Climate change and livestock farming in Cameroon: impacts and implications for poverty reduction

The objective of this paper is to investigate; first, the effects of livestock income on poverty and second, the impact of global warming on livestock farming and the way farmers adapt. Based on a 2004 household farm-climate data set generated by Global Environment Facility, Center for Environmental Economics and Policy in Africa and the World Bank we simulate the impact of livestock income on household poverty in Cameroon. Use is made of the Heckman’s two-step estimation procedure to identify the factors that influence livestock income in Cameroon. We estimate a structural Ricardian model of net livestock income which not only reveals how net income changes with climate, but also reveals how livestock farmers adjust to the changing climatic conditions. Our findings reveal that livestock income is poverty reducing. Also, livestock income is adversely affected by global warming.