Climate, Peace

and Security
Study: Somali
Region, Ethiopia
Lucas Destrijcker
Milen Yishak
Michael Thomson
Aminata Traore
Yishuang Antonio Xu
Hannah Kurnoth

July 2023
 Table of Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ................................................................................................... 3
INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................... 10
METHODOLOGY............................................................................................................ 11
REGIONAL CONTEXT AND TRENDS ............................................................................... 12
GOVERNANCE AND SOCIOECONOMIC PROFILE .................................................................................. 12
FOOD AND AGRICULTURE .............................................................................................................. 13
PEACE AND SECURITY ................................................................................................................... 15
HUMAN MOBILITY ........................................................................................................................ 17
INTERSECTIONAL VULNERABILITIES ............................................................................................... 18
ENVIRONMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE ........................................................................ 20
CURRENT CLIMATE AND HISTORIC TRENDS ....................................................................................... 20
CLIMATE PROJECTIONS................................................................................................................. 22
NATURAL HAZARDS AND EXTREME WEATHER .................................................................................... 24
DESERT LOCUSTS ......................................................................................................................... 24
CLIMATE CHANGE IMPACTS ON KEY SECTORS .................................................................................... 25
CLIMATE INSECURITY PATHWAYS: HOW CLIMATE CHANGE COMPOUNDS EXISTING
RISKS.......................................................................................................................... 27
EXISTING RESPONSES THAT ADDRESS CLIMATE-RELATED RISKS ................................ 36
ENTRY POINTS AND PRIORITIES ................................................................................. 39
REFERENCES ............................................................................................................... 43
ANNEX ........................................................................................................................ 53

2
Executive Summary
As part of the Weathering Risk initiative, adelphi and the World Food Programme (WFP)
set up a learning facility to explore entry points for strengthening climate adaptation
and resilience programming in Eastern Africa. Climate change and environmental
pressures have severe cascading effects on peace and human security in the region,
ranging from climate migration and displacement to food insecurity and conflict over
dwindling natural resources. In response, this learning facility aims to inform ways to
build more climate-resilient food systems in Eastern Africa as a way to prevent, mitigate
and resolve climate-induced conflicts and insecurity. This climate, peace and security
study focuses on the Somali Region of Ethiopia as one of the case studies undertaken
during the adelphi-WFP learning collaboration. The Somali Region, located in south-
eastern Ethiopia and bordering Somalia, was selected because of its particular
vulnerability to climate impacts and related risks to peace and human security.

This report, which is based on climate data from the Potsdam Institute for Climate
Impact Research (PIK) combined with an extensive literature review, first outlines the
relevant contextual factors that shape the Somali Region’s vulnerability to climate
change and environmental degradation, and then outlines historic, current and
projected climate trends and impacts in the region. Based on the combined analysis of
both contextual and climate-related factors, the report presents key climate insecurity
pathways, as well as entry points and priorities as guidance for future programming in
the region.

Climate and environment

The Somali Region's climate has already become drier, hotter and more unpredictable
over the past years, and is expected to worsen in the future. Some climate change
projections in the Somali Region include:
• A further increase in the average annual temperature and the number of ‘very hot
days’ (over 35°C).
• More rainfall variability, heightening the risk of extended periods of drought.
• More heavy precipitation events, leading to more water run-off and increasing the
risk of flash floods and river floods.
• Changing weather patterns, increasing the risk of disease outbreaks and pests
such as the desert locust.

Some of the key climate impacts in the Somali Region are summarised as follows:

Sector Projected Mechanism

impact
Agriculture Water scarcity Higher temperatures and more variation in
and precipitation patterns will increase water stress,
pastoralism contributing to losses in agricultural production
and livestock.
Pests and Rising temperatures will likely create an enabling
diseases environment for pest infestations and crop
diseases. Flooding increases the risk of desert
locust epidemics.

3
 Flooding Varied and more intense rainfall combined with
drier soil will increase the risk of flooding, affecting
agricultural production and livestock.
Health Malnutrition Extreme weather events will exacerbate food and
and famine water insecurity, contributing to malnutrition and
famine.
Vector-borne Increased temperatures will likely expand the
and water- reach of malaria to highland areas. Increased
borne flooding will contribute to the spread of water-
diseases borne diseases.
Infrastructure Transport- Erratic rainfall patterns and flooding will likely
ation damage transportation infrastructure, limit
possibilities for new development, and make
repairs and maintenance more challenging.
Human Extreme weather events will increase the
settlements vulnerability of human dwellings, especially
refugee and IDP settlements and infrastructure in
rural areas.

Table 1: Overview of impacts of climate change on various sectors in the Somali Region (source: The World Bank;
UN Habitat)

These climate impacts bring about a series of related security risks in the Somali
Region. There is ample evidence that climate and environmental pressures have
contributed to food insecurity and violent conflict across the world, and this is expected
to increase as the impacts of climate change worsen. People with considerable
development constraints, including Ethiopians and Somalis, have high vulnerability to
climatic hazards (IPCC, 2023). Research suggests that climate-related conflict is more
likely to emerge in regions highly vulnerable to climate variability combined with low
socioeconomic development, poor infrastructure and governance capacity, and high
levels of food insecurity, poverty, and socio-political inequality. Livelihood dependency
on natural resources, rain-fed agriculture and pastoralism also increase this risk
(Delgado, 2021; Liebig et al., 2022).

The Somali Region is already feeling adverse effects of climate-induced droughts,

displacement and water stress at an alarming level. Consecutive and multi-year climate
variability and extremes have left the region with drought and displacement in addition
to receiving refugees from other areas. The duration and severity of the current drought
in Ethiopia has already exceeded the droughts of 2010–2011 and 2016–2017. Some
3.9 million people are estimated to be in need of emergency food assistance in the
region, which is 62 per cent of the population (WFP, 2023). The number of people facing
critical water shortage and requiring emergency water response was estimated at 2.9
million as of March 2023 (OCHA, 2023a).

Climate insecurity pathways

The Somali Region has many of the above-mentioned characteristics, and, based on a
review of existing literature and the current state of vulnerability, this report identifies
five key overlapping insecurity pathways – or cascading effects – through which
climate change and environmental pressures can compound risks to peace and
security. These centre around:
4
Pathway 1: Livelihoods and natural resource competition

Climate hazards and environmental pressures contribute to severe livestock and yield
losses that threaten people’s livelihoods and food security. This in turn drives
competition over scarce, variable and ephemeral natural resources, which risks to
escalate into violent conflict.

Pathway 2: Human mobility and displacement

Shifting transhumance movements, as well as climate-induced migration and

displacement, can lead to an uptick in violence. Migration and mobility are amongst the
most important livelihood strategies of pastoral societies. Transhumance is not only a
vital aspect of the livestock production system and an inherent part of pastoral life, it
also helps pastoral communities to strengthen their resilience and adaptive capacity to
various stressors. However, if mobility patterns change, they can also become a source
of intense demographic pressures that lead to tensions between and within
communities. This is especially visible when shifting migration takes place in a poorly
planned, unmanaged, abrupt, or forced manner.

Pathway 3: Regional spill-over effects

The Somali Region’s geographic location, nested within the Horn of Africa, together with
its porous land borders, makes it vulnerable to security developments in neighbouring
regions. Conflicts in neighbouring Somalia, as well as in other Ethiopian regions, could
spill over and jeopardise stability in the Somali Region, especially in borderlands.
Somalia has experienced over three decades of civil war, including violent conflict over
natural resources that come increasingly under pressure, making it an area of instability
that could spur new conflagrations and regional spill-over effects at any point.
Furthermore, the ethnic homogeneity in the Somali Region has led to close ties with
clans in neighbouring Somalia, Somaliland and Djibouti. In addition to international ties,
Somali clans in the Somali Region inhabit areas within the borders of its Ethiopian
neighbouring regions of Oromia and Afar, which have already experienced ethnic
tension and resource competition in borderlands.

Pathway 4: Intersectional vulnerabilities

Climate change and environmental issues affect people differently depending on

gender, age, occupational group, socioeconomic situation, disability, etc. Inequality can
be a key cause but also a consequence of climate insecurity. Certain groups, especially
displaced persons, women, youth, elderly or disabled people, are the most vulnerable
because they have limited resources and options at their disposal to respond to
challenges or take advantage of opportunities. As a result, the combined impacts of
climate change and existing vulnerabilities widen already existing inequalities, with
layers of exclusion often overlapping. Climate insecurity can also increase levels of
gender-based violence.

Pathway 5: Governance

The presence, legitimacy and capacity of governmental actors can either mitigate or
exacerbate climate-related security risks. Disregard for customary regulations and
practices, as well as government interventions that could be perceived as
discriminatory, therefore risk flaring up historical grievances which can drive new
5
tensions and conflicts. These conflicts could play out intra-regionally, within and
between Somali pastoralist clans, or between Somalis and the Ethiopian central state
or neighbouring regions, such as Oromia or Afar. Some key risk areas include access to
and distribution of fertile land, water resources and humanitarian aid.

Entry points and priorities for building climate resilient and peaceful
livelihood systems
To build resilience among Somali Region’s to climate impacts and environmental
degradation, as well as to strengthen conflict management and promote peaceful
societies, existing evidence derived from our literature review has brought forward
numerous good practices, which are included in the following thematically organised
entry points and priorities for humanitarian and development actors to consider:

1. Conflict-sensitive and peace-oriented programming: As a general principle and

cross-cutting recommendation, it is critical to ensure that interventions leave no
one behind and do not cause harm, and also aim to enhance conflict management
and contribute to peaceful societies. A conflict-sensitive approach takes different
conceptual and contextual principles into account, allowing humanitarian and
development actors to gain a deeper and broader understanding of risks and avoid
unintended or harmful consequences of their intervention. In addition, projects
should actively seek to prevent and resolve conflict by linking climate resilience
with sustainable peace objectives. Therefore, key focus areas include:
• Identify synergies between climate adaptation and activities that help bridge
communities and strengthen social relations.
• Focus on opportunities to work towards shared interests, common goods
and mutual benefits between and within communities, especially between
displaced persons and host communities.
• Adopt a conflict-sensitive and peace-oriented approach to inform the
design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programmes and
projects.
• Develop specific climate, peace and security indicators and objectives that
enhance social cohesion, build synergies and improve relations between and
within communities.
• Appoint designated staff and focal points that are responsible for
mainstreaming a climate, peace and security lens.
• Promote (existing) platforms and mechanisms for local participation among
different communities, resource-sharing and inclusiveness.
• Build capacity and raise awareness across different levels and amongst all
key stakeholders.
• Mitigating and preventing harmful, unintended effects of interventions,
including environmental, social, cultural or societal impacts.

2. Livelihood diversification: Communities vulnerable to climate stressors, in

particular (agro)pastoralists and farmers, need to develop and maintain a range of
potential economic options that allow for a back-up plan in case of failed
agriculture or livestock production, or when new needs arise. Livelihood
diversification is already inherent to farming and pastoralism. Most pastoralists
have long practiced supplementary forms of food production, resource
exploitation and trade. Therefore, opportunities to support the diversification of
6
 livelihoods should be integrated in existing practices. However, with extended
periods of drought and back-to-back dry seasons in the past years, livelihood
diversification should also include options outside of the traditional ways of coping
with drought. Some focus areas to consider include:
• Portfolio diversification, allowing households to undertake multiple
productive activities to spread risk across a range of occupations with
different sensitivities to climate or other stressors.
• Temporal diversification, in which households move between different
activities and income sources at different times, e.g. following more closely
weather or seasonal patterns.
• Enhancing added values from by-products of livestock, such as dairy
products and animal hides, and additional aspects of the value chain.
• Investing in non-pastoral activities, such as small business development,
dryland and irrigated agriculture, agroforestry, adoption of agricultural
innovation such as new cash crops, education and vocational training, labour
migration, and trade.
• Enhancing access to markets, especially for vulnerable groups like farmers,
(agro)pastoralists, women, youth, and displaced persons.
• Uptake of non-traditional coping mechanisms, such as learning new
vocational skills and trades, and fostering sharing of knowledge and practices
from external pastoral and non-pastoral communities.

3. Climate-smart agriculture and practices: Enhanced management of water and

fertile soil, together with more sustainable agricultural practices and technologies,
can build more climate-resilient livelihood and food systems. This in turn reduces
the risk of competition and conflict over fertile land and natural resources. Some
climate-smart agricultural innovations and practices include:
• Enhanced absorptive capacity and water harvesting systems such as
irrigation schemes, water supply technologies, water capture systems, flood-
based farming (floodplain agriculture, spate irrigation, inundation canals,
depression agriculture, etc.) and sustainable water management in
wastelands. The selection of relevant water systems should be based on
equitable arrangements, the production capacities and socioeconomic
situation of farmers and pastoralists.
• Agro-weather management information systems, including early warning
and risk management.
• Promoting resilient, bio-fortified crop production, including intercropping,
and nutrient-dense foods, as well as the use of improved, high-yielding
seed varieties, especially fast growing, drought resistant plants.
• Exploring alternative farming approaches like agroforestry, urban farming,
and supporting enhanced food storage and post-harvest handling.

4. Animal health and production: Several measures allow (agro)pastoralists to

maintain the size and health of their herds and minimise losses, which in turn
prevent livestock raiding and the risk of conflict. These include:
• Animal health and veterinary services, including effective disease
management, vaccination and treatments.
• Streamlining and scaling up range of insurance provision and cash-based
products.

7
 • Drought-mitigating livestock supplementary feeds and fodder banks. For
example, hay products are relatively easy to produce and conserve, and have
high scalability potential.
• Improved breed reproduction centres to promote livestock breeds that are
more resilient to drought and provide higher production. This would include
cross-breeding with traditional and indigenous livestock, and providing
certified semen and artificial insemination services.
• Fostering animal health provision and vaccination campaigns as an entry
point to bring conflicting parties together, support dialogue processes and
facilitate the creation of local natural resource management agreements.

5. Rangeland and transhumance management: Rangeland fragmentation and

degradation reduce the options for pastoral movements. To recover spatial
optionality of nomadic pastoralists, and to prevent and resolve transhumance-
related conflicts, interventions could focus on the following priority areas:
• Facilitating dialogue and holistic solutions about rangeland management,
well adapted to the new realities of climate change and local needs.
• Investing in rangeland extensification to enhance herd movement and avoid
fragmentation.
• Promoting rangeland recovery, including through reseeding, reforestation,
and conservation projects, as well as by up-scaling nutritional feeding and
restricting range grazing.
• Facilitating livestock transport, access to markets, cross-border movement
and livestock trade so pastoralists can more easily traverse rangeland
ecosystems.
• Monitoring and mitigating the risk of borderland insecurity and conflict, as
these are major risks in cross-boundary transhumance.

