Climate services entail providing timely and tailored climate information to end-users in order to facilitate and improve decision-making processes. Climate services are instrumental in socio-economic development and benefit substantially from interdisciplinary collaborations, particularly when including Early Career Researchers (ECRs). This commentary critically discusses deliberations from an interdisciplinary workshop involving ECRs from the United Kingdom and South Africa in 2017, to discuss issues in climate adaptation and climate services development in water resources, food security and agriculture. Outcomes from the discussions revolved around key issues somewhat marginalized within the broader climate service discourse. This commentary discusses what constitutes “effective” communication, framings (user framings, mental models, narratives, co-production) and ethical dimensions in developing climate services that can best serve end-users. It also reflects on how ECRs can help tackle these important thematic areas and advance the discourse on climate services.

In Delta state, Nigeria, where food production is rain-fed, climatic risks have compromised rural livelihoods. Information about future weather conditions can help farmers adapt more efficiently. Data obtained using group discussions and semi-structured interviews revealed that farmers in Delta state rely on indigenous knowledge systems, despite occasional inconsistencies. Most farmers’ trust in seasonal climate forecasts has dwindled because they suffered losses when previously relying on the seasonal forecasts in a planting season. With climatic risks expected to increase by 2030, there is a need to rebuild farmers’ trust in seasonal climate forecasts, using a proposed multiple evidence-based approach.

It is acknowledged that subsistence farmers in developing countries rely on indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) to determine the appropriate time, the types and quantity of food to produce in a particular farming season. Due to the unprecedented rate in which climate variability is occurring globally, there are concerns that IKS will become unreliable to predict future weather events accurately, which will compromise the ability for farmers to secure their livelihoods. Nonetheless, some scholars are optimistic that if farmers rely on seasonal climate forecast (SCF), it will facilitate the adoption of planned and more efficient adaptation strategies, thereby ensuring that they continue effectively in food production. While most countries in sub-Saharan Africa have been investing in meteorology, farmers still rely heavily on IKS. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in the Delta State of Nigeria, this paper discusses the factors that contribute towards farmer’s willingness to adhere to IKS. The results suggest that being misled by an inaccurate scientific forecast, and the inability to comprehend how anthropogenic activities contribute to climate change, among others, have contributed to the farmer’s continued reliance on IKS. These issues have been explored within the broader contemporary theoretical arguments and debates revolving around IKS and SCF.

This paper examines social differences and drought vulnerability among subsistence livestock farmers in Mpakeni, Mpumalanga province, South Africa. This paper asks, how do social differences between households and power relations shape vulnerability to drought? This is against the backdrop that parallel exposure to climatic risks does not translate to similar vulnerability among households residing in the same community. In-depth interviews were used to obtain primary data from purposively selected participants in Mpakeni. Some key findings reveal that being a non-local elite, a migrant settler and some female-headed households, especially those burdened by the additional tasks of caregiving, amplifies the challenges of securing forage when depleted in communal grazing fields. This is partly due to reduced time allocated to shepherding their livestock to the bank of a local river. Also, non-local elite and those who lacked social ties to the headman found it difficult to get compensated when their livestock were eaten by wild animal upon illegal entry to a game reserve rich in vegetation. This paper argues that vulnerability studies that focus independently on issues like gender, ethnicity and class may miss the dynamics that shape individuals’ vulnerability to drought, which could have severe consequences for implementing effective interventions.

In the wake of a rapidly changing climate, climate services have enabled farmers in developing countries to make informed decisions, necessary for efficient food production. Climate services denote the timely production, translation, delivery and use of climate information to enhance decision-making. However, studies have failed to analyse the extent to which Indigenous farmers residing and producing their food in an environment degraded by multinational corporations (MNCs) utilise climate services. This study addresses this gap by analysing Indigenous farmers’ utilisation of climate services in Igbide, Olomoro and Uzere communities, in the oil-rich Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews were used to obtain primary data. Findings suggest that although the activities of Shell British petroleum, a MNC, have compromised food production, other factors have fuelled farmers’ unwillingness to utilise climate services. These include their inability to access assets that can significantly scale up food production and lack of weather stations close to their communities needed to generate downscaled forecasts, amongst others. This paper argues that failure to address these issues may stifle the chances of actualising the first and second sustainable development goals (no poverty and zero hunger) by 2030 in the aforementioned communities.