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Vulnerability and adaptive capacity of community food systems in the Peruvian Amazon: a case study from Panaillo
- Publication Year :
- 2015
- Publisher :
- Springer, 2015.
-
Abstract
- Rainfall variability and related hydrological disasters are serious threats to agricultural production in developing countries. Since projections of climate change indicate an increase in the frequency and intensity of climatic hazards such as flooding and droughts, it is important to understand communities’ adaptive capacity to extreme hydrological events. This research uses a case study approach to characterize the current vulnerability and adaptive capacity of the food system to hydrological hazards in Panaillo, a flood-prone indigenous community in the Peruvian Amazon. Participatory methods were utilized to examine how biophysical and socioeconomic factors constrain or enable local adaptive capacity to climatic hazards over time. Seasonal flooding was shown to strongly influence agriculture and fishing cycles. Panaillo residents have developed several adaptive strategies to adjust to hydrological extremes, such as food-sharing and the cultivation of fast-growing crops on riverbeds. However, Panaillo residents generally lack the necessary human, physical, social, and natural resources to effectively employ their adaptive mechanisms as a result of major social and environmental changes in the area. Economic development, low institutional capacity, climate variability, and the assimilation social model in Peru all have profound effects on the food system and health by affecting the ways in which adaptive strategies and traditional livelihoods are practiced. Climate change has the potential to exacerbate these socioeconomic and biophysical drivers and further compromise community food systems in the Peruvian Amazon in the future.
- Subjects :
- Atmospheric Science
Adaptive strategies
adaptive management
purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#1.05.09 [https]
vulnerability
Vulnerability
Vulnerability, flood
flooding
Amazonia
Natural hazard
Peru
Earth and Planetary Sciences (miscellaneous)
Agricultural productivity
Adaptation
Amazon
Water Science and Technology
Adaptive capacity
Food security
business.industry
Environmental resource management
food security
indigenous population
Indigenous
Adaptive management
food supply
Geography
climate change
hazard management
Food system
purl.org/pe-repo/ocde/ford#1.05.11 [https]
agricultural production
Food systems
business
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....aa915e7781e2feac69b4e8fe830b6e77