6. Natural resource management and governance: Government interference has

long been a sensitive issue in the Somali Region, but connecting the different
levels of natural resource management is key for sustainable development and
building climate resilience, as well as to increase social cohesion and manage
conflicts. Therefore, key focus areas include:
• Active engagement of pastoral communities by involving them in developing
and implementing policies, ensuring representation at relevant national and
international fora, and building agency as actors of adaptive governance.
• Supporting existing indigenous knowledge strategies for resilience, such as
social systems support, early warning systems based on long-term
observation of astral bodies, flora and fauna and experience.
• Promoting flexible and communal systems of governance for grazing and
water sources, as these have the highest potential for local acceptance and
ownership.
• Linking customary pastoralist institutions and practices with formal
government actors to promote bottom-up approaches and build sustainable
and effective partnerships.
• Helping to broker formal and informal natural resource sharing
agreements between farmers and (agro)pastoralists, among
(agro)pastoralists, and between refugees, IDPs and host communities.

8
7. Capacity-building and awareness raising: The following entry points can help to
improve the delivery of climate, environmental and security/conflict information
across different sectors of the food system:
• Collaborate with partners and stakeholders to develop programmes that can
build capacity in climate security and resilience, climate adaptation and
climate-smart food programmes.
• Develop information products targeting climate fragile communities, e.g.
related to weather forecasts, seasonal forecasts, and agricultural information.
• Incorporate climate security information for the different components of
food systems in early warning systems and emergency response
mechanisms.

8. Partnerships and coordination: The following entry points aim to strengthen

climate adaptation and resilience-building:
• Establish new partnerships and strengthen existing ones to bring in more
experience and expertise around climate- and conflict-sensitive
programming. Especially partnerships with local, community-based and
peacebuilding actors should be fostered.
• Develop a climate security and adaptation platform to periodically bring
together different actors and stakeholders active in and from the region,
during which relevant issues could be discussed. This would also lead to
fruitful exchanges and improved planning and coordination of activities.
• Minimise and avoid maladaptation through multi-sectorial partnerships and
coordination, as well as inclusivity of local knowledge in addition to focusing
on long-term goals starting from the planning stage of adaptation
programming.

9
Introduction
Climate change and its impacts create severe risks for food systems and human security
more broadly, making peaceful coexistence between people and communities harder
to maintain or achieve. Both slow onset changes such as temperature rise and
increased variability in precipitation patterns, as well as fast onset events such as
extreme weather events can severely affect people’s livelihoods and food security,
especially in contexts that are already fragile. These cascading effects can then
contribute to socioeconomic and political instability, increasing the risk of violent
conflict.

As part of the Weathering Risk initiative, adelphi and WFP set up a learning facility to
explore entry points for strengthening climate adaptation and resilience programming
in Eastern Africa. Climate change and environmental pressures have severe cascading
effects on peace and human security in the region, ranging from climate migration and
displacement to food insecurity and conflict over dwindling natural resources. In
response, this learning facility aims to inform ways to build more climate-resilient food
systems in Eastern Africa as a way to prevent, mitigate and resolve climate-induced
conflicts and insecurity.

This climate, peace and security study focuses on the Somali Region of Ethiopia as one
of the case studies undertaken during the adelphi-WFP learning collaboration. The
Somali Region, located in south-eastern Ethiopia and bordering Somalia, was selected
because of its particular vulnerability to climate impacts and related risks to peace and
human security.

The first chapter of this study outlines the relevant contextual factors that shape the
Somali Region’s vulnerability to climate change and environmental degradation. These
include governance and the socioeconomic situation, food and agriculture,
intersectional factors, migration and displacement, and conflict history. The second
chapter focuses on historic, current and projected climate trends and impacts. Based
on the combined analysis of both contextual and climate-related factors, the third
chapter presents key climate insecurity pathways relevant to the Somali Region. Finally,
this profile provides entry points and priorities as guidance for future climate- and
conflict-sensitive, peace-oriented programming in the region.

10
Methodology
Policy and decision-makers in multiple sectors have sought ways to predict and
respond to climate impacts on peace and security. However, to do so effectively and
sustainably, the complexity of different factors and interactions has to be unpacked into
a granular understanding of the relationship between climate change, environmental
pressures and insecurity in a given context. For awareness of the risks to be converted
into action that improves lives, concrete entry points need to be identified.

This is where Weathering Risk comes in. The Weathering Risk programme, led by an
interdisciplinary team from adelphi and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact
Research (PIK), unites state-of-the-art climate impact data and expert conflict analysis
to promote peace and resilience in a changing climate. It uses an innovative
methodology that unpacks the complex relationship between climate change and
insecurity and identifies entry points for action (see figure 1). Through its methodology
framework, Weathering Risk aims to facilitate risk-informed planning, enhance capacity
for action and improve operational responses that promote climate resilience and
peace.

Figure 1: Weathering Risk methodology framework (Weathering Risk, 2021)

This study focusing on climate change, peace and security in the Somali Region in
Ethiopia and is primarily based on climate impact data provided by PIK, combined with
an extensive literature review on the contextual factors shaping vulnerability and
resilience, as well as peace and security in the region. An important limitation of this
study is that there was no possibility to conduct field work or undertake rigorous
interviews with experts and stakeholders.

11
Regional context and trends
Governance and socioeconomic profile

The Somali Region, also known as Soomaali Galbeed and officially as the Somali Region
State (SRS), is the easternmost of the nine ethnic divisions (kililoch) of Ethiopia. It is the
second largest region in the country and divided into nine administrative zones and 53
Kebeles, which are Ethiopia’s smallest administrative units. The region shares a border
with Djibouti to the north; Somaliland to the northeast; the Ethiopian Oromia, Afar, and
Dire Dawa regions to the west; Somalia from east to south; and Kenya to the southwest
(Constitution of Ethiopia, 1995).

Figure 2: Map of the Somali Region (OCHA, 2005)

The Somali Region has an estimated population of 6.2 million people and is considered
one of the most ethnically homogenous regions in Ethiopia, with between 95 and 97 per
cent of the populace identifying as Somali and over 98 per cent identifying as Muslim
(SRHB, 2012). While the region is not densely populated, it has experienced rapid
population growth in the past decades. In 2004, there were about 14 Somalis per km²,
while in 2022, this number was estimated at 22. The most densely inhabited sub-region
is Jijiga (CIESIN, 2022).

Broadly speaking, Ethiopia’s total population is expected to increase from around 123
million in 2022 to nearly 200 million in 2050, with a projected urban growth of 18 per
cent (World Bank, 2023; UN Habitat, 2020). Population growth is particularly high in the
country’s secondary and intermediate towns, such as the towns in the Somali Region.1
Thus, many of the Somali towns are experiencing rapid growth in terms of population
size and economic activities, and function as the economic hubs of their respective
regions (UN Habitat 2020).

The Somali Region’s key livelihood source is (agro)pastoralism, but nomadic

pastoralists have long been marginalised from Ethiopian politics and governance. In the

1 Secondary and intermediate towns host between 100.000 to 500.000 inhabitants.

12
mid-1990s, the Ethiopian central government implemented the federal system, which
created regional states – such as the SRS – which allowed for a better representation
of pastoralist populations. However, the central government’s development agenda
continued to privilege agricultural investments over pastoralism, which caused
grievances among Somali pastoralists. In 2020, the Ethiopian government approved the
Pastoral Development Policy, signalling an attempt to pursue development policies that
are more appropriate in dryland contexts and suited to pastoralists’ needs (IOM and
ICPALD, 2022).

Food and agriculture

The Somali Region is characterised by an arid and semi-arid climate, with most of the
area covered by pastoral livelihood zones. The vast majority of the population is
involved in (agro)pastoralism, farming and trade. Key livestock in the region include
camels, cattle, goats, sheep and donkeys (Devereux, 2006). Cropland remains limited
to the areas located towards the Somali Region’s interior borders (see figures 3 and
4). The economic value of rainfed crop production2 in the Somali Region is overall
extremely low, with most productive areas concentrated in the Jijiga sub-region.

Figure 3: Livelihood zones in the Somali Region (FEWS-NET)

2 This is based on areas harvested with yield and the average international crop price indicated by FAO.
13
Figure 4: Pasture land (left) and cropland (right) in 2000 (per cent of grid cell). The percentage of land in every 5-
arc minute grid cell that is devoted to pasture or cropland. (Source: USGS/EarthStat; WPS Global Tool)

The Somali population’s high dependence on pastoralism and rain-fed agriculture

makes them highly vulnerable to various climate shocks, especially drought. Ethiopia is
home to about 35 million livestock units, and on average, one livestock unit requires
about 25 litres of water per day. Most of these livestock units are also based in the
Somali Region. The total daily water requirement for livestock is estimated at 875
million litres, which amounts to about 320 billion litres annually. In contrast to this
significant need, however, water is a very scarce commodity for many of the smallholder
farmers and (agro)pastoralists, and the situation is aggravated by seasonal variations in
availability of water (Sileshi, 2020).

Primarily because of water scarcity, Somalis have in the past decades suffered
extensively from food insecurity and malnutrition. While this has been a trend in many
parts of Ethiopia and the wider region, Somali households are often among the worst
affected by cycles of nutritional crises. Traditionally, the key underlying causes of food
insecurity in the Horn of Africa include population growth, conflict and insecurity, and
natural hazards. Even though the Somali Region remains sparsely populated,
demographic pressures in areas rich in natural resources, in particular farmland and
pasture, play a key role in the Somali people’s food and livelihood security (Mercy Corps,
2019).

Fast-onset causes of food insecurity include production losses from drought, flash
floods, and pests and diseases, as well as conflict over natural resources such as land
and water. Especially droughts, which have intensified over the years due to climate
change, have resulted in high incidences of livestock mortality, greatly reduced access
to food, and driven large-scale displacement (ACAPS, 2017). An important indicator to
grasp the consequences of drought is the vegetation health index, which indicates
seasonal shifts in vegetation health. Since the onset of the 2020 record-breaking multi-
year drought, which at the time of writing continues to affect the entire Horn of Africa,
vegetation health in the Somali Region has deteriorated rapidly, without sufficient
recovery due to absent or insufficient seasonal rains (see figure 5, left). This has led to
five consecutive failed farming seasons and the death of millions of livestock, with
devastating effects on households’ assets, food security and income (IGAD, 2022; WFP,
2022a). This consecutive failure of rainy seasons has exacerbated the impacts of the
14
current drought that started in late 2020, affecting over 24 million people across
Eastern Africa (OHCA, 2023c; ACAPS, 2023). In early 2023, the Somali Region’s
Disaster and Risk Management Bureau shared that over 3 million people had been
impacted by the current drought (especially in the Afder, Liben, and Dawa zones) and
more than 4.5 million livestock had died since late 2021, leaving 30 million at risk
(Addis Standard, 2023). In addition, the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022 led
to a spike in global food prices, particularly in the Horn of Africa, which is highly
dependent on Ukrainian and Russian grain and fertilizer imports. The spike in food
prices further pushed millions of people in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya to the brink of
starvation (IFPRI, 2022: WFP, 2022a).

While recent food security assessments in Ethiopia have been challenging to undertake,
mostly due to lack of access, a 2019 in-depth study carried out by the Integrated Food
Security Phase Classification (IPC) found that the entire Somali Region experienced
crisis levels of acute food insecurity (see figure 5, right).3 In 2020, approximately 1.25
million Somalis experienced a high degree of food insecurity (IPC, 2020). At the national
level, an estimated 40-60 per cent of the Ethiopian population experienced moderate
or severe food insecurity between 2019 and 2021. In the same period, an estimated
10-25 per cent were undernourished (FAO et al., 2022).

In late 2022, as the impacts of five consecutive failed rainy seasons intensified, WFP
estimated that nearly 12 million Ethiopians in drought-affected regions were in need of
food assistance. The Somali, Oromia, Sidama and Southern Nations, Nationalities and
Peoples’ regions in the south and southeast were hit the hardest. Across Ethiopia, 2.7
million children were acutely malnourished in 2022 due to the drought’s impact—over
705.000 of these children were severely malnourished (WFP, 2022b).

Figure 5: Left: Vegetation health index for the Somali region (Source: NOAA STAR; WPS Global Tool). Right: Acute
Food Insecurity covering the period Jul 2019 - Sep 2019 (IPC, 2020).

Peace and security

The Somali Region has been relatively peaceful in recent years. In 2022, the region
saw limited numbers of violent conflict and protest events compared to neighbouring
Somalia or other Ethiopian regions (see figure 6). However, in the past decades, the

3 The assessment covered six Ethiopian regions. The western and northwestern regions were not covered in this study.
15
Somali population suffered from repeated and intense cycles of violent conflict, often
state-driven, which included mass atrocities and large-scale human rights abuses
(Zewde, 2001; Hagmann, 2014; Hagmann, 2020).

Similar to the most recent conflict between the federal and Tigray governments that
broke out in the northern region in late 2020, the Somali Region has had its own share
of ethno-nationalist separatist movements. Grievances around marginalisation from
Ethiopian governance and politics, federal land distribution, regional borders and
sovereignty, as well as access to natural resources, have long existed and continue to
cause resentment among Somali communities. Many pastoral lands in the Somali
Region also experience disproportionately low investments in infrastructure and social
services development. Nomadic pastoralists have also long lacked secure legal claims
to their communal lands, leaving them vulnerable to dispossession in the face of
agricultural and industrial development efforts from the central government (Fratkin,
2014). Throughout recent history, state interventions have therefore repeatedly been
received by Somalis with suspicion or open, often violent resistance (Warfa, 2021;
Hagmann, 2014; Hagmann, 2020).

Figure 6: December 12, 2021 - December 12, 2022 ACLED conflict and protest events (Source: ACLED, WPS Global
Tool)

Apart from state-based violence, security in the Somali Region has also been affected
by small-scale, localised communal and ethnic conflicts, typically driven by food or
livelihood insecurity, access to land and natural resources. Pastoral areas in the Somali
Region, and the Horn of Africa more broadly, have also traditionally been prone to
conflict at the community level. Cattle-raiding, land disputes between farmers and
pastoralists, and conflicts between clans over territory and resources have long been
an innate part of pastoral life (IFAD, 2020a,b). For instance, inter-ethnic conflicts
repeatedly occurred in border areas with Afar and Oromiya regions. From 2016 to 2018,
a new outbreak of clashes between the Somali and Oromia regions displaced millions
(Majid et al., 2022).

