Local Observations of Climate Change and Impacts on Livelihoods in Kamchatka, Russia

Authors

Victoria N. Sharakhmatova, University of Northern Iowa
Drew Gerkey

Comments

First published in Routledge Handbook of Climate Change Impacts on Indigenous Peoples and Local Communitiess (2023) by Routledge. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003356837

Document Type

Book Chapter

Publication Version

Published Version

Keywords

Environment and Sustainability, Social Sciences

Journal/Book/Conference Title

Routledge Handbook of Climate Change Impacts on Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities

First Page

45

Last Page

60

Abstract

Indigenous communities throughout the Arctic are confronting unprecedented challenges arising from anthropogenic climate change. The inextricable connections between their livelihoods and social and environmental systems, combined with a rich foundation of individual and inter-generational collective experience and knowledge, make Indigenous communities particularly adept at observing changes in climate and understanding their impacts. In this chapter, we apply the protocol from the Local Indicators of Climate Change Impacts project to document observations and impacts of climate change in Khailino, an Indigenous community on the northern part of the Kamchatka Peninsula in Northeast Siberia, Russia. We use individual interviews to identify what changes are occurring, then use focus groups to assess consensus about those changes, their impacts, and the strategies people are using to adapt. We focus on (1) increasing winter temperatures, (2) decreases in the amount and quality of snow, (3) increases in winter rainfall, and (4) changes in the timing of fall freeze-up and spring break-up of river ice. These changes negatively impact people’s livelihoods in many ways, including disruptions to transportation and traditional subsistence activities. Our analysis connects these observations and impacts of climate change to forms of cultural, economic, and political change in the post-Soviet era.

Department

Department of Geography

Original Publication Date

2023

Object Description

1 PDF File

DOI of published version

10.4324/9781003356837

Repository

UNI ScholarWorks, Rod Library, University of Northern Iowa

Copyright

©2023 The Author(s) This chapter has been made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license.

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

Recommended Citation

Sharakhmatova, Victoria N. and Gerkey, Drew, "Local Observations of Climate Change and Impacts on Livelihoods in Kamchatka, Russia" (2023). Faculty Publications. 6047.
https://scholarworks.uni.edu/facpub/6047