Adverse Impact of Climate Change on Mambioko Community Dependent Forest and Local Perception on Vulnerabilities and Responses-Centre Region of Cameroon

This study was undertaken to identify and assess climate change vulnerabilities and impacts on the livelihoods of forest dependent communities in Mambioko community forest in the Centre Region of Cameroon. Primary data was collected from 120 households; key informants, focus group discussions and was supplemented with secondary data from desk review of relevant literature. Forest resources were generally perceived by forest dependent communities as declining. Climate Change was observed to have impacted on their major livelihood’s activities/resources of forest dependent communities by way of prolonged drought, erratic rainfall pattern, and variability in rainfall intensity. These trends have consequently led to drying of rivers and streams, shift in cropping season, reduced yield, frequent and extreme warm conditions among others. Use of irrigation, crop diversication, household income diversication through alternative livelihood activities and increase in size of cultivated farms are among the different measures being adopted by communities to cope up with the effects of climate change. Using socio-economic indicators, the bimodal agro ecological zone is vulnerable to climate change impact. The zone has relatively higher dependency on climate sensitive livelihood activities/resources, limited diversied income sources and moderate access to climate change information. In an attempt to help forest dependent communities cope up with climate change impacts, fundamental issues such as non-climate dependent alternative livelihood activities, access to climate, sustainable agricultural practices and sustainable forest resources management are key areas for various multidisciplinary intervention.


Background
Forest ecosystems have important environmental and ecological dimensions which provide livelihoods to Millions of people globally. Forest provides services that are directly link to micro and macro climate, water and soil resources, plants and animals' diversity, food production and food securities and energy resources. Nevertheless, the dynamic nature of ecological systems is continuously in uence by climate variabilities. Climate change has the multifaceted potentials to affect the geographical location of ecological systems the species they contain and ability to offer a wide range of bene ts on which society depend on for their sustained livelihood generations Climate change is often considered a key threat to the survival of species and the reliability on the forest ecosystems world-wide. It is believed that the effects of climate change on forests will continue to alter forest in many ways, resulting to change of many services that forest ecosystem provide. In the forest zone of Cameroon recent studies indicated that climate change is already having adverse impact on the livelihood strategies of rural people (Bele et al., 2013). Drought, changing seasons, erratic rainfall patterns, heavy rainfall and strong winds are among the main climate-related disturbances perceived by local people. Although some individuals have developed coping strategies, there is a limit of broader community resilience that can be fostered through such individual's efforts (Bele et al., 2013). It is important to understand and know the impact of climate change on the livelihoods of the forest dependent communities and the respond of these communities within the context of their adaptation strategies which in future will reduce their vulnerability and enhance their livelihoods activities. The roles play by forest-dependent communities through incentives, motivation and participation in design and the implementation of adaptation strategies. This research is aims at contributing to the growing literature on climate change vulnerability and the adaptation strategies in forests dependent communities in Cameroon.

Conceptual Frameworks
Vulnerability is a word that is familiar to most of the people and is commonly used to refer to something that is at risk of being harmed. Many speci c technical de nitions of vulnerability have been developed to meet the needs of different social and ecological elds of investigation. This research uses the technical de nition of vulnerability given by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the IPCC), where vulnerability is described as: The propensity or predisposition to be adversely affected. Vulnerability encompasses a variety of concepts and elements including sensitivity or susceptibility to harm and lack of capacity to cope and adapt. (IPCC, 2014) Resilience, a concept related to vulnerability, is also considered when projecting how systems may respond to climate change. The IPCC (2014) de nes resilience as: The capacity of social, economic, and environmental systems to coupe-up with a hazardous event or trend or disturbance, responding or reorganizing in ways that maintain their essential function, identity, and structure, while also maintaining the capacity for adaptation, learning, and transformation." Vulnerability and resilience are, therefore, related aspects of how systems are affected by climate change vulnerability re ects the harm that may be caused to a system by climate change, while resilience re ects the ability of a system to "carry on" despite being exposed to climate change (Brugère and De Young, 2015). Although they are closely linked concepts, vulnerability and resilience are not opposing concepts, since a system can be both vulnerable to climate change and resilient, if it has the capacity to recover from and adapt to damage caused by climate change (Buckle et al., 2001, Gallopin, 2006. Vulnerability and resilience can be analyzed by considering the impacts on a system caused by climate or extreme weather. Climate change impacts are often characterized using three factors: the exposure to potentially damaging climate or weather; the sensitivity of the system to that exposure, and the ability of the system to adapt once the exposure has happened. These three factors, exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity, are core elements of many approaches to assessing the vulnerability and resilience of systems to climate change (Fritzsche et al., 2014). The IPCC (2014) de nes exposure, sensitivity, impacts and adaptive capacity as follows: Exposure is the presence of people, ecosystems, infrastructure, or a species, in an area expected to be exposed to changes in climate or to extreme weather, either under present conditions or in future.
Sensitivity is the magnitude of the direct or indirect effects of climate or extreme weather, either adversely or bene cially, relative to the climatic event.
Impacts are the observed effects of climate and extreme weather.
Adaptive capacity is the ability of a system or a species to respond to climate change or a climatic event in a way that reduces harmful impacts. The relationships of vulnerability and resilience to exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity are shown diagrammatically in Figure 1. The damage caused to the system which re ects the system's vulnerability is the outcome of the exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. The ability of the system to retain its function -the system's resilience -re ects how well the system can recover from the exposure to climate change. Among the components, exposure and sensitivity is determined by the intrinsic attributes of the system. Exposure and sensitivity can increase or decrease according to the perturbation of external environments. Adaptive capacity of a system concludes how much a system is vulnerable or resilient to the perturbation.

