Tropical Ecologist Silvia Schrötter focuses on how to effectively incorporate the human dimension, including livelihood development, into nature conservation and climate change adaptation. The goal of this expedition was to identify land use strategies, crop diversity, and decision-making processes that put people and ecosystems at risk. In the Upper East Ghana region, food production is limited to the rainy season, and extreme climate events, such as drought and heat waves, seriously threaten livelihoods. Silvia conducted this expedition as a research fellow within the Franco-German Fellowship Programme on Climate, Energy, and Earth System Research and as part of the MONSOON project at the University of Augsburg in Germany.

Despite COVID-restricted travel, malaria, and heavy rainfalls and flooding that limited access to certain regions even by motorbike, Silvia and her team were able to interview more than 150 farmers and conduct small-group discussions across seven villages, record crop diversity and ecosystem services, and observe the driving factors and decision-making processes underlying crop choices, land use and land cover change. The team also interviewed key members of the West African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use (WASCAL), the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, and the Ghana Irrigation Authority. The data they collected will provide an overview of the region’s land-climate interactions, the current resilience of farmers using different irrigation schemes, and possible strategies to increase the resilience of people and nature in the face of climate change.

In 2017 Silvie carried WINGS Flag #3 to Assam, India, to research methods to help reduce the overexploitation of the Bengal tiger in the fringe villages of Manas National Park. Read the Flag Report of that expedition here.