In addition to access to land, water and pasture, other sources of pastoral conflict in the
Somali Region include fear of residential expansion, inter-clan mistrust, unfair power
16
sharing, unequal distribution of resources, lack of fair employment, the availability of
weapons, and the revenge of past harm in the community (Hussein, 2022). Governance
in the Somali Region functions primarily through a patriarchal clan system based on
principles of communal and uninhibited access to natural resources. Most conflicts in
the Somali Region are thus addressed through customary norms embedded in clan law
rather than through state authority, which enjoys less legitimacy in rural areas and
among pastoralists (Muluken, 2020).

Indigenous pastoral rules and regulations are often kept in the memory of clan elders
and religious figures, and passed down over generations. Clan elders are also central to
mediating and managing conflicts, and applying social sanctions in the community
(Bouh and Mammo, 2008; Muluken, 2020). However, due to increased pressures on
natural resources, governance interference and poor natural resources management,
customary practices over land ownership and rights have eroded, causing intense
competition between pastoral groups over water and pasture (Abbink, 2007; Muluken,
2020; Hussein, 2022).

Human mobility
Closely related to the fragile conflict and food security situation, the Somali Region has
long faced significant demographic pressures due to internal displacement. By the end
of 2022, Ethiopia had around 3.9 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) and over 1
million based in the Somali Region (IDMC, 2023). While high instances (51 per cent) of
displacement in the Somali Region are seen at the regional border with Oromia due to
political violence that flared up in 2017 and continues to persist, other key drivers of
displacement in the Somali Region are disaster-induced, especially through drought
and flooding. Compared to other Ethiopian regions, the Somali Region is particularly
prone to disaster-induced displacement, having endured repeated underperforming
rainy seasons since 2020 which caused a shortage of pastureland, water and food for
pastoralists and their livestock (IOM, 2022). By late 2022, there were close to 590.000
drought induced IDPs in Ethiopia with Somali Region accounting for over 300.000 of
those (OCHA, 2022). Additionally, as of June 2023, thousands have been impacted by
the floods caused by the Belg/Gu/Genna rains in Ethiopia, with the Somali Region
accounting for more than 460.000 of the victims (OCHA, 2023b). At the time of writing,
the Somali Region also hosts over 250.000 refugees, primarily from Somalia and South
Sudan, which constitute over one third of Ethiopia’s total refugee population (UNHCR,
2022).

Models indicate that by 2050, the Somali Region will become a hotspot for disaster-
induced migration, with changes in population in excess of 100 people per km².
Highland areas in particular have already experienced a significant population increase
due to climate in-migration, driven by the relatively favourable climate conditions.
However, the highlands might not be able to provide enough opportunities for economic
activities, which means that migrants will likely be pushed to urban zones within the
region (UN Habitat, 2020).

17
Figure 7: Displacement caseload in Ethiopia based on data collected between June and July 2022 through the IOM
site assessment (IOM, 2022)

With regard to human mobility, the Somali Region has a long tradition of transhumance,
with pastoralists migrating seasonally along established routes.

Concerning mobility and livestock trade, most Somali cattle and goats are channelled
through a series of clearly defined routes in the general direction of the Somali ports
(Berbera, Bosaso and Mogadishu) and the Kenyan market. There is relatively little
movement towards Ethiopia’s domestic markets, partly because of differences in taste.
Ethiopian highlanders are said to prefer highland breeds, while Somali meat is more
popular in the Gulf States (Economic Focus, 2020).

Intersectional vulnerabilities
Food and livelihood insecurity have different effects on people depending on gender,
age, occupational group, socioeconomic situation, ethnicity, etc. Women’s unique
socioeconomic status merits consideration because it increases their vulnerability to
climate security risks. Oftentimes, and especially in rural areas, women bear
disproportionate burdens due to gender-based differences in treatment by formal
institutions, access to assets and credit, restricted access to policy discussions, and the
limited availability of gender-disaggregated data for policymaking (World Bank, 2021).
Gendered structural inequalities limit women’s influence over climate adaptation
strategies and restrict their access to resources and assets required to cope with
environmental disasters. At the same time, climatic shocks can deepen gendered
vulnerabilities. This highlights the need to include gender-sensitive considerations in
climate adaptation efforts.

18
Ethiopia has made some progress towards gender equality in the last 20 years. The
country developed a national policy on women and revised its penal law to align with
international standards. Ethiopia has also made encouraging strides in improving the
representation of women in the House of Representatives, ministerial cabinet positions,
and governmental institutions. Furthermore, national poverty reduction strategies now
include targets to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment. Finally, the
Ethiopian government adopted many international conventions on gender equality and
women’s empowerment (Abebe, 2020; Oxfam, 2017).

Despite these gains, serious gaps in terms of gender equality persist, and the Somali
Region lags behind most other Ethiopian regions. With a Gender Parity Index (GPI) of
0.7 at the primary education level and 0.4 at the secondary level, the gender gap in
education in the region is one of the highest in the country (Oxfam, 2017). Another key
challenge in bridging the gender gap is women’s access to land, which has been a core
agenda item of the Ethiopian government in recent years. Although there are adequate
policy and legal frameworks to promote gender equality and assure women’s rights to
access, control and administer land, there have been serious institutional, cultural and
technical constraints in enforcing laws and achieving progress on women’s rights and
empowerment. Customary norms, religious beliefs and deeply traditional social
practices hamper the full realisation of women’s rights. For instance, at the local level,
patrilineal systems exclude women and girls from their legal right to inherit land.
Divorce rules often do not support women in customary practices (Abebe, 2020).

Intersectional vulnerabilities in the Somali region primarily play out across occupational
groups, migration status, ethnicity, household income, education, gender, age and
disability. Pastoralists, and in particular women and children, are the most vulnerable
among the rural poor. In pastoralist communities, mobility plays a key role to track the
best grazing and water sources, or to avoid drought, disease or conflict. Women, youth
and elderly people are often the least capable of moving as an adaptation strategy,
making them particularly vulnerable (IFAD, 2020a,b). This is further described in detail
in pathway 4, as part of the section on climate insecurity pathways of this report.

19
Environment and climate change
The Somali Region has a semi-arid to arid climate with perennial rivers that provide
opportunities for pastoralism and irrigated and localised rain-fed farming activities. The
region is part of the Somali Acacia-Commiphora bushlands and thickets ecoregion.
Altitudes in the Somali Region range from 1.500m above sea level in the northwest to
about 300m along the southern border and the Wabi Shebelle Valley. However, while
over half of Ethiopia rises over 1.500m, most of the Somali Region lies below 1.000m
and is comprised of semi-arid pastoral land (see figure 8). The landscape consists of
dense shrubland, bush grassland and bare hills (Somali Government, 2022).

Current climate and historic trends

Temperature and precipitation

Sitting slightly below the Sahel but above the tropics and adjacent to Somalia’s arid
desert, much of Ethiopia experiences moderate temperatures, reflected in its mean
annual temperature of 22.6°C (World Bank, 2021). However, as seen in the map
below, the Somali Region experiences some of the warmest temperatures in Ethiopia,
with a mean temperature close to 28°C (Time and Date, 2022). At the same time,
while the whole of Ethiopia has a mean annual precipitation of 815.8mm according to
the latest climatology, the Somali Region experiences the lowest mean annual
precipitation of the country, lower than 400mm for most of the region and in many of
the eastern parts below 200mm (see figure 9) (World Bank, 2021).

Figure 8: Average annual temperature (left) and elevation in meters (right) (Source: World Bank, 2021)

Throughout Ethiopia, seasonal rainfall is driven by the migration of the Intertropical

Convergence Zone (ITCZ), a narrow zone around the equator where air masses from the
south and north converge, producing low atmospheric pressure and rainfall (World
Bank, 2021). However, the impact of the ITCZ’s migration fluctuates across Ethiopia
given the country’s varied topography, aridity, and proximity to water sources such as
Lake Tana, the Gulf of Aden, and the Arabian Sea (Abera et al., 2016).

The Somali Region’s arid climate and geography near Somalia’s border gives it a
different seasonal precipitation cycle than the rest of Ethiopia. Indeed, it does not
experience the Kirempt (long rainy season) at all. Rather, the Somali Region’s
precipitation cycle includes a long rain, the Gu, from February to May, and a short rain,
the Deyr, from October to November (New Humanitarian, 2007).

20
Figure 9: Left: Mean temperature and precipitation in the Somali Region (Source: Agrica, 2021); and, right: annual
precipitation, 1901-2020 (Source: World Bank, 2021)

The impacts of climate change on precipitation in Ethiopia must be understood through

the climate and seasonal heterogeneity that characterises the country. In some regions
of the country, particularly in the Upper Blue Nile River Basin of the northwest,
precipitation has increased through sporadic bursts, causing flooding that destroys
crops, homes, and infrastructure, including critical roadways (Aich et al., 2014).
However, in eastern Ethiopia, including the Somali Region, the arid climate allows for
very little rainfall, and climate change has led to an increase in the frequency and
intensity of droughts (World Bank, 2021; Amede et al., 2015).

Given the seasonal fluctuation and the variation of seasons within Ethiopia, it is more
useful to measure trends in the anomalies in precipitation for the Gu/Deyr seasons than
to measure total precipitation variance in Ethiopia or the Somali Region across the year
(CHC, 2022). When looking at seasonal and interannual variability of available water
supply, it is clear that large parts of the Somali Region face medium to extremely high
variability, especially when assessing trends from year to year (see figure 10).

Figure 10: 1960-2014 seasonal variability (left) and interannual variability (right) of available water supply in the
Somali Region. This measure the average within-year variability (left) and between-year variability (right) of
available water supply, including both renewable surface and groundwater supplies. Higher values indicate wider
variations of available supply within a year (left) or from year to year (right). Values are calculated based on data
from years 1960 to 2014. (Source: WRI Aqueduct; WPS Global Tool)

21
Additionally, these trends must be paired to specific seasons, given rainfall variability
across different seasons. Trend analysis shows that, although the end of the Gu has
seen higher precipitation compared to recent years, the entire Deyr and the start of the
Gu have recently witnessed significantly lower precipitation (CHC, 2022). In the Somali
Region, climate change has increased the likelihood of severe and persistent drought.
Indeed, the periodic El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) has contributed to lower-
than-average Deyr and Gu rainfall in the Somali Region for several consecutive seasons,
which started in 2020 (see figure 11, left) (GEOGLAM, 2022).

Finally, seasonal and interannual rainfall variability are important factors affecting
baseline water stress, which is measured by comparing the ratio of total water
withdrawals to available renewable water supplies.4 Higher values of baseline water
stress indicate more competition among users. As seen in figure 11 (right), despite
some significant areas where no reliable data could be collected, several sub-regions
of the Somali Region experienced medium to high, and high levels of water stress at the
time of the latest available data in 2014 (WRI Aqueduct, 2014). With decreased
precipitation in recent years (see figure 11, left), the levels of baseline water stress
across the Somali Region could be expected to be significantly higher at the time of
reporting compared to the levels in 2014.

Figure 11: Precipitation anomalies in the Somali Region for 24 months5 (left) (Source: ECMWF/Deltares; WPS
Global Tool), and; Baseline water stress from 1960-2014 (right) (Source: WRI Aqueduct; WPS Global Tool)

Climate projections
Temperature and precipitation

The steady warming trend that the Somali Region is currently experiencing is expected
to continue, leading to a higher frequency of ‘very hot days’ (over 35°C), especially in
the second half of the century (IPCC Interactive Atlas, 2022). Both pessimistic (RCP6.0)
and more optimistic (RCP2.6) emissions scenarios show that the Somali Region will
witness the highest increase in very hot days over the next decades compared to other
Ethiopian regions (see figure 12).

4 Water withdrawals include domestic, industrial, irrigation, and livestock consumptive and non-consumptive uses. Available
renewable water supplies include surface and groundwater supplies and considers the impact of upstream users and large dams on
downstream water availability.
5 These were created using precipitation data from the ECMWF SEAS5 seasonal weather forecasts. Specifically, the Standard

Precipitation Index approach was used to create the anomalies.

22
Figure 12: Projections of the annual number of very hot days (daily maximum temperature above 35 ℃) in
Ethiopia under different GHG emissions (Source: Agrica 2021)

Future projections of precipitation are less certain than projections of temperature

change due to high natural year-to-year variability and modelling uncertainty (see figure
13). Projections of precipitation and drought over the remainder of the 21st century are
not linear. As the below maps show, while mean annual near-term precipitation is
expected to decline in the Somali Region, long-term precipitation might actually
increase (Agrica, 2022).

Figure 13: CMIP5 ensemble projected change (32 GCMs) in precipitation (bottom) by 2040-2059 (left) and by
2080 (right), relative to 1986-2005 baseline under RCP8.5

Closely linked to temperature and precipitation, hydrology projections for Ethiopia

indicate a strong and continuous rise of potential evapotranspiration. Under a medium
to high emissions scenario (RCP6.0), potential evapotranspiration is projected to
increase by 2.0 per cent in 2030, 2.7 per cent in 2050 and 4.4 per cent in 2080
compared to year 2000 levels (Agrica, 2022). Extreme precipitation events are also
expected to become more frequent and more intense due to the increased water vapour
holding capacity of a warmer atmosphere. As a result, although mean annual
precipitation may remain stable or even increase over the long-term, the incidence of
droughts and flooding are expected to increase throughout the century due to these
erratic patterns (Agrica, 2022; World Bank, 2021; IPCC, 2022).

23
Natural hazards and extreme weather
With more heatwaves, higher rainfall variability and an increase in heavy precipitation
events, the Somali Region is and will remain in the future highly exposed to extreme
weather events. Most high-risk weather-related events are drought and flooding,
including flash floods and river floods. Dry soil increases the levels of run-off such that
much water does not permeate the soil, resulting in increased risk of floods. When
looking at the percentage of the Somali population expected to be affected by riverine
flooding, almost the entire region is at medium to high, or extremely high risk (see figure
14) (WRI Aqueduct, 2010).

Drier weather conditions in the Somali Region also increase the severity and frequency
of wildfire hazards. According to ThinkHazard!, the risk for the entire region is classified
as high. Other natural hazards, including landslides, earthquakes, and cyclones are
marked as low to medium. The impact risk of volcanic eruption is only high in the
northwest of the Somali Region (ThinkHazard!, 2022).

