The broad objective has been broken down into the following research questions in order
to address the issues stated in the problem statement:
1. What is the history of climate variability in the southwestern and northern parts of
Botswana (over a period of 30 years)?
2. How has such climate variability affected rural societies living in the southwestern
and northern parts of Botswana?
3. How have the rural societies coped and adapted to climate variability in the past and
how are they currently coping and adapting?
4. What factors (biophysical, socio-economic, cultural or political) have heightened or
weakened people’s ability to cope with and adapt to climate variability?
Having set the context of the study, Botswana’s country profile is presented below to
provide a general background of the country. The profile includes a brief description of
Botswana’s physical features (location, vegetation, soil), natural resources, population
structure and economic status.