## 3 Results
### Household Adaptation and Coping Strategies and Their Determinants  
#### 3.3.1 Household Adaptation and Coping Strategies Toward Climate Variability  
The relationship between adaptation strategies and climate patterns in pastoralist areas is complex and multifaceted. Climate patterns, such as variations in rainfall and temperature changes, often shape pastoralists' strategies, directly impacting pasture availability, water resources, and livestock health. To address these challenges, adaptation serves as a proactive approach that helps pastoralists secure their livelihoods, protect their environment, and build resilience against the impacts of climate change. As the historical trends of rainfall and temperature (1984-2023) of Sawena district indicate, there are warming temperatures and declining rainfall in most months that lead the pastoralist household adaptation to climate variability. In Sawena district, in response to the perceived climate variability which has impacts on pastoralists' production systems and livelihood strategies, several adaptation practices at household level are taken up to cope with or adapt to climate change and variability. The most common adaptation practices, and the proportion of respondents involved at the household level, are seasonal livestock migration, livelihood diversification, seedling planting, and productive safety net programs (PSNPs); these being the coping strategies that are presented in Figure 9.  
Seasonal livestock migration (SLM) as adaptation strategy is the most commonly adopted strategy in the study area; 45.1% of respondents adapted these strategies. It represents a traditional adaptation strategy where pastoralists move their livestock to different grazing areas to manage environmental risks such as drought and resource competition. Figure 8: Trend of mean annual temperature. Figure 9: The most common adaptation and coping strategies of households in Sawena district. Source: authors’ own computation. Around 26.3% of respondents are involved in productive safety net programs (PSNPs), which provide support to vulnerable households in exchange for participation in community-based work or training. This suggests that a significant portion of the population relies on external aid to manage economic instability, likely reflecting issues such as poverty or climate vulnerability. Nearly 19% of households have adopted livelihood diversification (LD), which involves seeking alternative income sources apart from livestock, such as small-scale farming, business, or wage employment. While this percentage is lower than migration and PSNP participation, it demonstrates a growing trend toward economic diversification as a resilience-building strategy. Only 9.7% of respondents adopt plant seedling strategies (PSs), likely as part of agroforestry or reforestation efforts. Although less common, this strategy is important for long-term climate adaptation and land restoration, indicating an opportunity for increased awareness and support for sustainable land management practices. There is a causal relationship between temperature and rainfall patterns and the strategies employed by pastoralist households in the study area. These strategies include adaptation strategies like seasonal livestock migration, livelihood diversification, and planting seedlings, as well as coping strategies like participation in the productive safety net program (PSNP). Rising temperatures increase water scarcity, reduce pasture availability, and affect livestock health. This compels households to adapt strategies that mitigate heat stress and its impacts. For instance, the significant warming trend in Sawena district (e.g., 0.034 \({}^{\circ}\)C annual increase) has led to widespread seasonal livestock migration (45.1%). This strategy allows pastoralists to access cooler or more vegetated areas. Temperature rise also encourages livelihood diversification (19%) to reduce dependence on livestock, which is more vulnerable to heat stress.