Figure 14: Riverine flood risk (left) (Source: WRI Aqueduct; WPS Global Tool, 2010) and urban flood risk
(ThinkHazard!, 2022)

Desert locusts
Desert locusts (Schistocera gregaria) are considered the world’s most widespread and
destructive pest. In Ethiopia, desert locust swarms emerge in two stages. The first
stage, known as the solitary stage, exhibits a low density of locusts, but once the
swarms are formed in the second stage, called the gregarious stage, the threat of
locusts increases in terms of geographic area and scale of harm in any given area (Guan
et al., 2021).

Weather patterns determine a locust’s life cycle and therefore climate change impacts
desert locusts. First, egg hatching relies on moist soil, and therefore higher precipitation
is associated with higher rates of locust reproduction. For example, the 2003–2005
desert locust invasion can be largely attributed to abnormally high rainfall. Similarly, the
two strong tropical cyclones in the Arabian Sea in May 2018 and December 2019
created ideal conditions for locust crises in Ethiopia from 2019–2021. FAO’s

24
documentation of locust swarms during this period illustrates the unique vulnerability
of the Somali Region to locust swarms (Guan et al., 2021; FAO, 2022).

Figure 15: The spread of locust swarms in Ethiopia from August 2019 to January 2020 (FAO, 2020)

The risk of desert locust swarms in the Somali Region will continue into the foreseeable
future. Advances in modelling can be used to predict the distribution of desert locusts
along climate pathways associated with warming targets. This modelling forecasts that
temperature rise will lead to a contraction in the locusts’ reproduction cycle, and
therefore warmer temperatures are generally associated with reduced areas of
reproduction potential. However, for those areas within this contracted zone where
locust reproduction will take place, which includes the Somali Region, the compounding
factors of i) maintained breeding area, ii) frequent extreme weather events, and iii)
population growth may actually contribute to an increased intensity and duration of
locust swarms (Guan et al., 2021).

Additionally, climate models predict an increase in extremely severe cyclonic storms

(ESCS) in the Arabian Peninsula due to climate change (Murakami et al., 2017). As
recent swarms have shown, an ESCS can catalyse substantially larger breeding
densities on the Arabian Peninsula, which can then cross over into the Horn of Africa
and continue to breed and expand (Guan et al., 2021). In addition to a higher frequency
of ESCS, there is a general higher than average rainfall due to changes in the Indian
Ocean dipole, which has also increased the frequency of locust swarms in the Arabian
Peninsula and Horn of Africa (Stone, 2020).

Climate change impacts on key sectors

Sector Projected Mechanism

impact
Agriculture Water scarcity Higher temperatures and more variation in
and precipitation patterns will increase water stress,
pastoralism contributing to losses in agricultural production
and livestock.
25
 Pests and Rising temperatures will likely create an enabling
diseases environment for pest infestations and crop
diseases. Flooding increases the risk of desert
locust epidemics.
Flooding Varied and more intense rainfall combined with
drier soil will increase the risk of flooding, affecting
agricultural production and livestock.
Health Malnutrition Extreme weather events will exacerbate food and
and famine water insecurity, contributing to malnutrition and
famine.
Vector-borne Increased temperatures will likely expand the
and water- reach of malaria to highland areas. Increased
borne flooding will contribute to the spread of water-
diseases borne diseases.
Infrastructure Transportatio Erratic rainfall patterns and flooding will likely
n damage transportation infrastructure, limit
possibilities for new development, and make
repairs and maintenance more challenging.
Human Extreme weather events will increase the
settlements vulnerability of human dwellings, especially
refugee and IDP settlements and infrastructure in
rural areas.

Table 2: Overview of impacts of climate change on various sectors in the Somali Region (source: The World Bank;
UN Habitat)

26
Climate insecurity pathways: How climate change
compounds existing risks
There is ample evidence that climate and environmental pressures have contributed to
food insecurity and violent conflict across the world, and this is expected to increase as
the impacts of climate change worsen (Delgado, 2021). Evidence also suggests that
climate-related conflict is more likely to emerge in regions that are highly vulnerable to
climate variability and experiencing low socioeconomic development, poor
infrastructure and governance capacity, alongside high levels of food insecurity,
poverty, and socio-political inequality. Livelihood dependency on natural resources,
rain-fed agriculture and pastoralism also increase this risk (Belay et al., 2005; Beyene,
2017). Most of the regions that experience protracted crisis or high risk of famine are
often simultaneously affected by violent conflict and natural resource scarcity, which
reflects the interconnection between climate, food systems, environment, climate, and
insecurity (Liebig et al., 2022).
It is important to note that the cascading effects of climate on peace and security are
highly complex, and usually first play out at the local and communal level. Multiple
moving parts influence each other: there can be linear, causal linkages between climate
and insecurity, but these are also shaped by indirect, intermediate factors and context-
specific dynamics. Although there are some general trends and patterns to discern
through climate insecurity pathways, the change processes always remain difficult to
comprehend or predict (Liebig et al., 2022; Rüttinger et al., 2015).
This means climate change is seldom the direct source or driver, but it has a multiplier
effect and is an aggravating factor for crisis, instability, and conflict (Pacillo et al., 2022).
Other variables, especially history of conflict, political instability, oppression or
marginalisation, might have stronger explanatory or predictive value for violence than
climate stressors. Simplistic climate-conflict narratives should therefore not overwrite
longstanding historical factors that drive conflict in a certain context (Verhoeven, 2011;
Salehyan, 2014).
Based on a review of existing literature, the following section identifies five key
overlapping insecurity pathways – or cascading effects – through which climate change
and environmental pressures can compound risks to peace and security in the Somali
Region. These centre around:

1. livelihoods and natural resource competition;

2. human mobility and displacement;
3. regional spill-over effects;
4. intersectional vulnerabilities, and;
5. governance.

Pathway 1: Climate hazards and environmental pressures cause severe losses in

livestock and crop yields that threaten people’s livelihood and food security. This
in turn drives competition over scarce, variable and ephemeral natural resources,
which risk to escalate into violent conflict.

The Somali Region has always had limited natural resources available, and recent
droughts, flooding and pests have further reduced this, causing repeated devastation
on communities’ livelihood and food security. Even though livelihoods are relatively
diversified, (agro)pastoralists and farmers remain heavily reliant on natural resources
(Beyene, 2017). Most of the region’s population is dependent on livestock as a both
source of food and income, but when seasons fail, these households experience a rapid
27
deterioration in food security and increased risk of malnutrition. Rains are becoming
more unpredictable and intense, oftentimes followed by flash floods and high levels of
run-off which means much water is lost as it cannot permeate the soil. Cycles of drought
and flooding have caused critical feed and water shortages, resulting in widespread
livestock and yield losses (FAO, 2016). The Somali Region local office has shared with
media outlet that more than 4.5 million livestock have died since late 2021 and 30
million are at risk (Addis Standard, 2023). In addition, a warming Arabian Sea increases
rainfall in and around the Arabian Peninsula, leading to higher rates of locust swarms.
Between 2019 and 2021, vast swarms of desert locusts wreaked havoc all over Eastern
Africa, causing severe damage to vital vegetation, agriculture land, rangelands and
fodder (The Week, 2021; Murakami et al., 2017).

Coping with climate hazards and environmental pressures has long been an integral
part of (agro)pastoralist life, especially in settings that experience a lot of climate
variability such as the Somali Region. More recently, pastoralists have increasingly
adapted by engaging in more diverse and non-pastoralist livelihoods like wage labour,
petty trade or selling assets (Belay et al., 2005; Beyene, 2017). Of course, Somali
pastoralists pursue heterogeneous adaptation pathways according to differences and
disparities in material, social and cultural capital (IOM and ICPALD, 2022).
Communities living in areas with access to markets, social infrastructure, and roads
have a greater range of adaptation options (UN Habitat, 2014).

Most pastoralists follow seasonal livestock mobility patterns to utilise the wet and dry
season grazing lands, and breed livestock that feed selectively on available pastures in
the dry lands. Adjusting these mobility strategies for the sustainable management of
drylands vegetation and water is also a well-known adaptive behavioural response
(IGAD, 2019). Similarly, cattle raiding and natural resource competition, including land
and water disputes – either between farming communities and pastoralists or between
pastoral clans – have been part of Somali pastoral ecosystems for a long time. Such
competition and cattle raiding often have deeply rooted belief systems and long-
standing traditional practices (Hegazi et al., 2022; Mussa et al., 2017).

Oftentimes, this cattle raiding and competition turns violent, and pastoral societies
have developed numerous traditional and customary ways to prevent and resolve
conflict. Somali clan elders play a key role in customary law by mediating in disputes
between clans and negotiating agreements on compensation, and also by leading
traditional practices of forgiveness (Muluken, 2020). The Ethiopian government also
recognised this as a conflict resolution mechanism, which was integrated in the Somali
government (Hegazi et al., 2022; Mussa et al., 2017). However, when natural resources
dwindle and competition becomes fiercer, the risk of violence also heightens. Evidence
from different contexts suggests that food and livelihood insecurity increase grievances
and can have negative implications for peace and stability (Delgado et al., 2021).

The incidence of violence related to livestock raiding has been found to increase during
atypically wet and atypically dry years. Some evidence suggests that pastoral groups in
the Somali Region engage in more livestock raiding during dry years, suggestive of
greater scarcity (Raleigh and Kniveton, 2012). However, other research in the broader
region indicates that livestock violence becomes higher in wet times suggestive of more
violence in times of plenty (Ember et al., 2014). Oftentimes, to cope with the effects of
drought, livestock is raided within the same clan, or between different clans. This does
not necessarily lead to conflict, as it is part of traditional resource sharing mechanisms
28
managed through indigenous conflict resolution. However, inter-ethnic or inter-clan
raiding – as compared to intra-clan – often causes conflict between communities
because there are no or few mechanisms for conflict resolution or compensation
between such groups (Belay et al., 2005). In periods of drought, intra-clan raiding might
reduce, and inter-clan or inter-ethnic raiding increase, leading to more violent conflict
between communities (Hegazi et al., 2022).

The supply and availability of small arms to farmers and herders also play a key role in
escalating competition into conflict, and conflict into violence. Communal conflict
management mechanisms can erode, leading to further deterioration of the security
situation (Abbink, 2007). External shocks, such as weather hazards and locust swarms,
that threaten natural resources have a high likelihood of simultaneously exacerbating
these conflicts. This insecurity pathway has spiralled repeatedly during several
episodes in recent Somali history, and is expected to become more intense and
frequent when the impacts of climate change worsen (Hegazi et al., 2022; IOM and
ICPALD, 2022).

Finally, it is important to note that environmental degradation can contribute to

insecurity, but insecurity also affects the environment. Rather than one linear pathway,
these feedback loops can be seen to mutually reinforce each other. Conflicts between
farmers and herders, or between pastoral clans cause general insecurity that limit
pastoralists’ options to secure their livelihoods, often requiring them to stay in secure
areas close to urban centres. Intensified grazing and overexploitation of these areas
then again result in environmental degradation. Access to fertile areas may also be
highly unequal, varying according to each household’s social networks, herd size and
wealth level (IOM and ICPALD, 2022).

Pathway 2: Shifting transhumance movements, as well as climate-induced

migration and displacement, can lead to an uptick in violence.

Migration and mobility are amongst the most important livelihood strategies of pastoral
societies. Transhumance is not only a vital aspect of the livestock production system
and an inherent part of pastoral life, it also helps pastoral communities to strengthen
their resilience and adaptive capacity to various stressors. However, if mobility patterns
change, they can also become a source of intense demographic pressures that lead to
tensions between and within communities. This is especially visible when shifting
migration takes place in a poorly planned, unmanaged, abrupt, or forced manner
(Ahmed and Bihi, 2019; IOM and ICPALD, 2022).

Even though migration as an adaptation and risk management strategy has often been
successful for nomadic pastoralists, it also comes with heightened risks. Migration puts
additional stress on already weakened animals, especially when routes become longer
or more arduous. Higher concentrations of livestock in restricted areas, e.g. in
diminished plots of fertile rangeland, have also been conducive to the rapid spread of
contagious diseases. In the worst-affected areas of the Somali Region, households
dependent on their animals – mainly sheep, goats, cattle and camels – have seen most,
or all, of their herd perish as a result of insufficient feed and water (FAO, 2016). Ex-
pastoralists and pastoral drop-outs who lost their assets and property often
subsequently migrate to urban centres in search for a better and more secure life.
Mostly young (ex-)pastoralists then end up in extreme poverty in villages and towns,

29
without social protection and economic income, and marginalised from host
communities (Ahmed and Bihi, 2019).

It is worth considering the impact that consecutive and multi-year climate variability
and extremes have had on traditional ways of coping mechanisms such as
transhumance and migration patterns. For example, a study that focused on
understanding climate variability and indigenous adaptation strategies by Somali
pastoralists in the Kebribeyah district (northwest of the Somali Region) revealed that
unusual adaptation strategies are replacing the traditional pastoralist livelihood
system. Survey responses suggested that most households resorted to various non-
farm and off-farm methods, including petty trade, charcoal production, daily labor,
remittance, milk sells and meat sell (Ayal et al., 2022). Furthermore, focus group
discussion with young pastoralists disclosed the extent of out-migration of the young
population in search of employment to the nearby towns like Jigjiga and Degehabour
and as far as Saudi Arabia and Libya (Ayal et al., 2022).

A major element in transhumance movements is access to and availability of

rangelands. When rangelands get fragmented, nomadic pastoralists need to shift their
routes, heightening insecurity and conflict risks. Rangeland fragmentation can occur as
a consequence of environmental degradation, but also due to physical obstructions
such as infrastructural developments, commercial projects, private property lines and
fences, exclusionary conservation zones, and international borders. In other cases,
rangeland fragmentation is caused by pastoralists themselves, either as part of pastoral
competition over land or when wealthy pastoralists decide to invest in land for other
purposes like agriculture or business (IOM and ICPALD, 2022).

Access can also be restricted due to legal or governance issues. For example, the Land
Administration to Nurture Development (LAND) project was established as a legal and
regulatory framework related to land tenure and property rights, including for
communal lands used by pastoralists. However, the project caused tensions because
pastoralists identified the dheeda (a traditional grazing unit) as the unit of landholding,
while regional officials were reluctant to formally recognise such large land-holdings,
which often traverse administrative boundaries. From the administration’s point of
view, customary structures were only deemed acceptable for local governance of small
territories. To safeguard transhumance movements, new legislation had to be passed
to allow pastoral community institutions to register as Community Land Governance
Entities (CLGEs) and hold title to communal land (Woldegiorgis, 2018; IOM and ICPALD,
2022).

