Climate Change and Rural Livelihoods in Developing Countries

Abstract

This chapter reviews the interaction of climate change and livelihoods focusing on the rural communities in developing countries. Climate hazards cause disproportionate impacts on the limited assets of disadvantaged communities, thereby increasing their exposure and vulnerability. However, agricultural wage laborers in food-exporting countries are expected to benefit from the rise in global food prices owing to climate change. In the rural areas of developing countries, climate change has shifted livelihood trajectories from farming to a more diversified one. Planned adaptation and mitigation responses to climate change are mostly found to have adverse impacts on rural livelihoods, especially for those communi- ties whose livelihoods depend on land and forest. Impacts of climate change on mountain livelihoods are directly felt on agriculture, water resources, livestock, and forests