Climate change and anthropogenic pressure are increasingly modifying and interfering with ecosystem functions and limiting the delivery of ecosystem products, livelihoods, and adaptive response capacity in many developing countries. We identify measures by which local people in the semi-arid Limpopo Basin part of Botswana are responding to climate change and fluctuations in ecosystem products and examine socio-economic attributes of households influencing their adoption and discuss their adequacy. Our study used a case study of Bobirwa sub-district and employed key informant and household interviews to collect qualitative and quantitative data. Thematic analysis was used to analyze textural data from key informant interviews while frequencies, proportions, and Chi-squared tests were used to analyze the adoption of different strategies. A multinomial logit (MNL) regression was used to analyze the influence of several social, demographic, and economic attributes of households on household adaptation choices. We attributed the high adoption of on-farm adaptations to the simultaneous influence of more severe droughts and the free input support through the government’s Integrated Support Programme for Arable Agriculture (ISPAAD). Our findings suggest that current adaptations were inadequate and implementation of the ISPAAD programme required fine-tuning to be more effective. Results of the MNL regression provide critical information on the barriers and enablers of adaptation in the sub-district yet offer important entry points for improving current adaptations. Therefore, the government needs to put measures that encourage investments in the processing of ecosystem products in rural areas to broaden the livelihood base and possibly reduce overdependence on rainfed agriculture. However, the extent to which this can be achieved depends on the level of government commitment to supporting local initiatives to addressing the climate change threat.

Purpose: Between 2006 and 2016, local communities in semi-arid Bobirwa sub-district in the Limpopo Basin part of Botswana had endured notable fluctuations in the delivery of critical ecosystem services. These changes have been coupled with adverse effects on local people’s livelihood options and well-being. However, a few such studies have focussed on the semi-arid to arid landscapes. This study therefore aims to provide recent knowledge and evidence of consequences of environmental change on semi-arid arid landscapes and communities.Methodology: To examine these recent changes in key ecosystem services, the authors conducted six participatory mapping processes, eight key informant interviews and several rapid scoping appraisals in three study villages. The analyses were centred on changes in seasonal quantities, seasonality, condition of ecosystem service sites, distance to ecosystem service sites and total area providing these services. Drivers of change in the delivery of key ecosystem services and the associated adverse impacts on human well-being of these recent changes in bundles of ecosystem services delivered were also analyzed.Findings: Results show that adverse weather conditions, drought frequency, changes in land-use and/or land-cover together with unsustainable harvesting because of human influx on local resources have intensified in the past decade. There was circumstantial evidence that these drivers have resulted in adverse changes in quantities and seasonality of key ecosystem services such as edible Mopane caterpillars, natural pastures, wild fruits and cultivated crops. Similarly, distance to, condition and total area of sites providing some of the key ecosystem services such as firewood and natural pastures changed adversely. These adverse changes in the key ecosystem services were shown to increasingly threaten local livelihoods and human well-being.Research limitations/implications: This paper discusses the importance of engaging rural communities in semi-arid areas in a participatory manner and how such information can provide baseline information for further research. The paper also shows the utility of such processes and information toward integrating community values and knowledge into decisions regarding the management and utilization of local ecosystem services under a changing climate in data-poor regions such as the Bobirwa sub-district of Botswana. However, the extent to which this is possible depends on the decision makers’ willingness to support local initiatives through existing government structures and programmes.Originality/value: This study shows the importance of engaging communities in a participatory manner to understand changes in local ecosystem services considering their unique connection with the natural environment. This is a critical step for decision makers toward integrating community values in the management and utilization of ecosystem services under a changing climate as well as informing more sustainable adaptive responses in semi-arid areas. However, the extent to which decision makers can integrate such findings to inform more sustainable responses to declining capacity of local ecosystems in semi-arid areas depends on how they value the bottom-up approach of gaining local knowledge as well as their willingness to support local initiatives through existing government structures and programmes.

This article highlights a multidisciplinary collaborative program between the University of Botswana and the University of Tromsø, Norway, focusing on San research and capacity-building. After 12 years of operation, this program led, in April 2010, to the creation of a new Research Center for San Studies at the University of Botswana. This research center will build on and expand the efforts of the initial collaborative program, which include research and teaching on the cultural, historical, social, economic, and legal situation of the San of southern Africa; capacity-building of San students and researchers; and advocacy. This article provides a brief retrospective of the UBTromsø program, with emphasis on the political context of San studies in Botswana and the challenges facing San youth in education systems.

During the 1970s, the violence in neighbouring states spilled over into Botswana, making untenable its previous policy of having no army. This article examines the experiences of women in the north-east border regions who suffered violence from South African and Rhodesian soldiers crossing illegally and yet routinely into Botswana. As these incidents show, rape as a weapon of war has a long history in the region, although world attention is more recent. I suggest that a key underlying factor in the cross-border violence was the difficult and incomplete transition from permeable boundaries within a wider colonial space to hard international borders between fully independent and hostile states. As a result, the role of Botswana in the liberation struggle of southern Africa served as the main reason for the regular violations of its sovereignty during that period. The lives of ordinary people straddled the border, and so did the violence of armies, making it crucial to consider the reactions of the people of Botswana to cross-border warfare. I will also use comparisons with other notable contemporary incidents of cross-border violence and cross-border ambiguity, including one incident that took place, paradoxically, in the middle of the country, involving travel on the Rhodesian-owned railway.

(2009). Contested Identities: Bessie Head, Maru, and BaSarwa/San: A Report from the Home Front. Journal of the African Literature Association: Vol. 4, No. 1, pp. 158-180.