Vulnerability and resilience to drought in the Chaco, Paraguay

This chapter presents an innovative methodology to identify and characterise the vulnerability and resilience to drought in ten indigenous communities (comunidad) in Chaco, Paraguay. The first part studies meteorological drought through the analysis of average daily rainfall over the last 38 years. The second part analyses vulnerability (V) on the comunidad scale. The third and final part analyses resilience (R) on the comunidad scale. The main sources used are the survey conducted for the Participatory community diagnosis (2014), from which 18 indicators have been chosen to measure exposure (E), sensitivity (S), and adaptive capacity (Ac) according to the equation V = (E * S) / Ac. We ascertain that rainfall in the driest areas of the Paraguayan Chaco varies cyclically in relation to the meteorological phenomena of El Niño and La Niña. The operative consequence of this phenomenon is that in the Chaco, drought may be predicted with enough forewarning to launch an early warning in the driest areas. Furthermore, we highlight that the most vulnerable comunidades are also the most resilient. This demonstrates that the various projects undertaken to strengthen resilience have so far benefited the most vulnerable communities and therefore the drought defence has been well directed.