Uganda: Cattle Corridor in Climate Scare

Going by this year's rainfall performance and outlook reports issued by the meteorology department, most areas in Uganda have received poor rainfall.
Statistics show that most parts of the country have received rainfall within the near normal to below normal range throughout the first half of this year, a proof that global warming is real.

In the last two years alone, the country has experienced shortage of food, inflation, floods and general increase in temperature, which has affected the economy.
Global warming, a gradual increase in the temperature of the atmosphere, is tending to change the earth's climate permanently. The warming is largely the result of emissions of greenhouse gasses for human activities, fossil fuel combustion and changes in land use such as deforestation and agriculture as well as industrial processing.
The greenhouse effects is a phenomenon whereby certain gases (CO2 methane and the other gases) in the earth's atmosphere, absorb heat that would otherwise escape to space.
As the country feels the impacts of climate changes, the worst scenario is reported in the cattle corridor, stretching from the northern region to the southwest region.
It is reported that the cattle corridor has a fragile ecosystem that is gravely affecting agriculture, cattle keeping, health and water.
GA_googleFillSlot( "AllAfrica_Story_InsetB" );
Ms Rehema Kahigwa Akiki, a subsistence farmer of Wabigalo village, Wabinyonyi Sub-county in Nakasongola District (one of the districts that lies in the corridor), says the situation is worrying.
Ms Kahigwa, a single mother of eight, whose livelihood solely depends on farming, says bad weather has frustrated their efforts to overcome poverty.
The farmer, who grows matooke (bananas) and rears local poultry, reveals that chronic drought has gravely affected her banana plantations, diminishing her returns by more than half.
"In order to maintain this garden, I have to irrigate it daily with water I fetch from a water dam located about one and half kilometre from here," a distressed mother says.
"At times I am forced to buy water at Shs200 per 20litre jerrican to irrigate because I can't sit and look on when my garden, the only source of income, is drying up."
GA_googleFillSlot( "AllAfrica_Story_InsetC" );
To Salongo Stanley Senku, a commercial farmer of Macumu-Sasira parish in Nakasongola District, this year's first season has been a gamble. He says the change in weather patterns has prompted them to plant whenever they see some rains, which was a grave move.
"We have harvested nothing in this year's first season due to poor rain," Mr Senku who has lived on farming for over 30 years, says.
All crops he planted after receiving mild rains stunted or dried up as temperatures soared.
"This season alone, I have slashed two maize plantations, one of seven acres and another on of 10 acres after they dried up," he narrates.
Salongo Senku says Uganda's two rainy seasons, the long rain starting in March and lasting through until June and the short rains running from around October/November to December are now erratic.
GA_googleFillSlot( "AllAfrica_Story_InsetD" );
The farmers' misery, however, is echoed by the District's Production officer Sarah Nakamya, who admits that the district is in crisis.
"We have been advising farmers to diversify cattle keeping with crop farming, but what disturbs, is that people are not harvesting due to bad weather and animals have started dying," she laments. She says though they receive weather focus reports from the meteorology department, purposely to advise farmers on when to start sowing with a view of minimising losses, the practice has yielded nothing because reports are also erratic.
She says with such experiences, farmers have lost trust in them. Despite the fact that Nakasongola greatly depend on agriculture, the district has intensely destroyed its tree cover due charcoal burning.
Currently, the district is ranked among the three districts (Nakasongola, Kiboga and Apac) that lead in charcoal supply.


Meanwhile, Ms Nakamya, says the district is currently sensitising residents to abandon charcoal burning and plant more trees to restore what has been degraded. But the rate at which trees are cut doesn't match with those being planted.
Currently, deforestation in Uganda is alarming. Over 90,000 hectares of Uganda's forest cover disappear per year yet deforestation is responsible for up to 20 per cent greenhouse gases.
According to the March 1 to April 30, 2009 meteorology report, places in the Lake Basin and central, Kampala recorded 43 per cent, Namulonge 61 per cent and Kituza 67 per cent of their Long-Term Mean (LTM) rainfall, which was in the below normal range. Only Kibanda, Entebbe and Mubende recorded amounts which were within the near normal range; 102 per cent, 93 per cent and 80 per cent respectively.