Zambia's climate is highly variable and over the last few decades has experienced a series of climatic extremes, e.g. droughts, seasonal floods and flash floods, extreme temperatures and dry spells, many of these with increased frequency, intensity and magnitude.
Over nine million people in 84 out of the 117 districts are affected according to the government crop assessment data. The 2023/2024 rainfall season was characterized by late onset, prolonged dry spells, and high temperatures. This erratic rainfall affected crop and animal production.
The prolonged dry spells in southern parts of the country coincided with crucial vegetative and flowering stages for staple and economic crops resulting in total crop failure. A total of 982,765 hectares out of an estimated 2,272,931 hectares of maize planted have been destroyed by the drought resulting in total crop failure. These dry conditions have resulted in a significant reduction in crop production in affected regions, with cereal production forecasted to decline by nearly 50 per cent.
In a Climate stressed Kalomo District in the Southern part of Zambia its another story where some parents are forcing girl children into early marriages to raise money for food as hunger coping strategy due persistent drought.
Rise Community Aid Programme (RICAP) Research, Monitoring and Evaluation Manager George Mumbi, who represented RICAP Executive Director Samuel Tundu said Kalomo District in Southern Province is in Zambia's Agro - Ecological Zone 1, which is prone to drought.
Mr. Mumbi further said agriculture is sometimes affected by drought which threatens food security resulting in malnutrition especially among children.
He said his organization is hoping to soon implement a donor funded project that hopes to focus on reducing the vulnerability of children and their communities to impacts of Climate Change in selected wards of Kalomo district.
"On the other hand, when rivers are flooded, children fail to go to school thereby tempering with their Right to Education," he said.
Girl Child marriage is still widespread across the globe where the total number of girls married in their childhood accounts for 12 million per year. One of the targets set in United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 5.3) is to end child marriage by 2030, but without increasing the rate of progress “more than 150 million additional girls will marry before their 18th birthday by 2030”.
The number of girls at extreme risk of facing the double blow of climate change and child marriage is set to increase 33% to nearly 40 million by 2050, new estimates from Save the Children released on the eve of International Day of the Girl reveal.
A new report by Save the Children – "Girls at the centre of the storm: Her planet, her future, her solutions" - also shows that around two-thirds of child marriages happen in regions with higher-than-average climate risks.
Currently an estimated 29.9 million adolescent girls live in the top 10 child-marriage-climate hotspot countries which are the nations that carry the highest risks that a girl will both marry as a child and experience life-changing climate disasters.
The combination of the impact of the climate crisis and child marriage has created emergency hotspots for girls' rights in some countries.
child marriage issue in regards to climate change and natural disaster should be addressed by governments by ensuring the agencies responsible for addressing climate change and natural disasters participate in developing and implementing the national action plan to end child marriage by 2030.
Meanwhile in Northern Province the case is different where Mirriam Chongo a single of Kaputa village in Northern Province knows what it is like to live on the edge of desperation. Climate change and economic hardship have proved a potent combination for this 47-year-old single Zambian mother of five.
Her struggles to keep her family afloat by growing maize and groundnuts after the death of her husband several years ago were dashed by unseasonal weather patterns.
Following the failure of her crops, Mirriam started running a makeshift grocery shop in her village in Kaputa, Zambia’s Northern Province. But her income – just 300 Zambian Kwacha (USD 15) in a good month – was barely enough to meet her family’s basic needs.
In least developed countries like Zambia, poverty forms a trap around rural families as strong as any prison walls as they struggle to obtain access to finances. When climate change hits in the form of unseasonal rains, droughts and floods – destroying crops and killing livestock - they are unable to spend their way out of trouble.
Single women like Mirriam Chongo are among the most vulnerable in Zambia’s patriarchal traditional communities, where age-old customs dictate a woman’s life. This vulnerability is compounded by the ravages of climate change.
Climate change can sometimes result in migration. In some cases only men migrate, while women are then left with their responsibilities back home, which creates problems as women cannot access resources and ownership in the same way in many places
Mirriam’s life improved during the past few months after ministry of green economy and environment started providing real-time weather advice, using mobile phones to help female farmers adapt to climate change.
She lost everything during floods, but with new training and support, Miriam has moved from just growing maize to venturing into more than five different drought-resistant crops.
"So most of the farmers here including myself, we grow crops such as sorghum, cassava, sweet potatoes and also millet," Mirriam said. She explained that these crops are climate resilient.
"We have also adapted agroforest where we plant a lot of trees including making our own organic fertiliser, we are not only depending on the artificial fertilisers but we also make our own fertiliser."
A year later, Mirriam now has had a total of 30 goats, including additional goats she bought using proceeds from the sale of goat manure. Mirriam sold 10 of her goats and five goat offspring were passed on to help other women. This tiered, multiplier-effect approach capitalizes on initial handouts while promoting solidarity, equity and sustainability within communities.
“If Zambia is to develop we need to scale up agro ecology farming as one of the sustainable means to secure our economy and secure our food.
There is need for government to invest more in terms of fighting the impact climate change saying that the 0.6 which is currently channeled towards environmental issues in the national budget is not enough.
The impact of climate change has affected us which has also seen a lot of health diseases such as malaria and others,”ActionAid Zambia Public Social Accountability Alliance Project Manager Geoffrey Sinzala said.
He is hopeful that as the ministry of finance when presenting the 2024 budget atleast 10% will be allocated towards the fight against climate change.
"We want to make sure that atleast 10% of the resources are channeled towards agriculture in line with the Malabo declaration,’He noted.
According to the Malabo Declaration, Agriculture should remain high on the development agenda of the continent, and is a critical policy initiative for African economic growth and poverty reduction.
There is not a moment to lose as Zambia is being hit hard by climate change. Since a drought in 2019, the devastating effects of prolonged dry spells coupled with the late onset of the rain season has impacted agriculture severely - reducing food availability and contributing to acute food insecurity across the country.
“Climate change is one of the major factors and challenges contributing to the low productivity of farmers, especially at the small-scale level,” said Minister of Agriculture Reuben Mtolo Phiri.
''Women play a central role in the conservation, management, and use of biodiversity, yet their contribution is often overlooked. They are relatively 'invisible' partners from the grassroots to the policy making level. If biodiversity is to survive, both women and men must play an equal part in its management''
Call to action; Because climate change is a relatively new subject among Zambians, more community work is needed for people to assimilate essential information.
For example, traditional farming methods locally called “Chitemene system”, imply cutting down trees for farming and wood as a source of domestic energy, which continues to injure the environment at an alarming rate.
Additionally, climate change financing is poor among local organizations and the implementation of the 2021 Zambia National Climate Learning Strategy requires momentum.
Government and civil society need to educate people about climate change, especially in Southern Province where parents are resulting in the marriage of young girls.
The question remains: Is the government, CSOs, and NGOs doing enough to help women especially in rural areas to fight climate change?
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