ABSTRACT

Introduction

Against the backdrop of the Sustainable Development Goals 1, 2 and 3, which aim to improve global health, food security, and reduce poverty, agriculture for most is crucial to achieving self-sustainability in Africa. However, the increased occurrence of adverse events including droughts and conflicts, with losses to farmers, threatens efforts to achieve the set goals. These losses can affect livestock farmers’ psychosocial wellbeing and productivity. Identifying, therefore, the drivers of livestock farmers’ wellbeing is essential to meeting the set goals, in areas most affected by climate change including Ghana. This study assesses the sources of livestock losses to farmers and its influence on livestock farmers’ psychosocial wellbeing. Methods This was a cross-sectional survey of 287 randomly selected livestock farmers and in-depth interviews with 19 purposively selected key informants, in the Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo and Kwahu Afram Plains Districts in Ghana. The mental health, resilience, quality of life, and food security, of the livestock farmers, were assessed as dimensions of psychosocial wellbeing, using four standardized questionnaires. Psychosocial wellbeing was estimated as the mean of individual dimension scales’ percentage scores. Descriptive analyses were done, and general linear models fitted to identify the predictors of psychosocial wellbeing. Values of α