Climate change and food security in Tanzania: analysis of current knowledge and research gaps

Abstract

A review of literature was conducted in order to identify knowledge gaps in climate change and food security research in Tanzania. The review focused on published literature covering the past 20 years addressing climate change effects on various components of the food security. The review of literature reveals, among other things, that the current agricultural practices cannot ensure food security due to the fact that they heavily rely on the increasingly erratic and unreliable rainfall. Food systems in Tanzania are highly vulnerable to climate change and variability due to poor adaptive capacity of the socio-economic systems and limited community resilience to cope with climate variability and change. Response to climate change impacts is affected by multiple factors at different scales, ranging from the individual to the household and landscape, which in turn affects food security. Quality climate change science research in Tanzania is limited by few, scattered, unevenly distributed, and ill-equipped meteorological stations. This calls for research that is geared towards combining mitigation and adaptation strategies against the impacts of climate change, focusing on adaptation strategies that build climate resilience, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and increase food security. Multidisciplinary research is required to provide a science-based analysis of potential coping and adaptation strategies and their economic and social effects.