Large Scale Land Acquisitions and Pastoralists’ Climate Change Adaptation in Kenya

Jackson Wachira*, Paul Austin Stacey, Joanes Atela

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Working paperResearch

Abstract

This working paper explores literature to establish the interrelationship between Large Scale Land Acquisition (LSLA) and pastoralists’ climate change adaptation. The paper builds on a wealth of academic and policy literature that has emerged over the last decade, mainly concerned with the extraordinary growth of the LSLA phenomenon since the year 2000 and resultant contestation with indigenous communities. By adopting a climate change adaptation framing, the paper examines the opportunities and constraints that arise from LSLA’s for pastoralism and pastoralists’ climate change adaptation strategies. The paper finds that LSLA disrupts mobility, a traditional pastoral resilience strategy while precipitating a discursive space of contestation that may further constrain pastoralists climate change adaptation, or provide opportunities for pastoralists to assert rights for adaptation to impacts of climate change. This takes place through wide-ranging forms of negotiations around access to privatized pastoral lands, and by pastoralists tapping into contested visions of transformation mainly driven by governments and investors based on expropriation of extensive pastoral lands.
Original languageEnglish
Place of PublicationRoskilde
PublisherRoskilde Universitet
Number of pages31
Publication statusPublished - 2020
SeriesRARE Working Paper
Volume2/2020

Keywords

  • Large Scale Land Acquisition
  • Climate Change
  • Climate change adaptation
  • Pastoralism
  • Arid and Semi-Arid Lands
  • Community
  • Kenya

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