Both male and female significantly associ...

The need to merge scientific with societal knowledge in addressing global sustainability challenges has deepened research on a methodology known as co-producing knowledge. It differs from participatory approaches by holding potential for solution-oriented research through sustained relationships with actors across disciplines and sectors. Although there is growing recognition that power shapes interactions in co-producing knowledge, few studies have empirically grounded articulations of power in the context of urban sustainability. This paper draws on case study projects in Africa to discern the forms of power that are navigated by actors when co-producing locally grounded knowledge and solutions for urban sustainability. The projects include: localizing norms on sustainable energy in Kampala city Uganda; confronting coastal vulnerability in Durban South Africa; and upgrading informal settlements in Stellenbosch South Africa. The forms of power across the projects are: expert power ...

Queen Elizabeth National Park (QENP), their coping mechanisms, and challenges encountered. Data was collected from 250 respondents through questionnaires administered to small holder farmers, salt miners, and fisher folks, as well as in-depth interviews and focus group discussions (FGDs) held with selected households in Katunguru, Lake Katwe, Kasenyi, and Kahokya parishes in and around the park. The results indicated that climate variability affects all households through long dry spells (drought), increased intensity of rain and occurrence of water related diseases. This resulted in decline in economic output in the context of reduced food availability, household incomes, and poor health of the household members. The results further showed that although diversification of livelihood activities was uniform, the coping mechanisms were heterogeneous across the three economic sectors. While the agricultural households engaged in agricultural intensification, fisher folks changed their fishing technologies, and salt miners drained their flooded saltpans. According to the findings of this study, the effects of climate variability were widespread across all households in and around the park. The study recommends that rural households be supported in a variety of activities in order to build capacity.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set out a normative agenda that offers opportunity for cities to steer profound change globally. But if cities are to play an effective role in localizing the 2030 Agenda, there is a need for systematic engagement with the conundrums presented by the normative dimensions of the SDGs. We argue that African cities offer unique contextual insights into the linkages and overlaps among SDG norms, due to their immensely diverse nature and historically distinct drivers of urbanization. Set against African urban realities, the chapter presents an analytical framework that construes the linkages between global normative statements and local SDG meanings as mainstream and counter-mainstream interpretations. The framework was built by exploring alternative ways of localizing SDGs, through a transdisciplinary waste-to-energy research project in Kampala, Uganda. Based on the locally experienced tensions within the SDGs, we argue for a flexible approach to...

Understanding the evolution of land use/land cover change (LULCC) and how it shapes current and future ecosystem services (ES) supply potential remains critical in sustainable natural resource management. Community perception of historic LULCC was reconciled with previous study via remote sensing/geographical information systems using recall data in the Budongo–Bugoma landscape in Uganda. Then, a CA-Markovian prediction model of a LULC situation in 2040 under business as usual (BAU) and forest restoration scenarios was constructed. Additionally, we assessed the perceived proximate and underlying drivers of LULCC, and how LULCC shapes ecosystem services potential using household surveys. The perceived LULCC trend for the past three decades (1990–2020) corresponded with previous studies showing grassland, bushland, tropical high forest, and wetland cover declined greatly, while subsistence farmland, commercial farmland, and built-up areas had a great increment. The predicted LULC unde...