Country Office 506574 Oxfam Novib Nigeri North West Nigeria will experience a great impact from climate change since it lies either in the desert or dry land, where majority of small holder farmers still earn their livelihoods from subsistence agriculture and pastoralism. In most places, soils are inherently poor- low in organic matter and rich in salts and rainfall is erratic. Soil erosion and general land degradation has caused part of the lands to fall out of cultivation. Land degradation has reached crisis proportion with not only problem of desert expandingbut also soil depletion, soil erosion and water loss as a result of poor land use.(UNEP, world Atlas of desertification).
The NorthWest Nigeria vulnerability to climate change impacts have been underscored by severe droughts experienced recently in the Sahel in 2012. By 2050 many crops in sub-Saharan Africa are expected to experience yield declines between 5-22% as a result of climate changeimpacts (FAO, How to feed the world in 2050, 2009). These experiences and projections bring into focus the serious impacts of climate change on the continent and highlight the urgent need for adaptation as a priority for food security; reducing the vulnerability of a great majority of Africa#s one billion citizens.
Climate change will act as a multiplier of existing threat to food security: It will make natural disaster more frequent and intense, land and water more scarce and difficult to access, and increases in productivity even harder to achieve. The implications for people who are poor and already food insecure and malnourished are immense. The livelihoods and lives of the poorest and the most vulnerable, including women and children and the marginalised communities, are at the greatest risk to suffer from the potential impacts of climate change. This is due to their high exposure to natural hazards, their direct dependence on climate- sensitive resources such as plants, trees, animals, water and land, and their limited capacity to adapt and cope with Climate Change impacts.
Climate change will affect four dimensions of food security: availability, accessibility, stability and utilisation. It will reduce food availability, because it negatively affects the basic elements of food production- soil, water and biodiversity. Rural communities face increased risks including recurrent crop failure, loss of livestock and reduced availability of fisheries and forest product. Changing temperatures and weather patterns furthermore creates conditions for emergenceof new pests and diseases that affect animals, trees and crops. This has direct effects on the quality and quantity of yields as well as the availability and price of food, feed and fibre. Competition over increasingly scarce resources will also increase the risks of conflicts, displacement and migration, which in turn will again increase the risk of food insecurity (climate change and the risk of hunger. (WFP, 2009).
Reduced food availability due to decreasing yield as a result of climate change has additional direct implications for food accessibility: As food becomes scarce, prices go up and food becomes unaffordable, i.e. inaccessible, for a growing part of the population.

It thus becomes necessary for Oxfam to undertake a study and implement recommended adaptation options that have the potential to improve the capacity of the vulnerable people to be food secured and adapt to climate change

The overall objective of the project is to improve resilience to climate change, food security and household incomes of the rural poor in the North Western Nigeria. To achieve this, the is commencing with a study which has the following strategic objectives: -
To carry out a study to:
# To identify the main drivers of climate change within the North West of Nigeria
# 2. To investigate the vulnerability of small scale farmers in the North western part of Nigeria to the effects of climate change, land degradation and conflicts and analyse the coping strategies they adopt.
# 3.  Identify ecosystem- based approaches that can be harnessed to improve food security, buildcapacities for adaption to climate change and mitigate climate change induced conflicts.
# 4. To synthesize objectives 1-3 into insights/recommendations for conservation and management action as well as identify investment opportunities for private sector participation
# 5.  Recommend viable projects that can be implemented to contribute to increased food security, reduction in land degradation through improved resources management techniques and support sustainable livelihoods.