Environmental Degradation in Mambioko Community Forest
The principal cause of environmental degradation as reported by the local communities during the focused group discussions and eld survey were bush re with an estimated 50 ha forest being cleared every year as dry season has been come to prolong resulting to drought and ooding of some food crops farms as the rainy season has been too rainier.

Literature Review
In the forest zone of Cameroon recent studies indicated that climate change is already having adverse impact on the livelihood strategies of rural people (Bele et al., 2013). Drought, changing seasons, erratic rainfall patterns, heavy rainfall and strong winds are among the main climate-related disturbances perceived by local people. Although some individuals have developed coping strategies, there is a limit of broader community resilience that can be fostered through such individual's efforts (Bele et al., 2013). It is important to understand and know the impact of climate change on the livelihoods of the forest dependent communities and the respond of these communities within the context of their adaptation strategies which in future will reduce their vulnerability and enhance their livelihoods activities

Study objectives
The objectives of this study are: To identify major climate sensitive livelihood resources at the household level.
Examine the level of dependency on climate sensitive livelihoods resources and their perception of climate change impacts on their livelihoods.
To examine the socio-economic vulnerability and the available coping and adaptation strategies.

Study area Description and Methodology
The site selected for this study (Mambioko ) is about 40km away from the chief town of Ngambe-Tikar sub division. It was selected based on the accessibility, number of villages, and dependency of the community on climate sensitive livelihood resources. The study site is covered by a community forests (Mambioko community forest) and it fall in the bi-modal humid forest agro-ecological zone with an annual rainfall range of 1,500-3,000mm and mean temperature of 23°C and covered a surface area of 4684 hectares with a population of about 800 inhabitants and a population density of about 7 people per km2. They are found in the transition zone between Northwestern Congolian lowland forests and Northern Congolian forest-savanna mosaic. The local economy is based on the exploitation of natural resources including timber agriculture, hunting, shing and the exploitation of non-timber forest products (NTFPs). The area is characterized by an equatorial climate, made up of two dry seasons (November -February and July -mid-September), and two rainy seasons (March to June and mid-September late October. Annual rainfall is between 1,600 mm and 1,700 mm and average temperature range from 19ºC to 29 ºC

Data collection
Secondary data was obtained through desk review of related literature from published and unpublished sources. A survey and primary data collection was collected within ve months from February 2018 to July 2018 in villages that constitutes the study area. Primary data was collected through structured questionnaire for conducting interview at household level. In each village, the households were selected based on their availability of individuals, their willingness to participate in the interviews and their estimated numbers as given by the village head and the age chosen that was from 27 years and above was based on their longevity in the study site; experienced in local climatic variability and climatic changes. Additional information was collected from key informants through focus group discussions or village meetings. Tools used include; brainstorming, historical trend analysis diagnosis, visioning, process documentation. Tools which were used include; brainstorming, historical trend analysis diagnosis, visioning, process documentation.

