Abstract:
This study determined the social vulnerability index (SoVI) of households to
climate change impacts for three identified locations (upper, mid and lower) in the Vea
catchment, semi-arid Ghana. This study adapted the social, economic and demographic
indicator approach. The data used were obtained from a survey of 186 randomly sampled
farm households and direct field measurements of 738 farm plots belonging to the same
sampled farm households. Information from the literature, expert judgement and principal
component analysis were useful for computing and analysing the SoVI. The variables were normalized, weighted and subsequently recombined to determine the index of the three
locations towards climate change. Although the SoVI to climate change was highest (0.77)
for the upper part of the catchment, the mid- and lower parts of the catchment show a high
SoVI of 0.72 each. The overall SoVI for the catchment is 0.73. The study re-emphasizes
the high vulnerability level of dry areas to climate change. Moreover, it shows there is
variability at micro-scale. There is a need to put appropriate measures to address the
vulnerability of households to climate change in the semi-arid areas of West Africa.
Factors aggravating dry land’s vulnerability towards climate change should be prevented
with implementable policies. Furthermore, it is important to identify conditions that have
made some areas less vulnerable to climate change, and then, we can work out the possibility of adapting such to the vulnerable places.
