The predominant preoccupation of most rural communities’ we work with is agriculture and related economic activities. These economic activities as principal source of livelihoods and means of survival for these communities are totally dependent on nature and as a result highly susceptible to diverse livelihoods shocks such as long term drought, erratic rainfall regime, frost, etc. In significant parts of most rural communities, deforestation, overgrazing and plowing of hilly places have led to excessive topsoil erosion which in turn resulted in substantial reduction in agricultural productivity and depletion of livelihoods assets and resource base. Such excessive forms of natural resources utilization exposed the majority of agrarian and pastoral communities to several vulnerabilities including recurrent drought and the resultant food insecurity.
Increasing poverty has forced many of the rural residents to further exploit their environment, in some instances to unrecoverable level, simply to win their daily breads. This is one among the very disastrous incidents that put sustainable human development and the fate of the future generation under question. We don’t think that this should never be allowed as “the legacy of the contemporary generation for the future.” Unless we address this problem in terms of enabling marginalized and vulnerable community members, who are our primary target groups, to adapt to the disasters, shocks and risks associated with the climate change, our commitment to organizational vision and mission will be challenged.
It is increasingly becoming clear that climate change is a global concern where each and every soul has to contribute to its mitigation or stand prepared to cope with its effects/ adaptation mechanisms. To bring about massive concern and deliberate action, communities we work with should acquire adequate knowledge on what a climate change is and its impacts. A much thorough awareness creation on climate change and its impacts has widely been provided as an important component of this program. The predominant preoccupation of communities that we work with is agriculture and related activities. These communities by definition will be susceptible to long-term drought, erratic rainfall regime, frost, etc that present an additional shocks and vulnerability to the existing livelihoods. The most affected segment of rural communities are the resource-poor and marginalized sections who need various capacity building and accompaniment support and assistance to diversify their livelihood sources in order to enhance their resilience to climate change induced shocks and hazards. Accordingly, climate change vulnerability and adaptation have been singled out and incorporated in developing programs and projects primarily benefiting the resource poor and disadvantaged groups; and the wider community at large. To this end, HUNDEE has employed traditional knowledge and also linked with relevant climatic change institutions to enhance our organizational strength to design and implement such programs and projects that would bring greater resilience of communities to climate change. In particular, the cyclic relationship between the natural environment and communities’ means of livelihoods entailed the need to designing and promoting eco-friendly development programs that primarily focuses on and benefiting resource poor and vulnerable community groups.