These impediments to movement are often the result of governmental fragmentation,

due to different institutional bodies and unclarities in legal frameworks. Oftentimes,
both public and private interventions cause unintended harm to rangelands, but in other
cases – e.g. land grabbing or elite exploitation – pastoralist rights and practices are
purposefully ignored or hampered. Either way, nomadic pastoralists, especially
smallholders and rural poor have not been considered thoroughly in the search for
comprehensive solutions, forcing them to adapt in ways that secure their livelihoods in
the short-term, but jeopardise sustainable solutions and consequently also peace and
security (IOM and ICPALD, 2022).

Somali herders also face forced migration and displacement. In recent years, extreme
weather events in the Somali Region forced thousands of families out of their homes
30
and into displacement camps. A recent assessment found that 85 per cent of displaced
people in the Somali Region reported the main reason for their displacement as ‘loss of
livelihood due to drought’ (ACTED, 2021). The Somali Region has seen a continuous
influx of refugees and IDPs for years, including in and around urban centres and
highland areas, causing stress on host communities (FAO, 2016; UN Habitat, 2020). The
recent drought has also forced Ogaadeen (of Somali Region) pastoralists to cross over
to Somaliland and, in mid-2022, some 3.000 families and their livestock had arrived in
different parts of Somaliland (Rift Valley Institute, 2022).

Transhumance-related violence often takes place in regions that are rich in natural
resources, rather than in environmentally degraded zones. As nomadic pastoralists
leave drylands or unsuitable lands for pastoralism and travel to fertile rangeland and
agrarian areas in search for non-drought conditions, the latter regions consequently
experience demographic pressures, followed by a spike in competition and conflict over
natural resources. Drought-affected pastoral areas thus remain relatively calm, while
less arid lands with grazing opportunities risk becoming more unstable (Mcguirk and
Nunn, 2020). Often, (agro)pastoral areas where agriculture and pastoralism have
coexisted for a long time have greater resilience to such spill-over effects because
conflict management systems and resource-sharing mechanisms have already been
implemented. Fertile regions that did not experience increases in population (climate
in-migration) earlier might be less equipped to find suitable arrangements (IOM and
ICPALD, 2022). While transhumance-related violence and herder-farmer conflicts
remained relatively low in the Somali Region in recent history, the situation might
quickly deteriorate if climate stressors and associated disputes are poorly managed. In
such a scenario, the Somali Region could face an increase in transhumance conflicts as
seen in other parts of the broader region, such as in Somalia, Nigeria and Liptako
Gourma.

Pathway 3: Climate-induced conflicts in neighbouring Somalia, as well as in other

Ethiopian regions, could spill over and jeopardise stability in the Somali Region.
Borderlands are considered the most high-risk.

The Somali Region’s geographic location, nested within the Horn of Africa, together with
its porous land borders, makes it vulnerable to security developments in neighbouring
regions. Somalia has experienced over three decades of civil war, including violent
conflict over natural resources that come increasingly under pressure, making it an area
of instability that could spur new conflagrations and regional spill-over effects at any
point. Furthermore, the ethnic homogeneity in the Somali Region has led to close ties
with clans in Southern Somalia (Ogaden), Somaliland (Issaq), and Djibouti (Issa)
(Ficquet and Feyissa, 2015).

In addition to international ties, Somali clans in the Somali Region inhabit areas within
the borders of its Ethiopian neighbouring regions of Oromia and Afar, which have
already experienced ethnic tension and resource competition in borderlands (Kefale,
2013). Ethno-nationalist conflicts, as flared up between the federal and Tigray
governments in late 2020, might also spur separatist sentiment and grievance in the
Somali Region towards central governance and politics, federal land distribution,
regional borders and sovereignty (Hagmann, 2014; Hagmann, 2020). The disputed
borders area between Afar and Somali Regions, which has significant resources such as
31
the Awash River6, has seen a rise in conflict over these resources since 2018, with major
clashes happening at the time of heightened political tensions during the run-up toward
the national elections in 2021 (Ethiopia Peace Observatory, 2023). Although a major
clash has not made the news since 2021, the Awash River continues to be an important
resource for both Afar and Somali herders and is critical for trade between Addis Ababa
and Djibouti (Ethiopia Peace Observatory, 2023).

Finally, the Somali Region’s neighbours are also highly exposed and vulnerable to
climate shocks and disasters caused by natural hazards (ND-GAIN, 2022; Weathering
Risk, 2022). Even though climate impacts can play out differently across the wider
region, and while the Somali Region might remain spared from severe climate hazards,
it is by no means isolated from its neighbours. The Somali population could therefore
bear the consequences of the wider region’s high fragility to climate and environmental
stress. Taken together, the socio-political, economic and climate volatility of neighbours
inside and outside of Ethiopia, as well as the complex ties and interdependence
between neighbours, make the Somali Region equally vulnerable to external climate-
related security risks. These have the potential to exacerbate conflict among Somalis
or between Somalis and their neighbours, especially in borderlands (Kefale, 2013; IOM
and ICPALD, 2022).

The Somali Region is also dealing with refugees fleeing conflict. In 2023, at least
100.000 refugees from Somalia fled to remote areas of the Somali Region because of
conflict between Somalian security forces and opposition groups, particularly after
fighting started in Las Anod, in the disputed Sool region (UNHCR, 2023b). In the past,
cross-border security between the Somali Region and Somalia has been relatively
peaceful owing to strong Ethiopian Security forces presence, except for a rare attack of
two villages by Al-Shabab forces in July 2022 (Reuters, 2022). However, as climate and
demographic pressures increase, and if strong security is not maintained, the Somali-
Somalia border area could see higher displacement and instability.

Pathway 4: Climate hazards and environmental stressors can exacerbate existing

intersectional vulnerabilities.

Climate change and environmental issues affect people differently depending on

gender, age, occupational group, socioeconomic situation, disability, etc. Displaced
persons, women, youth, elderly or disabled people are the most vulnerable because
they have limited resources and options at their disposal to respond to challenges or
take advantage of opportunities. The basis for adaptive capacity is often captured under
the term ‘optionality’ (IOM and ICPALD, 2022).

Concerning socioeconomic class, wealthier herders can more easily diversify their
income by focusing on agriculture or by investing in less climate-sensitive economic
activities – something herders with less means at their disposal are oftentimes unable
to do (IOM and ICPALD, 2022). For example, some Somali herders have opposed
irrigation-based schemes that reduce available pasturelands, while other, often
wealthier pastoralists from the same community decided to purchase private land and

6 The Awash river basin is one of the most important river basins in Ethiopia covering significant populated areas. Climate
vulnerability has resulted in increased dependency on the river and its tributaries (CSE, 2022).
32
invest in irrigated cultivation as a way to diversify their income. Such coping
mechanisms applied by wealthy pastoralists might also reduce options for poor,
smallholder herders (Eriksen and Marin, 2011).

As for gender, in the Somali Region men tend to respond to drought by migrating to look
for work, selling assets or livestock, and purchasing food on credit. Each of these
adaptation strategies is used in higher proportion by men compared to women, which
could be due to women’s limited opportunities for mobility, and their limited access and
control over resources and assets (Oxfam, 2017). In response to food insecurity,
women tend to adopt negative coping strategies, such as reduction in food
consumption. Furthermore, women may have more control over decision-making about
food assistance than decision-making about cash assistance, compared to men. When
men leave the herd behind and migrate in search for other income generating activities,
women become de facto heads of households and in charge of livestock keeping. In
such cases, women usually take over some of the decision-making authority, but this is
often faced with resistance, either within households or from the community. In
addition, when taking on additional responsibilities in response to climate stressors,
women and children often have to leave safe environments and expose themselves to
security risks, e.g. when fetching water over longer distances or when taking care of the
herd (Oxfam, 2017; IFAD, 2020a).

Although Somali women and men are both involved in livestock rearing, women tend to
face more constraints in market access and control over resources. Thus, women are
generally more often engaged in labour-intensive activities such as milking and feeding
livestock, while men are in charge of decision-making of livestock sales (WFP, 2019).
With the implementation of statutory, formal systems of land use and ownership, some
communal pasture tenure systems have been breaking down. This has led to adverse
impacts on women, who often fall ‘between two stools’, i.e. that of the customary
practices and that of the more formal governance tenure. This can materialise in women
missing out on formal recognition of their roles and titles in pastoral societies (Adoko
and Levine, 2008; Flintan, 2011).

To cope with increasingly harsh living conditions, over the years, pastoralists have
attempted to diversify their livestock, because depending on one particular livestock
type makes them more vulnerable to drought, rangeland fragmentation or market
accessibility and fluctuation. Higher diversification of livestock requires additional tasks
and responsibilities, and consequently women and children have started to play a
greater role in herd management. Women will usually have responsibility for small
livestock such as sheep or goats, and/or the larger livestock that is kept around the
household. Typical tasks include milking and caring for sick or young animals, especially
when men are migrating with the herd (IFAD, 2020a).

Both Somali men and women also try to diversify their income by engaging in non-
pastoralist related work. This may involve farming or trade in non-pastoral goods,
leading to increased resilience to climate-related or other stressors. However,
livelihood diversification can also push women into higher workloads that are time-
consuming, and thus negatively affect other aspects of their lives, such as domestic
work, education, leisure and social activities, etc. This eventually hampers their
socioeconomic empowerment. In sum, economic diversification into non-livestock
alternatives can lead to both empowerment or disempowerment of women (IFAD,
2020a).
33
The introduction of modern technology and livestock information services offers a range
of opportunities for pastoralists to strengthen their resilience. However, such
innovations typically have a higher uptake amongst men as compared to women.
Furthermore, livestock extension provision and veterinary services are generally
designed by and provided for men, with limited focus on women’s involvement in
livestock health and production (IFAD, 2020a).

Not only women, but also children, youth, disabled and elderly persons have limited
access to coping mechanisms and are more vulnerable to harmful adaptation practices,
which reinforce the cycle of poverty and insecurity. The cascading effects of climate
change on these vulnerable groups can also have a direct impact on their personal
security. Examples include reduced access to education, increased child marriage and
Female Genital Mutilation, or increased mortality among the elderly due to climate-
induced livelihood stress and insecurity (UNICEF, 2022; Nusrat, 2019). Marginalisation
and poverty amongst youth, whether exacerbated by climate insecurity or not, have also
been well-evidenced drivers of armed group recruitment and mobilisation (Haer, 2019;
Achvarina and Reich, 2006). When pastoral livelihoods dwindle, older community
members can compel youth to engage in cattle raiding, often against their will, exposing
them to violence. Finally, youth are often more likely than their older counterparts to
aspire to livelihood diversification, and, for example, migrate to urban areas in search
for opportunities. While this can strengthen their resilience, it can also expose them to
urban poverty, criminality and violence (Humphrey et al., 2023).

Finally, women and youth are not solely victims of climate insecurity. They are often
wrongly perceived as passive actors in transhumance-related conflicts. While it is
mostly men engaging in violence, women play a role in cultivating a culture of conflict,
or indeed, peace (IFAD, 2020a). Women sometimes encourage young family members
to fight to protect their clan and livelihoods, while on the other hand, they can also play
a role in mediating conflicts or preventing them from escalating. For example, in some
instances, women can intervene where men cannot, for fear among the latter that they
could be killed before negotiations begin or if a resolution is not found (Bouh and
Mammo, 2008).

Pathway 5: The presence, legitimacy and capacity of governmental actors can

either mitigate or exacerbate climate-related security risks.

The Somali Region, which in the 1880s was one of the last regions to be incorporated
into the Ethiopian state, did not integrate into state institutions in the same way as other
regions because of its rural demographics and predominantly pastoralist populace.
Historically, there has been inequity in power and resource allocation between
Ethiopia’s highland and central regions in comparison with its lowland and peripheral
regions (Kefale, 2013). Because of this history, today most governmental actors still
have limited activities and influence in the Somali Region, especially related to climate
adaptation and resilience building. This is due, in part, to the lack of formal partnerships
between authorities and other relevant stakeholders, such as (agro)pastoral
communities, civil society organisations, and the private sector. The history of state-
based violence in the Somali Region, as well as opposition to state interference, has
consistently hampered the presence, legitimacy and capacity of governmental actors in
the region. As a result, basic safety measures, such as disaster and emergency
management are considerably limited or non-existent (UN Habitat, 2014).
34
Politics and governance in the region remain inseparable from inter-clan and intra-clan
dynamics and norms among the Somali population, as well as the longstanding ties
between these Somali clans and their counterparts in Somalia (Kefale, 2013). In this
context, initiatives from the central government to respond to climate and
environmental pressures can create new problems or conflicts across jurisdictions. For
example, if climate, peace and security strategies enacted by Ethiopian authorities in
the Somali Region do not have local buy-in or ownership, they could be perceived by
Somalis as undesirable or even harmful, leading to push back that could potentially turn
into violent conflict – as it has on numerous occasions in the past (Warfa, 2021).
Disregard for customary regulations and practices, as well as government interventions
that could be perceived as discriminatory, therefore risk flaring up historical grievances
which can drive new tensions and conflicts. These conflicts could play out intra-
regionally, within and between Somali pastoralist clans, or between Somalis and the
Ethiopian central state or neighbouring states, such as Oromia or Afar. Some key risk
areas include access to and distribution of fertile land, water resources and
humanitarian aid.

35
Existing responses that address climate-related risks

At the national level, Ethiopia’s climate change adaptation policies identify and
prioritize the need for safeguarding livelihood security and strengthening of climate
vulnerability and shock coping mechanisms. For instance, three out of the 18
adaptation options that have been identified for implementation in the National
Adaptation Plan (NAP) are (1) enhancing food security by improving agricultural
productivity in a climate-smart manner, (2) building social protection and livelihood
options of vulnerable people, and (3) strengthening drought, livestock and crop
mechanisms (FDRE, 2019). It is worth noting that Ethiopia’s Nationally Determined
Contribution (NDC), which was updated in 2021, after initial submission to the UNFCCC
in 2016, focuses its adaptation commitments in the areas of agriculture and land use
with priorities in livestock diversification, drought resistant animal breeding, rangeland
management and livestock insurance (UNFCCC, 2022). Furthermore, key intervention
points relating to climate resilient food systems that were recognized by the NDC are:
agriculture resilience and diversification, risk reduction, transfer, and insurance, water
management and irrigation, and, climate information services (UNFCC, 2022).