Data Analysis
Data were analyzed descriptively using excel spread sheet. Statistics were carried out where necessary to test for the level of signi cance among variables. Analysis were made at the level of the agro-ecological zone Results And Discussion 5.1 Major climate sensitive livelihood resources.
According to some households during survey, shing was identi ed as major climate sensitive livelihood activity and ranked the lowest climate sensitive livelihood activity (1.75%) of the respondents their major livelihood activity was shing. Hunting was identi ed as another major climate sensitive livelihood activity (1.7%) of the respondent their major climate sensitive livelihoods activity was hunting, which ranked the second lowest. Others livelihood activities were (non dependent on climate sensitive livelihood activities like business and white collar job).The collection of NTFPs was also another major climate sensitive livelihood activity/resources (61.3%) of the respondents do carried out the collections of NTFP as their major livelihood activity and was ranked the second highest major livelihood activity and agriculture ranked the highest major livelihood activity (100%) of the respondents carried out agriculture as their major livelihood activity. From this study it was observed that, the entire households do carry out different agricultural activities but to some households it is not their major livelihood activities ( Figure.3)

Level of dependency on climate sensitive livelihoods resources
In the study area, respondents ranked their level of dependency on climate sensitive livelihood activities/resources based on the signi cant contribution climate sensitive livelihood activities/resources (tree products, plant materials and forest product for food and agricultural activities like farming) make to household's income and other household needs ( Figure.4). The three-level ranking was used based on the signi cant role these resources play in livelihoods sustainability. (High dependency = Home consumption and frequent sale of surplus on the local market; Moderate Dependency = Home consumption and occasional sale on the local market; Less dependency = Home consumption only) Generally, (46.7%) of the total respondents were ranked as high level of dependency on forest resources. In this category, respondents described the contribution of climate sensitive livelihood activities/ resources to household's income as very signi cant. The study showed that level of dependency on shing was(11.8%) following the eld survey which ranked the third lowest dependency, follow by hunting which recorded a percentage of (6.8%) which ranked the second lowest dependency while others activities recorded (3.4%) level of dependency which ranked the lowest dependency while the collections of NTFPs recorded (39.8%) of dependency which ranked the second highest dependency and nally agriculture recorded the (99.2%) level of dependency and was ranked the rst highest level of dependency following the survey. (Figure.4)

Perception on climate change impacts on major livelihoods resources (agriculture and its indicators)
Agriculture is still highly dependent on climate; temperature, light, and water are the main drivers of crop growth. The perception of climate change impact on agriculture was based on the following indicators like pest and diseases, drought, erratic rainfall, prolong, rainfall, low production, changing seasons and strong winds. In this study (74.6%) of the respondents agreed that pest and diseases have been affecting their agricultural activities in the past 10 years especially cocoa. This nding is like the study of (INS,2009b). Low production (83.2%) of the respondents agreed that this have been the principal climatic threat to their agricultural activities leading to food insecurity in these communities. Erratic rainfall as one the indicator, (81.5%) of the respondents believed the climatic stress they are facing on their agricultural activities is erratic rainfall which have change their traditional farming which they use to have in the past. This nding is like another study carry out (Bele et al.,2013). According to the survey (54.2%) of respondents agreed that prolong rainy seasons was affecting their agricultural activities which result to post harvest problem and food insecurity. This nding is similar to the study carried out by ((Yengoh et al., 2010a). In addition, (97.5%) of respondents said strong winds is one of the climatic stress affecting their livelihood activity (agriculture). This nding is like the study carried out by (Bele et al.2013). Following the household survey, (94.1%) of respondents agreed that the increase in climatic events like drought have increase food insecurity in this communities which their livelihoods depend on agriculture. (Figure.5). According this communities, changing seasons (100%) of the respondents is affecting the production calendar which at rst was clearly de ned but now farmers needs to adapt to unpredicted rainfall and dry season patterns. This nding was revealed by (Chia et al.2011).

Respondents perception of climate change impact on shing and its indicators
Fishing is another activity and a source of income to some households in the study area. According to responses during the survey, (9.8%) of the household agreed that, the drying of water courses due to unreliable rainfall have reduced shing ground in this communities leading to reduction in the quantities of sh which is caught, for the past 10 years for commercial and for subsistence. In addition, drought (93.2%) of the households agreed that, the principal climatic threat to shing activity was drought especially during the short rainy seasons reducing food compliments of the households. (Figure.6).
Furthermore, household responses (69.5%)agreed that heavy rainfall is the climatic disturbance affecting shing in this communities especially as the rainy seasons have been come rainier in the past years.

The perception of respondents on the impact of climate change on NTFPs
Forest resources in the form of NTFPs serve as safety nets, sustaining the livelihoods of some forest communities in Mambioko. They play a vital role in income generation and household food security (Nkem et al.2010 due to prolong dry season. Also (84.9%) of the household agreed that erratic rainfall is affecting the collection of NTFPs especially the harvesting of certain fruits in some tree species according some household in Ngoume is very poor due pests and diseases that affect the owering of this fruits base on their local knowledge.

