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Climate change is a reality in Africa’s drylands. Pastoralists are engaging and embracing a range of adaptive strategies to adjust to these changes. The socioeconomic factors driving them to engage in a portfolio of multiple adaptation strategies have not been adequately addressed in the existing literature. A multivariate probit model was used to analyze them as determinants of adaptive capacity that promotes or hinders adaptation to climate change. Adaptation is represented by uptake of multiple strategies (irrigation, livestock migration, fodder production, and improved livestock breeds) by households, a demonstration of a household’s ability to diversify and adapt to the effects of climate change. The household asset base, particularly social capital represented by government assistance, stands out as it positively influenced by the uptake of four out of five adaptation strategies; that is, irrigation, livestock manure, fodder production, and improved breeds. Information heavily supports the adaptation process as it influenced all the five adaptation strategies analyzed but has a heterogeneous effect, supporting households to either adopt or reject a strategy. Crop-based information positively determines uptake of yield-enhancing strategies while relevant information for livestock activities contributes to the uptake of livestock-based strategies. These findings suggest that mainstreaming agricultural innovations, building a household asset base, and facilitating access to agronomic and climatic information will enable dryland communities to better adapt to climate change.

Irrigation as a climate-smart practice in agriculture is identified as a strategy accompanying the transformation witnessed where the dryland community is transitioning from pastoralism to agro-pastoralism. This community is learning and nurturing new adaptation strategies to adapt to the diminishing yet crucial natural resources. This article identifies the socio-economic factors that encourage or hinder the uptake of irrigation as an adaptation strategy among the dryland community in Laikipia County, Kenya. The Heckman probit model is used first, to assess a total of 494 household on how they perceive climate change, and secondly it identifies the drivers that either encourage these households or hinder them from adopting irrigation as an adaptation strategy. Results indicate that 80% of the households investigated experience the indicators of climate change, out of this, 32% adopted irrigation as an adaptation strategy to climatic changes among other livelihood changes. The drivers encouraging this uptake are identified as: quality of land for food production (1.152∗∗), assistance received from government (0.906∗∗), large livestock herd size, governance of community land tenure (1.556∗∗) and agronomic information (1.094∗∗∗). There is low possibility of adopting irrigation by older household heads (−0.0219∗) and those with small livestock herds (−0.473∗). The sustainable development of agriculture promoted in these dryland regions requires a broader policy response that looks at the sustainability of irrigation as an adaption strategy in the dryland.

International audience; Within the context of the FP7 JOLISAA project (JOint Learning in and about Innovation Systems in African Agriculture), an inventory of agricultural innovation experiences was developed in three African countries: Kenya, South Africa and Benin. The main objective was to assess a broad diversity of multi-stakeholder agricultural innovation processes involving smallholders. National teams used literature searches and interactions with a range of institutions and networks engaged in agricultural innovation to identify cases. Interviews with resource persons and field visits were also conducted to supplement the available / accessible documentation. The inventory was made according to a common analytical framework and guidelines inspired by the Innovation System perspective to allow for an analysis across cases and countries. The completed inventory includes 57 documented cases, covering a wide diversity of experiences, in terms of types, domains, scales and timelines of innovation. The 57 cases confirm previously documented features, such as the diversity of stakeholders involved in innovation, the diversity of innovation triggers, or also the frequent occurence of market driven innovation. It also illustrates more original features: the typically long time frames of innovation processes; the common occurrence of "innovation bundles" (a combination over time of technological, social and/or institutional innovations); and an often close relationship between innovation and externally-funded projects. National teams faced several challenges during the inventory process, including a common understanding and consistent use of key innovation-related concepts, and a difficult access to relevant information related partly to restrictions put by several case holders on sharing openly their experience. Out of the inventory, JOLISAA has selected thirteen cases which will undergo a subsequent phase of collaborative assessment. The assessment will strive to assess issues the inventory could not tackle, such as the actual roles and contributions of the various stakeholders, the dynamics of the innovation process, and the influence of the enabling environment on the innovation process and outcome.