At the implementation level, several programmes aim to address climate-related

security risks in the Somali Region, especially in the areas of livelihood security and
climate-induced migration. The following were identified through desk research:

Anticipatory Actions (AAs) for Food Security: WFP partners with local institutions,
the Somali Region Disaster Risk Management Bureau (DRMB), National Meteorological
Authority (NMA) and Somali Micro Finance Institution and Mercy Corps to implement
anticipatory action programmes (UNFCCC 2022; WFP 2023). The anticipatory action
programming has a two-fold approach to preventing or reducing climate hazards on
vulnerable populations: (1) strengthening national and local capacities for early warning
and reach the increasing number of vulnerable populations, and (2) direct delivery of
anticipatory action (UNFCCC, 2022; WFP, 2023). In 2022, two AAs were activated in
July and August with the goal of protecting lives and livelihoods from deteriorating
drought conditions through dissemination of early warning messages and advisories to
vulnerable local communities, rangeland enclosure and fodder production and
provision of anticipatory cash (see table 2) (WFP, 2023). In 2023, WFP aims to continue
support drought-affected (agro)pastoralists in the region through anticipatory action
programming, which will include providing microinsurance and assisting to boost
livelihoods (WFP, 2023).

Somali Regional State Durable Solutions Strategy 2022-2025: The SRS Durable
Solutions Strategy 2022-2025 is part of the Durable Solutions Initiative (DSI) that was
established by the Government of Ethiopia, in collaboration with the UN, NGOs and
donors by focusing on communities affected by recent internal displacement (UN
Ethiopia, 2019). The action plan of this strategy is to provide a pathway for
displacement affected communities to transition from dependency on humanitarian,
urgent life-saving assistance to a condition of self-sufficiency and, ultimately, resilience
(DSI and SDC, 2022). In 2020, the Durable Solution Steering Committee headed the
development of solution options for IDPs which included returning to areas of origin,
relocation to both urban and rural areas; and local integration; with a costed plan of
action to outline multi- sectoral needs and technical support (DSI and SDC, 2022).
36
UNHCR Response to Drought Impacted Communities: UNHCR’s current drought
impact response may not necessarily be considered long-term risk reduction
programming but helps mitigate the impact of the climate vulnerability and extremes
that communities are dealing with from the ongoing drought and flooding. From April-
July of 2023, 1.4 million people were prioritised for assistance in drought affected areas
of the Somali Region (UNHCR, 2023a). UNHCR partnered with the local government
office to distribute emergency food (rice, wheat flour, sugar and dates) to communities
experiencing drought displacement and floods (UNCHR, 2023). Additionally, UNHCR
distributed principal relief items (plastic sheets, solar lanterns, jerrycans and sleeping
mats) to drought displaced households and profiling of IDPs and identified needs for
effective planning of response, including arrangement for multi-purpose cash
assistance (UNHCR, 2023a).

WFP programming in the Somali Region

In response to the severe drought, WFP launched a drought response programme
aimed at supporting families with a combination of emergency relief, nutrition
support and resilience building actions to save lives in the short-term and build
resilience in the long-term. In late 2022, WFP provided around 2.8 million Somali
people with food, cash and nutrition assistance on a monthly basis. However, due
to funding shortfalls, WFP was not able to target the 4.7 million people estimated
to be in need.

In addition to these lifesaving initiatives, WFP supported (agro)pastoralists in the

region with trainings on small-scale, drought-resistant agricultural techniques and
entrepreneurial skills to help them build businesses and diversify their livelihoods
in the face of climate change. More specifically, WFP’s climate adaptation and
resilience programme in the Somali Region includes:

• Microinsurance against climate shocks: WFP’s Satellite Index Insurance for

Pastoralists (SIIPE) programme provides Somali (agro)pastoralists with
livestock insurance against extreme climate shocks. In addition, WFP’s
forecast-based financing programme provides early warning to support
(agro)pastoralists to prepare for climate shocks before they turn into
humanitarian disasters.
• Boosting (agro)pastoralists’ livelihoods and restoring degraded land: WFP
provides livelihood support both on and off the farm to (agro)pastoralists in
the Somali Region by helping them construct irrigation canals, conducting
trainings on smart agricultural practices and providing agricultural inputs. Over
500 hectares of rangeland have been rehabilitated through these activities.
WFP has also supported farmers and pastoralists in the Gode woreda to
rehabilitate drought-affected land by digging half-moon formations to capture
water and help re-grow pasture in the arid areas.
• Fostering savings and lending schemes: WFP also supports
(agro)pastoralists and refugees in the Somali Region to save, lend and invest
money in their livestock and crop production through the establishment of
Village Saving and Loan Associations (VSLAs).

Table 3: WFP programming in the Somali Region (WFP, 2022b)

37
A critical element to consider when designing and implementing climate security
programmes includes taking into account the risk of maladaptation. According to the
IPCC, maladaptive responses to climate change can create lock-ins of vulnerability,
heightened exposure to risks that are harmful and costly to manage and worsen existing
inequalities. However, it is possible to avoid maladaptation through flexible, multi-
sectoral, inclusive and long-term planning and implementation of adaptation
programmes that benefit to multiple sectors and systems (IPCC, 2022). In a nutshell,
cross-sectorial partnerships and coordination with the inclusion of contextual and local
knowledge will be important to minimising the risk of maladaptation. Overall, it is
difficult to forecast which strategies will translate adaptation programs into
maladaptation but growing experience of adaptation on the ground has clarified that
poorly designed adaptation strategies are often the drivers of maladaptation (Schipper,
2020). The overarching strategy to avoid maladaptation should also take into account
how coping mechanisms outside of climate change adaptation programming are
impacting sustainable development and peace and security goals. For instance,
considering that the Somali Region is already noticing maladaptive coping mechanisms
such as charcoal trading and Khat farming that threaten bushland and compete with
food production, an effective adaptation strategy would put in place a way to assess
those impacts (Ayal et al, 2022).

38
Entry points and priorities

This report highlights some of the climate-related security risks in the Somali Region
and describes how these are interlinked with existing vulnerabilities. The intensifying
severity of climate change impacts and environmental degradation, combined with the
lack of alternative coping strategies in many communities in the Somali Region, are
decreasing the ability of people to adapt, including through migration and livelihood
diversification. When people flee conflict and weather-related hazards, they face
deteriorated living conditions and increased vulnerability. Rural-urban migration, as
well as refugee sites and settlements for IDPs, also cause additional pressures on
already scarce, variable and ephemeral natural resources, putting stress on host
communities. Strong feedback loops between climate change impacts and drivers of
conflict exist, in particular with poor governance and livelihood and food insecurity.

Severe shortages of water and pasture in the Somali Region are devastating livelihoods
and forcing families from their homes. This consequently increases the risk for
unorderly migration, competition over natural resources, and violent conflict. With the
effects of climate change, these impacts will worsen in the future, especially for
(agro)pastoralists and farmers, as well as women, youth and rural poor, who are
amongst the most vulnerable communities to environmental stressors.

To build resilience among Somalis to climate impacts and environmental degradation,

as well as to strengthen conflict management and promote peaceful societies, existing
evidence derived from our literature review has brought forward numerous good
practices, which are included in the following thematically organised entry points and
priorities for humanitarian and development actors to consider:

1. Conflict-sensitive and peace-oriented programming: As a general principle and

cross-cutting recommendation, it is critical to ensure that interventions leave no
one behind and do not cause harm, and also aim to enhance conflict management
and contribute to peaceful societies. A conflict-sensitive approach takes different
conceptual and contextual principles into account, allowing humanitarian and
development actors to gain a deeper and broader understanding of risks and avoid
unintended or harmful consequences of their intervention. In addition, projects
should actively seek to prevent and resolve conflict by linking climate resilience
with sustainable peace objectives. Therefore, key focus areas include:
• Identify synergies between climate adaptation and activities that help bridge
communities and strengthen social relations.
• Focus on opportunities to work towards shared interests, common goods
and mutual benefits between and within communities, especially between
refugees and host communities.
• Adopt a conflict-sensitive and peace-oriented approach to inform the
design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programmes and
projects.
• Develop specific climate, peace and security indicators and objectives that
enhance social cohesion, build synergies and improve relations between and
within communities.
• Appoint designated staff and focal points that are responsible for
mainstreaming a climate, peace and security lens.
39
 • Promote (existing) platforms and mechanisms for local participation among
different communities, resource-sharing and inclusiveness.
• Build capacity and raise awareness across different levels and amongst all
key stakeholders.
• Mitigating and preventing harmful, unintended effects of interventions,
including environmental, social, cultural or societal impacts.

2. Livelihood diversification: Communities vulnerable to climate stressors, in

particular (agro)pastoralists and farmers, need to develop and maintain a range of
potential economic options that allow for a back-up plan in case of failed
agriculture or livestock production, or when new needs arise. Livelihood
diversification is already inherent to farming and pastoralism. Most pastoralists
have long practiced supplementary forms of food production, resource
exploitation and trade. Therefore, opportunities to support the diversification of
livelihoods should be integrated in existing practices. However, with extended
periods of drought and back-to-back dry seasons in the past years, livelihood
diversification should also include options outside of the traditional ways of coping
with drought. Some focus areas to consider include:
• Portfolio diversification, allowing households to undertake multiple
productive activities to spread risk across a range of occupations with
different sensitivities to climate or other stressors.
• Temporal diversification, in which households move between different
activities and income sources at different times, e.g. following more closely
weather or seasonal patterns.
• Enhancing added values from by-products of livestock, such as dairy
products and animal hides, and additional aspects of the value chain.
• Investing in non-pastoral activities, such as small business development,
dryland and irrigated agriculture, agroforestry, adoption of agricultural
innovation such as new cash crops, education and vocational training, labour
migration, and trade.
• Enhancing access to markets, especially for vulnerable groups like farmers,
(agro)pastoralists, women, youth, and displaced persons.
• Uptake of non-traditional coping mechanisms, such as learning new
vocational skills and trades, and fostering sharing of knowledge and practices
from external pastoral and non-pastoral communities.

3. Climate-smart agriculture and practices: Enhanced management of water and

fertile soil, together with more sustainable agricultural practices and technologies,
can build more climate-resilient livelihood and food systems. This in turn reduces
the risk of competition and conflict over fertile land and natural resources. Some
climate-smart agricultural innovations and practices include:
• Enhanced absorptive capacity and water harvesting systems such as
irrigation schemes, water supply technologies, water capture systems, flood-
based farming (floodplain agriculture, spate irrigation, inundation canals,
depression agriculture, etc.) and sustainable water management in
wastelands. The selection of relevant water systems should be based on
equitable arrangements, the production capacities and socioeconomic
situation of farmers and pastoralists.
• Agro-weather management information systems, including early warning
and risk management.

40
 • Promoting resilient, bio-fortified crop production, including intercropping,
and nutrient-dense foods, as well as the use of improved, high-yielding
seed varieties, especially fast growing, drought resistant plants.
• Exploring alternative farming approaches like agroforestry, urban farming,
and supporting enhanced food storage and post-harvest handling.

4. Animal health and production: Several measures allow (agro)pastoralists to

maintain the size and health of their herds and minimise losses, which in turn
prevent livestock raiding and the risk of conflict. These include:
• Animal health and veterinary services, including effective disease
management, vaccination and treatments.
• Streamlining and scaling up range of insurance provision and cash-based
products.
• Drought-mitigating livestock supplementary feeds and fodder banks. For
example, hay products are relatively easy to produce and conserve, and have
high scalability potential.
• Improved breed reproduction centres to promote livestock breeds that are
more resilient to drought and provide higher production. This would include
cross-breeding with traditional and indigenous livestock, and providing
certified semen and artificial insemination services.
• Fostering animal health provision and vaccination campaigns as an entry
point to bring conflicting parties together, support dialogue processes and
facilitate the creation of local natural resource management agreements.

5. Rangeland and transhumance management: Rangeland fragmentation and

degradation reduce the options for pastoral movements. To recover spatial
optionality of nomadic pastoralists, and to prevent and resolve transhumance-
related conflicts, interventions could focus on the following priority areas:
• Facilitating dialogue and holistic solutions about rangeland management,
well adapted to the new realities of climate change and local needs.
• Investing in rangeland extensification to enhance herd movement and avoid
fragmentation.
• Promoting rangeland recovery, including through reseeding, reforestation,
and conservation projects, as well as by up-scaling nutritional feeding and
restricting range grazing.
• Facilitating livestock transport, access to markets, cross-border movement
and livestock trade so pastoralists can more easily traverse rangeland
ecosystems.
• Monitoring and mitigating the risk of borderland insecurity and conflict, as
these are major risks in cross-boundary transhumance.

6. Natural resource management and governance: Government interference has

long been a sensitive issue in the Somali Region, but connecting the different
levels of natural resource management is key for sustainable development and
building climate resilience, as well as to increase social cohesion and manage
conflicts. Therefore, key focus areas include:
• Active engagement of pastoral communities by involving them in developing
and implementing policies, ensuring representation at relevant national and
international fora, and building agency as actors of adaptive governance.

41
 • Supporting existing indigenous knowledge strategies for resilience, such as
social systems support, early warning systems based on long-term
observation of astral bodies, flora and fauna and experience.
• Promoting flexible and communal systems of governance for grazing and
water sources, as these have the highest potential for local acceptance and
ownership.
• Linking customary pastoralist institutions and practices with formal
government actors to promote bottom-up approaches and build sustainable
and effective partnerships.
• Helping to broker formal and informal natural resource sharing
agreements between farmers and (agro)pastoralists, among
(agro)pastoralists, and between refugees, IDPs and host communities.

7. Capacity-building and awareness raising: The following entry points can help to
improve the delivery of climate, environmental and security/conflict information
across different sectors of the food system:
• Collaborate with partners and stakeholders to develop programmes that can
build capacity in climate security and resilience, climate adaptation and
climate-smart food programmes.
• Develop information products targeting climate fragile communities, e.g.
related to weather forecasts, seasonal forecasts, and agricultural information.
• Incorporate climate security information for the different components of
food systems in early warning systems and emergency response
mechanisms.

8. Partnerships and coordination: The following entry points aim to strengthen

climate adaptation and resilience-building:
• Establish new partnerships and strengthen existing ones to bring in more
experience and expertise around climate- and conflict-sensitive
programming. Especially partnerships with local, community-based and
peacebuilding actors should be fostered.
• Develop a climate security and adaptation platform to periodically bring
together different actors and stakeholders active in and from the region,
during which relevant issues could be discussed. This would also lead to
fruitful exchanges and improved planning and coordination of activities.
• Minimise and avoid maladaptation through multi-sectorial partnerships and
coordination, as well as inclusivity of local knowledge in addition to focusing
on long-term goals starting from the planning stage of adaptation
programming.

