The Impacts of Climate Change Increase the Need for Family Planning Services in Tabora, Tanzania
Francis’s wife, Diana, laughs with two of her children. Photo: Eric Bond / EGPAF 2020
“The thing that made me seek family planning services is that I wanted to stop having children so that I can raise these four children and provide them with a bright future.”
Francis sits under the shade of a tree while three of his children, two girls and a boy, jump rope in the distance. Francis’s youngest child looks on with curiosity from the wrap on their mother’s back.
“We are in an area where the people are livestock farmers, so they need many children [to help care for the animals],” Francis explains. “But we are heading towards an industry economy. How are you going to be employed in an industry without education?”
Francis lives on a farm in Tabora region, Tanzania, where he grows maize, groundnuts, squash, and potatoes. Despite the lush greenery of the sweet potato vines, Francis tells us that there has been an unusual volume of rain, and the crops are not as promising as they had been in previous years. As these unfavorable weather patterns continue, he feels a greater need to ensure his children have a future outside of farming.
“I had livestock but now I don’t; I have only three small chickens. I had goats and cows, but I sold the livestock so I could afford to send my children to school.”
The Impact of Climate Change
Corn fields in rural Tanzania. Farmers growing crops like corn have been impacted by climate change, reducing their annual yields. Photo: Eric Bond / EGPAF 2020
It is well-documented that human activity is contributing to a more severe and rapidly changing climate than ever before. As more greenhouse gasses enter the atmosphere, primarily due to human reliance on burning fossil fuels, our world is getting warmer, changing global weather patterns. For example, Tabora is projected to have a shorter growing season, increased moisture and heat stress, and more insects and pests, all of which threaten agricultural productivity.
The Tanzania 2007 National Adaptation Program of Action Report predicts a 33% reduction in maize yield nationally, with Tabora and Dodoma regions facing even steeper crop failures. In an area reliant on subsistence farming, this is devastating. These stresses on production are driving up food prices, ultimately making it more difficult for families to get the nutrients they need to thrive. Combining the increasing threats of poverty and food insecurity with the predicted rise in communicable diseases such as Malaria, Cholera, and HIV, it is getting harder and harder for families to stay safe and healthy.
Francis is noticing these changes in his own crops, and it is jeopardizing his family’s livelihood. “Are there any interventions to support farmers like me?” Francis says.
The agricultural sector in Tanzania is increasingly aware of climate change and its impacts on food security, poverty, and health outcomes. For example, new stress-tolerant sorghum varieties are becoming popular as farmers face increasing environmental threats, and the Tanzanian National Bank of Commerce (NBC) is collaborating with Jubilee Insurance Company on agriculture insurance to protect farmers from natural disasters and resulting crop failures. The agricultural sector is also scaling up improvement of agricultural land and water resource management, climate-smart agricultural interventions, and strengthening research, development, and knowledge systems.
But climate change and its impacts are already on Francis’s doorstep. The majority of these interventions take time to implement and currently only exist on paper. Those that have been implemented are often out of reach for lower-income farmers, which make up the majority of Tanzanian farmers. With a family to look out for, Francis needs multiple strategies to adapt to the changing landscape, and he needs them now.
Family Planning
Francis M Bukumbi, 53, a farmer in the Tabora region of Tanzania, sees to it that all of his children receive a quality education. As he and his wife, Diana, after four children with Diana, Francis realized that he would not be able to afford education for any more children. Francis insisted on doing what he thought was best for his family, so while extremely unusual and taboo for the region, they sought family planning services. Francis underwent a vasectomy, and looks forward to the day all his children graduate from secondary school. Photo by Eric Bond / EGPAF 2020
In the face of climate stress, Francis and his wife are turning to family planning to ensure their family stays a size he feels confident he can feed, clothe, and educate. He views this resource as key to helping his family adapt to the changing environment and move into the future.
“My wife and I talked about this together, that we should rest giving birth. She started; I took her [to the facility] and she got the implant, but I learned this would need to be replaced. I then followed up so that I could understand if there is an option that completely stops fertility so that we can raise our children and give them a good education.”
Francis chose to have a vasectomy, which is a very uncommon procedure in this area, but one that he stands by, and is even vocal about with other men in his community.
“I tell them look, when you produce fewer children you can [afford to] educate them, because where we are heading, class seven (primary education) has no job, and even form four (secondary education) you can barely get a job. So we need to study until higher education, like university. If you have fewer children, you are able to provide education to them.”
Looking Toward the Future
Francis M Bukumbi, 53, a farmer in the Tabora region of Tanzania, sees to it that all of his children receive a quality education. As he and his wife, Diana, after four children with Diana, Francis realized that he would not be able to afford education for any more children. Francis insisted on doing what he thought was best for his family, so while extremely unusual and taboo for the region, they sought family planning services. Francis underwent a vasectomy, and looks forward to the day all his children graduate from secondary school. Photo by Eric Bond / EGPAF 2020
“The thing that made me seek family planning services is that I wanted to stop having children so that I can raise these four children and provide them with a bright future.”
Francis believes that education will build his children’s and his country’s resilience to climate change, and he is right. Project Drawdown, a leading resource for climate solutions, identified educating girls as the 6th most impactful climate intervention out of over 90 potential solutions. Number seven is human rights-based family planning, a pillar of EGPAF’s work across sub-Saharan Africa. When girls are educated, they are more likely to have long-term financial stability, better health outcomes, healthier children, avoid un-wanted pregnancies, they live longer, and can better contribute to their community’s adaptation efforts in response to climate change.
“People must be empowered to recognize that primary or secondary education alone will not guarantee you a job in Tanzania today, but specialized education such as agricultural education, vocational education and training (VET), and technical education and training can help to mitigate problems by increasing self-employment,” says Julius Mkumbo, a data analyst and biostatistician at EGPAF.
EGPAF recognizes this, and has projects across various sub-Saharan countries that provide specialized education to young women and girls and people living with HIV. Ultimately, access to essential health services such as family planning and education are both key pillars to strong and resilient communities facing climate threats.
Francis is a pioneer of family planning in his community, and he is proactive in building a resilient future for his children, but he can’t fight climate change alone. There is still a lot of work to do to ensure adaptation efforts keep up with the pace of change. Every sector, healthcare, agriculture, industry, education, technology, energy, forestry, and more, needs to come together to support parents like Francis as they care for and protect their families.
Family Planning services were supported in Tabora by the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation (EGPAF) through the USAID Boresha Afya project, which closed in 2021. EGPAF continues to support family planning services in other regions in Tanzania, as well as other sub-Saharan African countries.
More and more, EGPAF witnesses the impact climate change has on health outcomes for people living with HIV, and the threat it poses to our mission to end AIDS in children, youth, and family. Predicted losses in agriculture exacerbate inequities related to food insecurity and poverty, which correlate to increased transactional sex, HIV transmission rates, treatment failure, advanced HIV disease, and mortality. Extreme weather damages health infrastructure and disrupts essential healthcare for people living with HIV. Family planning is one of many resources needed to strengthen communities, including those living with HIV, in the face of climate change, and EGPAF is proud to participate in solutions that mitigate the impacts of climate change for the overall well-being of the populations we serve.
Thanks to Nuru Ngailo, Julius Mkumbo, Francis, and others for their collaboration on this story.