5.6Socio-economic vulnerability of respondents in the study site base on six selected indicators
The socio-economic vulnerability in the study site was estimated using six socio-economic indicators. In the estimation, the following assumptions were made: improving (technically, nancially and materially) agriculture activities which will reduce the vulnerability and increase the adaptive capacity of households. The planting of trees to protect winds (5.9%) of the household have planted trees especially around their houses to protect strong winds during torrential rainfall which is accompanied by strong winds in the study site which use to off roof their houses and most households used their traditional methods to protect winds by tying red pieces of cloths round their farms land. Additional (7.6%) of the household have adopted irrigation system of farming during the prolong dry seasons and drought, they moved to swamps areas and opened their new farms where water is available throughout the year the local farmer used watering cane to send water into the farms. They described this irrigation system as "climatic push factor". In this result (69.7%) of household have diversi ed their occupation in order to reduce their vulnerability to local climate and uncertainty. Engaging in non-climate dependent alternative jobs such as driving, masonry works, sale of assorted goods "provision store", shoe repairing, painting, sewing or dress making was ranked the second highest among the coping measures described by respondents. Although the dominant occupation is farming and therefore it is expected that most people will give priority to any coping measures that will help sustain their dominant livelihood activity, household members especially the young migrating to urban centres in search for jobs resulting to rural exodus in the study site. Finally, (78.2%) of respondent have increased their farms sizes. According to the household, they increase their farms sizes every beginning of farming season as an adaptation option to local climate variability and uncertainty. The expansion of agricultural land is a coping and adaptation strategy for these forest dependent communities (Figure.8). This supported the ndings carried around the same area (Bele et al., 2013a, 2013band Chia et al., 2013. Increasing the agriculture land to compensate for losses has put more pressure on other natural resources on which the communities depend, resulting in a perverse cycle that could increase their vulnerability even more. Increased climate variability and uncertainty seems to be one of the main disturbances shaping current vulnerability in these communities.

Conclusions
This study has investigated the adverse impacts of climate change effect at the household level of forest dependent communities in the case of Mambioko CF in the Centre region of Cameroon. It has also assessed the different coping and adaptation measures being adopted by these communities in the wake of a changing climate. Socio-economic vulnerability levels of this ecological zone have also been determined. Generally, the adverse effects of climate change on key livelihoods activities/ resources and its impacts on livelihoods over the years are already evident. Community perceptions indicate that they are vulnerable to the variation in local climatic conditions and the seasonal calendar, with noted variations in temperature and sunshine, rainfall, and other climate sensitive schedules such as sowing periods and harvesting periods. The secondly vulnerability fear is related to the high level of dependency on climate sensitive livelihoods activities/resources and to some extend the lack of knowledge; widespread poverty and capacity relating to coping strategies.
The communities ranked as highly vulnerable based on the socio-economic vulnerability indicators used. Generally, the high dependency on climate sensitive sectors tends to increase vulnerability to climate change especially, rural communities whose livelihood predominately depends on rain-fed agriculture and forest resources. In the light of this study, addressing the effect of climate change impact at the household level requires reducing the socio-economic vulnerability.
Critical issues such as options of alternative livelihood activities, access to climate, sustainable agricultural practices and agro forestry practices and sustainable forest resource management are key areas to focus. Signi cant contributions from civil society groups and relevant governmental institutions can play a key role in minimizing the exposure of forest dependent communities to the impact of climate change. This can be done through creating awareness and helping communities to cope and adapt to a changing climate by building on existing coping and adaptation measures whiles a more scienti c approach to ensure sustainable livelihood are being developed.

Recommendations
Based in literature and results of this study, the following recommendations could be considered in enhancing the adaptive capacity of the Mambioko local communities: 1. Community resilience building plans should be work out as it will enhance their adaptive capacity there by reducing their vulnerabilities Authors declared no competing interest with regard to publication of this paper Availebilty of data and materials: The data used in this paper were freely available, thanks informed prior consents Funding: The funding for this study was from the TTRECED-Cameroon Authors contributions: Tieminie Robinson Nghogekeh: He generates the primary idea of this study and the write up of the paper  Figure 1 A model of factors that can be used to assess the vulnerability and resilience of ecosystems.  Level of dependent on Major climate sensitive livelihoods Resources. Perception of climate change impacts on agriculture and its indicators.

Figure 6
Perception of climate change impacts on shing and its indicators. Climate change impact on NTFPs and its indicators.  Coping and adaptation strategies and its indicators.

Supplementary Files
This is a list of supplementary les associated with this preprint. Click to download. Appendix.docx