42
References

Achvarina, V.; and Reich, S. (2006) No Place to Hide: Refugees, Displaced Persons, and
the Recruitment of Child Soldiers. International Security 31, pp. 127–164. Retrieved
from: https://direct.mit.edu/isec/article-abstract/31/1/127/11860/No-Place-to-Hide-
Refugees-Displaced-Persons-and?redirectedFrom=fulltext

Abbink, J., (2007) Ethnicity and conflict generation in Ethiopia: Some problems and
prospects of ethno-regional federalism. Journal of Contemporary African Studies, vol.
24, no. 3. Retrieved from:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02589000600976729

Abdi, M. M., (2020) Regularly Irregular: Varieties of Informal Trading in the Ethiopia-
Somaliland Borderlands. Rift Valley Institute. Retrieved from:
https://riftvalley.net/news/drought-ethiopias-somali-region-and-cross-border-
strategies-survival

Abdirahman, A., Alexion E., Burns, D. (2021) Livelihood Components of Durable

Solutions for IDPs: Assessments of three cases in Somali Region, Ethiopia. Retrieved
from: https://fic.tufts.edu/wp-content/uploads/Durable-Solutions-11.19.21.pdf

Abebe, B. (2020) National Gender Assessment of the Land Sector: Ethiopia. Inter-
Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD). Retrieved from:
https://igad.int/download/national-gender-assessment-of-the-land-sector-in-
ethiopia/

Abera, W., Brocca, L., and Rigon, R. (2016) Comparative Evaluation of Different Satellite
Rainfall Estimation Products and Bias Correction in the Upper Blue Nile (UBN) Basin. In:
Atmospheric Research, pp. 178–179. Retrieved from:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2016.04.017

ACAPS (2017) Ethiopia: Food Insecurity and Malnutrition in Somali Region. Online.
Retrieved from: https://www.acaps.org/special-report/ethiopia-food-insecurity-and-
malnutrition-somali-region

ACAPS (2023) Ethiopia Impact of drought: Oromia and Somali Regions. Online.
Retrieved from:
https://www.acaps.org/fileadmin/Data_Product/Main_media/20230207_acaps_them
atic_report_horn_of_africa_analysis_ethiopia_impact_of_drought_oromia_and_somali
_regions.pdf

ACTED (2021) ACTED Drought Needs Assessment Somali Region, Ethiopia, Post Short
Rains. Retrieved from: https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/acted-drought-needs-
assessment-somali-region-ethiopia-post-short-rains-2021

Addis Standard (2023) News Analysis: Drought hit pastoralists of Afder zone in Somali
region linger between life and death, urge immediate food aid. Retrieved from:
43
https://addisstandard.com/news-analysis-drought-hit-pastoralists-of-afder-zone-in-
somali-region-linger-between-life-and-death-urge-immediate-food-
aid/#:~:text=The%20UN%20said%20this%20is,more%20than%203.3%20million%
20livestock

Ahmed, M.E.; Bihi, M.A. (2019) Indigenous Knowledge for Resilience and Adaptation in
Pastoral Production System of Somali Regional State in Ethiopia. Institute of Disaster
Risk Management and Food Security Studies, Bahir Dar University. Retrieved from:
https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/336784

Aich, V.; S. Liersch, T. Vetter, S. Huang, J. Tecklenburg, P. Hoffmann, H. Koch, S. Fournet,

V. Krysanova, E.N. Müller, and F.F. Hattermann (2014) Comparing impacts of climate
change on streamflow in four large African river basins. In: Hydrology and Earth System
Sciences 18:4, pp. 1305–1321. Retrieved from:
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Comparing-impacts-of-climate-change-on-
streamflow-Aich-Liersch/7522634db88f6a7686f6113793d8b14705092a1e

Amaha, N. (2020) Ethiopian progress towards achieving the global nutrition targets of
2025: analysis of sub-national trends and progress inequalities. Online. Retrieved from:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33298157/

Ayal, D. Y, Kebede, H. Y., Belay, A., Emiru, N. C. and Mekuyie, M. (2022). Climate
variability and indigenous adaptation strategies by Somali pastoralists in Ethiopia.
Retrieved from: https://www.researchsquare.com/article/rs-1990099/v1

Belay, K., Beyene, F. and Manig, W. (2005) Coping with drought among pastoral and
agro-pastoral communities in eastern Ethiopia. Journal of Rural Development, vol. 28.
Retrieved from: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/288376

Beyene, F. (2017) Natural Resource Conflict Analysis among Pastoralists in Southern

Ethiopia. In: Journal of Peacebuilding and Development 12:1, pp. 19–33. Retrieved
from: https://doi.org/10.1080/15423166.2017.1284605

Bogale, A., and Korf, B. (2007) To Share or Not to Share? (Non-)Violence, Scarcity and
Resource Access in Somali Region, Ethiopia. In: Journal of Development Studies 43:4,
pp. 743–65. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.1080/00220380701260093
Bouh, A.M., and Mammo, Y. (2008) Indigenous Conflict Management and Resolution
Mechanisms on Rangelands in Somali Regional State, Ethiopia. In: Nomadic Peoples
12:1, pp. 109–21. Retrieved from: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43123815

CGIAR (2021) Assessing the Relationship Between Climate, Food Security, and Conflict
in Ethiopia and in the Central American Dry Corridor. Retrieved from:
https://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/31%20October_CGIAR_Final
%20Report.pdf

Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) (2022) Towards a Water Management
Programme for the Awash Basin. Retrieved from: https://www.cseindia.org/the-awash-
basin-11376

44
Delgado, C., Murugani, V. and Tschunkert, K. (2021) Food Systems in Conflict and
Peacebuilding Settings: Pathways and Interconnections. SIPRI: Stockholm. Retrieved
from: https://sipri.org/publications/2021/other-publications/food-systems-conflict-
and-peacebuilding-settings-pathways-and-interconnections

Devereux, S. (2006) Vulnerable Livelihoods in Somali Region, Ethiopia. Institute of

Development Studies (IDS). Retrieved from:
https://www.ids.ac.uk/download.php?file=files/Rr57.pdf

Devereux, S. (2010) Better Marginalised than Incorporated? Pastoralist Livelihoods in

Somali Region, Ethiopia. In: European Journal of Development Research 22:5, pp. 678–
95. Retrieved from: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/ejdr.2010.29

Ember C. R., Skoggard I., Teferi A.A., Faas A.J. (2014) Rain and raids revisited:
Disaggregating ethnic group livestock raiding in the Ethiopian-Kenyan border region.
Civil Wars, vol. 16, no. 3. Retrieved from:
https://doi.org/10.1080/13698249.2014.966430

Constitution of Ethiopia (1995) Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of

Ethiopia. Retrieved from: https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b5a84.html

Eriksen, S., and Marin, A. (2011) Pastoral Pathways: Climate Change Adaptation
Lessons from Ethiopia. Oslo: The Development Fund. Retrieved from:
https://www.academia.edu/65923757/Pastoral_pathways_Climate_change_adaptatio
n_lessons_from_Ethiopia

Ethiopia Durable Solutions Initiative (EDI) and Swiss Agency for Development and
Cooperation (SDC) (2022). Somali Regional State Durable Solutions Strategy 2022-
2025 Retrieved from:
https://ethiopia.iom.int/sites/g/files/tmzbdl996/files/documents/somali-region-
durable-solutions-strategy.2022.2025.pdf

Ethiopia Peace Observatory (2023) Afar-Somali Border Conflict. Retrieved from:

https://epo.acleddata.com/afar-somali-border-conflict/

FAO (2016) Improving governance of pastoral lands: Implementing the Voluntary

Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in
the Context of National Food Security. Retrieved from:
https://www.fao.org/3/i5771e/i5771e.pdf

FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO (2022) The State of Food Security and Nutrition in
the World 2022. Repurposing food and agricultural policies to make healthy diets more
affordable. Retrieved from: https://www.fao.org/publications/sofi/2022/en/

Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (2019) Ethiopia’s National Adaptation Plan.

Retrieved from: https://www4.unfccc.int/sites/NAPC/Documents/Parties/NAP-
ETH%20FINAL%20VERSION%20%20Mar%202019.pdf

Flintan, F. (2011) Changing nature of gender roles in the drylands of the Horn and East
Africa: implications for DRR programming. Regional Learning & Advocacy Programme
45
for Vulnerable Dryland Communities (REGLAP). Retrieved from:
https://www.preventionweb.net/files/24271_24271genderanddrrfinaldec20111.pdf

Fratkin, E. (2014) Ethiopia’s Pastoralist Policies: Development, Displacement and

Resettlement. Nomadic Peoples 18 (1): 94–114.
https://doi.org/10.3197/np.2014.180107

Getu, Demeke A., Duncan, J., van Dijk, H. (2021) Development, Governmentality and
the Sedentary State: The Productive Safety Net Programme in Ethiopia’s Somali
Pastoral Periphery. In: Journal of Peasant Studies, pp. 1–23. Retrieved from:
https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2021.1945044

Guan J., Moyan L., Xifeng J., Jun L., Jianguo W., and Jianghua Z. (2021) The Potential
Habitat of Desert Locusts Is Contracting: Predictions under Climate Change Scenarios.
In: PeerJ 9, pp. 1–26. Retrieved from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34754618/

Haer, R. (2019) Children and armed conflict: looking at the future and learning from the
past, Third World Quarterly, 40:1, pp. 74-91, Retrieved
from: 10.1080/01436597.2018.1552131

Hagmann, T. (2014) Punishing the periphery: legacies of state repression in the

Ethiopian Ogaden. Journal of Eastern African Studies, 8:4, 725-739. Retrieved
from: 10.1080/17531055.2014.946238

Hagmann, T. (2020) Fast politics, slow justice: Ethiopia’s Somali region two years after
Abdi Iley. Conflict Research Programme. Briefing Paper. London School of Economics
(LSE). Retrieved from: https://www.lse.ac.uk/ideas/Assets/Documents/Conflict-
Research-Programme/crp-memos/Hagmann-Two-years-after-Iley-final.pdf

Hagmann, T. and Mulugeta, A. (20080 Pastoral Conflicts and State-Building in the

Ethiopian Lowlands. In: Africa Spectrum 43:1, pp. 19–37. Retrieved from:
https://www.zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/40006/

Hegazi, F., Murugani, V., Pacillo, G., Läderach, P. (2022) The World Food Programme’s
Contribution to Improving the Prospects for Peace in Ethiopia. Stockholm International
Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Retrieved from:
https://www.sipri.org/publications/2022/other-publications/world-food-programmes-
contribution-improving-prospects-peace-ethiopia

Hussein, M. (2022) Inter-Clan Conflicts In the Somali Region of Ethiopia: A Case Study
Of the Conflicts between the Dagodia and Baydisle Clans. Retrieved from:
http://ir.bdu.edu.et/handle/123456789/14304

Humphrey, A.; James Gai, T.; Lony, N. (2023) Dynamism in the Drylands: Evidence from
South Sudan for supporting pastoral livelihoods during protracted crises. SPARC
Knowledge. Retrieved from: https://www.sparc-knowledge.org/news-
features/features/dynamism-drylands-how-pastoral-livelihoods-are-changing-south-
sudan

ICPALD (2020a) Fact sheet series. Business case of resilience-enhancing technologies

and good practices on fodder and fodder seed production in Karamoja Cluster.
46
ICPALD/FS/02/2020. Retrieved from: https://icpald.org/wp-
content/uploads/2020/05/BUSINESS-CASE-OF-RESILIENCE-ENHANCING-
TECHNOLOGIES.pdf

ICPALD (2020b) Business case of resilience-enhancing technologies and practices

along the livestock value chain in IGAD cluster 1 (Karamoja). ICPALD/FS/03/2020.
Retrieved from: https://icpald.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/BUSINESS-CASE-
KARAMOJA-CLUSTER.pdf

ICPALD (2020c) Business case on innovative resilience-enhancing technologies and

practices in African-grown staple grains and horticultural products in cross-border
markets of IGAD cluster 1 (Karamoja cluster). Retrieved from: https://icpald.org/wp-
content/uploads/2020/05/BUSINESS-CASE-KARAMOJA-CLUSTER-1.pdf

IFAD (2020a) How to do: Gender and Pastoralism. Pastoral development. Retrieved
from:
https://cgspace.cgiar.org/bitstream/handle/10568/108874/FINAL2_HTDN_gender%
26pastoralism_2020_08_07.pdf?sequence=5&isAllowed=y

IFAD (2020a) How to prevent land use conflicts in pastoral areas. Retrieved from:
https://www.ifad.org/documents/38714170/42028241/LandUseConflicts.pdf/4da68
519-6c21-bc00-67df-d7e75aba9543?t=1627039407989

IGAD (2019) Ethiopia: Consolidating the path to resilience and sustainability 2019 –
2024. Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD). Retrieved from:
https://icpald.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/CPP-ETHIOPIA.pdf

IGAD (2022) Impact of Drought on Livestock in the IGAD Member States. ICPALD.
Retrieved from: https://resilience.igad.int/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/IMPACT-OF-
DROUGHT-ON-LIVESTOCK-ICPALD.pdf

Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) (2023) Ethiopia Country Profile.

Retrieved from: https://www.internal-displacement.org/countries/ethiopia

IOM (2022) Ethiopia National Displacement Report 13. Site Assessment Round 30 &
Village Assessment Survey Round 13: June — July 2022. Retrieved from:
https://displacement.iom.int/sites/g/files/tmzbdl1461/files/reports/DTM%20Ethiopia
%20National%20Displacement%20Report%2013_online_3.pdf

IOM (2022) Somali Region profile. International Organisation for Migration (IOM).
Retrieved from: https://ethiopia.iom.int/somali-region

IOM and ICPALD (2022) Equipped to adapt? A review of climate hazards and
pastoralists’ responses in the IGAD region. Retrieved from: https://icpald.org/wp-
content/uploads/2022/09/ICPALD-IOM-Pastoralism-Report.pdf

IPC (2020) Ethiopia IPC Acute Food Insecurity Analysis, October 2020–September
2021. Retrieved from: https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/ethiopia-ipc-acute-food-
insecurity-analysis-october-2020-september-2021-issued

47
IPCC (2022) Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability (Summary
for Policy Makers) Retrieved from:
https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg2/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGII_SummaryFo
rPolicymakers.pdf

IPCC (2023) Climate Change 2023 Synthesis Report: Summary for Policymakers.
Retrieved from:
https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/syr/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_SYR_SPM.pdf

Kefale, A. (2013) Federalism and Ethnic Conflict in Ethiopia. A comparative regional

study. New York: Routledge.

Kichner, S. (2021) The World Bank aids smallholder farmers in Ethiopia. Online.
Retrieved from: https://borgenproject.org/smallholder-farmers-in-ethiopia/

Kniveton, D., and Raleigh, C. (2012) Come rain or shine: An analysis of conflict and
climate variability in East Africa. Journal of Peace Research, vol. 49, no. 1. Retrieved
from: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0022343311427754

Mahamoud, A.A., and Ahmed M.E. (2019) The Social Consequences of Pastoralist
Sedenterisation Schemes in Somali Regional State, Ethiopia. In: Interdisciplinary
Description of Complex Systems 17:4, pp. 738–52. Retrieved from:
https://hrcak.srce.hr/file/336785

Majid, N.; Abdirahman K.; Daar A. (2022). Ethiopia’s Somali Region: between drought
and unrest. Online. Retrieved from: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/crp/2022/03/11/ethiopias-
somali-region-between-drought-and-unrest/

Mcguirk, Eoin F, and Nunn, N. (2020) Nomadic Pastoralism, Climate Change, and
Conflict in Africa. NBER Working Paper No. 28243. Retrieved from:
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w28243/revisions/w28243.rev0.
pdf

Mekonnen, A. (2020) Climate change impacts on household food security and

adaptation strategies in southern Ethiopia. Retrieved from:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/fes3.266

Mercy Corps (2019) The facts: How we're fighting hunger in Ethiopia. Online. Retrieved
from: https://www.mercycorps.org/blog/fighting-hunger-ethiopia

Mohammed, A., and Beyene, F. (2016) Social Capital and Pastoral Institutions in
Conflict Management: Evidence from Eastern Ethiopia. In: Journal of International
Development 28, pp. 74-88. Retrieved from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jid.3069

Mossa Endris, A., Ahmed Bihi, M. (2019) Indigenous Knowledge for Resilience and
Adaptation in Pastoral Production System of Somali Regional State in Ethiopia. In:
Interdisciplinary Description of Complex Systems 17:4, pp. 723–37. Retrieved from:
https://www.bdu.edu.et/idrmfss/node/213

48
Murakami, H.; Vecchi, G.A., and Underwood S. (2017) Increasing Frequency of
Extremely Severe Cyclonic Storms over the Arabian Sea. In: Nature Climate Change
7:12, pp. 885–889. Retrieved from: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-017-
0008-6

Mussa, M., Teka, H. and Aliye, A. (2017) Indigenous conflict management and
resolution mechanisms on rangelands in pastoral areas, Ethiopia. Journal of African
Studies and Development, vol. 9, no. 9. Retrieved from:
https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Indigenous-conflict-management-and-
resolution-on-in-Mussa-Teka/c3d2125c1bde1d6a8f3df1357abd1ae53c62f385

Muluken, T.F. (2020) The Role of Indigenous Conflict Resolution Mechanisms in the
Pastoral Community: An Implication for Social Solidarity in Somali Region, Shineli
Woreda. Open Access Library Journal. Vol.7 No.2. Retrieved from:
https://doi.org/10.4236/oalib.1106122

ND-GAIN (2022) Country Index. Retrieved from: https://gain.nd.edu/our-work/country-

index/

Neville, C. (2021). Climate change wreaks havoc on livelihoods in Ethiopia’s Somali

Region. Retrieved from: https://www.wfp.org/stories/climate-change-wreaks-havoc-
livelihoods-ethiopias-somali-region

New Humanitarian (2022) Water shortage in Somali Region. Retrieved from:

https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/report/18991/ethiopia-water-shortage-somali-
region

Nusrat, N. (2019) Children Risk Early Marriage: Climate Change One of the Factors. Inter
Press Service (IPS). Retrieved from: http://www.ipsnews.net/2019/12/children-risk-
early-marriage-climate-change-one-
factors/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=children-risk-early-
marriage-climate-change-one-factors

OCHA (1999) Drought situation in Ogaden Region (Somali National Regional State).
Online. Retrieved from: https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/drought-situation-
ogaden-region-somali-national-regional-state

OCHA (2017) GIEWS Update - Ethiopia: Severe food insecurity in southern Somali
Region due to prolonged drought. Online. Retrieved from:
https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/giews-update-ethiopia-severe-food-insecurity-
southern-somali-region-due-prolonged

OCHA (2022) East and Horn of Africa, and the Great Lakes Region: UNHCR Drought
Situation Response Update #4 – November 2022. Online. Retrieved from:
https://reliefweb.int/report/somalia/east-and-horn-africa-and-great-lakes-region-
unhcr-drought-situation-response-update-4-november-2022

OCHA (2023a) Ethiopia: Drought Situation Update #1 - As of 10 March 2023. Online.

Retrieved from: https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/ethiopia-drought-situation-
49
update-1-10-march-
2023#:~:text=In%202023%2C%20Humanitarian%20organizations%20aim,)%20req
uires%20an%20estimated%20%24US2

OCHA (2023b) Ethiopia - Situation Report, 14 Jun 2023. Online Retrieved from:
https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/ethiopia-situation-report-14-jun-
2023?_gl=1*imjn1n*_ga*MTk0NTcwODgyMy4xNjg4MDk2NDYy*_ga_E60ZNX2F68*M
TY4ODUyMTUzOS4yLjEuMTY4ODUyNDI5OS42MC4wLjA

OCHA (2023c) Ethiopia: Tough months ahead as rains fail for the fifth season in a row,
with millions in need of urgent food assistance. Online. Retrieved from:
https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/ethiopia-tough-months-ahead-rains-fail-fifth-
season-row-millions-need-urgent-food-
assistance#:~:text=ADDIS%20ABABA%2C%2013th%20January%202023,country%
2C%20Save%20the%20Children%20said

Pacillo, G.; Achicanoy, H.; Ramirez-Villegas, J.; Craparo, A.; Basel, A.; Villa, V.;
Schapendonk, F.; Carneiro, B.; Resce, G.; Ruscica, G.; Liebig, T.; and Läderach, P. (2022)
Is climate a “risk multiplier” in Ethiopia? Factsheet Climate Security in Ethiopia. WFP
and CGIAR. Retrieved from: https://www.wfp.org/publications/climate-risk-multiplier-
ethiopia

Rice, B., Hernandez, M.A., Glauber, J., Vos, R. (2022) The Russia-Ukraine war is
exacerbating international food price volatility. International Food Policy Research
Institute (IFPRI). Retrieved from: https://www.ifpri.org/blog/russia-ukraine-war-
exacerbating-international-food-price-volatility

Rüttinger, L.; Stang, G.; Smith, D.; Tänzler, D.; Vivekananda, J. (2015) A New Climate for
Peace – Taking Action on Climate and Fragility Risks. Adelphi. Retrieved from:
https://climate-diplomacy.org/magazine/conflict/new-climate-peace

Salehyan, I. (2014) Climate Change and Conflict: Making Sense of Disparate Findings.
Political Geography 43: pp. 1–5. Retrieved from:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2014.10.004.

Sand, N. (2021) Supporting Women in the Informal Sector in Jugjiga, Ethiopia. Online.
Retrieved from: https://www.cipe.org/blog/2021/05/26/supporting-women-in-the-
informal-sector-in-jigjiga-ethiopia/

Schipper, L. (2020) Maladaptation: When Adaptation to Climate Change Goes Very

Wrong. Science Direct: (3) 4 pp. 409-414. Retrieved from:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332220304838

Somali Government (2022) About Government SRS Geography. Retrieved from:

https://www.somali.gov.et/geo.html

SRHB (2012) Sonali Region Overview. Somali Regional Health Bureau. Retrieved from:
https://www.moh.gov.et/site/Somali_Regional_Health_Bureau

50
Stone, M. (2020) A plague of locusts has descended on East Africa. Climate change may
be to blame. National Geographic. Retrieved from:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/locust-plague-climate-science-
east-africa

ThinkHazard! (2022) Somali Region risk overview. Retrieved from:

https://www.thinkhazard.org/en/report/47679-ethiopia-somali

UNFCCC (2022) Ethiopia: A Case Study Conducted By The Climate Resilient Food
Systems Alliance. Retrieved from:
https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/resource/crfs_casestudy_ethiopia.pdf

UN Habitat (2021) Qoloji Spatial Profile. Online. Retrieved from:

https://unhabitat.org/sites/default/files/2021/06/210614_qoloji_spatial_profile_lr.pd
f

UNHCR (2022) Operational Data Portal: Ethiopia overview. Retrieved from:

https://data.unhcr.org/en/country/eth

UNHCR (2023a) East and Horn of Africa, and the Great Lakes Region Regional Update
#9 : East and Horn of Africa, and the Great Lakes Region. Retrieved from:
https://data.unhcr.org/en/documents/details/100925

UNHCR (2023b) 100,000 new Somali refugees arrive in Ethiopia in the past month, UN
and partners are calling for urgent funding. Retrieved from:
https://www.unhcr.org/news/100-000-new-somali-refugees-arrive-ethiopia-past-
month-un-and-partners-are-calling-urgent

UNICEF (2022) Child marriage on the rise in Horn of Africa as drought crisis intensifies.
Retrieved from: https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/child-marriage-rise-horn-
africa-drought-crisis-intensifies

United Nations Ethiopia (2019) Durable Solutions Initiative launched in Ethiopia.

Retrieved from https://ethiopia.un.org/en/27655-durable-solutions-initiative-
launched-ethiopia

Verhoeven, H. (2011) Climate Change, Conflict and Development in Sudan: Global Neo-
Malthusian Narratives and Local Power Struggles. Development and Change 42 (3): pp.
679–707. Retrieved from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22069801/

Warfa, A. (2021) What now for the Somali Region in Ethiopia? World Peace Foundation.
Retrieved from: https://sites.tufts.edu/reinventingpeace/2021/11/17/what-now-for-
the-somali-region-in-ethiopia/

Weathering Risk (20220) Climate Risk Profile: Somalia. adelphi and Potsdam Institute
for Climate Impacts Research (PIK). Retrieved from:
https://weatheringrisk.org/en/publication/Climate-Risk-Profile-Somalia

51
Woldegiorgis, S. B. (2018) Formally Recognizing Pastoral Community Land Rights in
Ethiopia. USAID. Retrieved from: https://www.land-links.org/2018/03/formally-
recognizing-pastoralcommunity-land-rights-in-ethiopia/

World Bank (2021) Climate Risk Country Profile: Ethiopia. Online. Retrieved from:
https://climateknowledgeportal.worldbank.org/sites/default/files/2021-05/15463A-
WB_Ethiopia%20Country%20Profile-WEB.pdf

World Bank (2021) The World Bank in Ethiopia. Online. Retrieved from:
https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/ethiopia/overview#1

World Bank (2022) Prevalence of stunting, height for age (% of children under 5) -
Ethiopia. Online. Retrieved from: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.STA.STNT.ZS

World Food Programme (2019) Decentralized Evaluation: Evaluation of the Satellite

Index Insurance for Pastoralists in Ethiopia (SIIPE) Programme: Impact Evaluation of
the SIIPE Pilot (2017-2019). Retrieved from:
https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-
0000107946/download/?_ga=2.224946706.984414977.1648173370-
1348609776.1647734893

World Food Programme (2022a) Horn of Africa 'Cannot wait': WFP scales up assistance
as historic drought raises famine threat. Retrieved from:
https://www.wfp.org/news/horn-africa-cannot-wait-wfp-scales-assistance-historic-
drought-raises-famine-threat

World Food Programme (2022b) Ethiopia Drought Response: Situation Report #6.
Retrieved from: https://reliefweb.int/report/ethiopia/wfp-ethiopia-drought-response-
situation-report-6-november-2022

World Food Programme (2023a) Ethiopia Country Profile. Retrieved from:

https://www.wfp.org/countries/ethiopia

World Food Programme (2023b) Scaling Up Anticipatory Actions for Food Security:
Anticipatory Action- Year In Focus 2022. Retrieved from:
https://docs.wfp.org/api/documents/WFP-
0000148257/download/?_ga=2.222251800.1064841900.1688700145-
1653990340.1687926309

Zewde, B. (2001). A History of Modern Ethiopia, 1855–1991. James Curry: Oxford.

Updated and revised edition. Boydell & Brewer. Retrieved from:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/history-of-modern-ethiopia-
18551991/C0852BA84C34071333C899ACC8F1C863

52
Annex

Key actions for avoiding and managing conflict in pastoral lands (FAO, 2016)
The following actions can help interveners to identify project and programme-based
priorities that can help prevent conflict in pastoral areas:
1. Understanding conflict triggers and multipliers – conflict analysis.
2. Restoring capability of traditional institutions.
3. Strengthening social cohesion and good social relations.
4. Strengthening environmental management and sustainability.
5. Repairing relationships.
6. Making governance and decision-making processes fairer.
7. Establishing tenure clarity.
8. Strengthening (institutional) capacity to buffer and respond to crisis.
9. Addressing factors underpinning structural inequity.

Tools for conflict analysis (IFAD, 2020b)

There are numerous tools and processes available for undertaking a conflict analysis
for assessing climate-related security risks. These tools differ in depth of analysis and
should be applied depending on the information required, project goals and
objectives, and capacities. Some useful options to consider include:
1. ABC Triangle to map behaviours, attitudes and context.
2. Conflict tree as a graphic tool to map core problems, root causes and effects.
3. Conflict relationship mapping to identify power dynamics, key actors and
stakeholders in a conflict situation.
4. Conflict hotspot mapping to highlight conflict hotspots across geographic zones
and identify priority areas.

Table 3: Guidelines for managing conflict in pastoral lands (IFAD, 2020b)

53
Imprint

Published by Authors
adelphi research gemeinnützige GmbH Lucas Destrijcker, Milen Yishak, Michael
Alt-Moabit 91, 10559 Berlin Thomson, Aminata Traore, Yishuang
+49 (030) 8900068-0 Antonio Xu, Hannah Kurnoth
[email protected]
https://www.adelphi.de/en Layout
Nina Schmelzer
Header Image
© Inga Israel Contact
Lucas Destrijcker
License [email protected]
For the texts in this publication, the
publishers grant a license under the Date
terms of Creative Commons July 2023
Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0
International. You map reproduce and
share the licenses material if you name
adelphi as follows: ‘© adelphi CC-BY
ND 4.0’. Photographs and graphics are
not covered by this license. In case of
doubt please contact adelphi prior to
reusing the material.

© adelphi, 2023

54