Adaptation to climate change or non-climatic stressors in semi-arid regions? Evidence of gender differentiation in three agrarian districts of Ghana

•Climate variability in semi-arid areas shows increasing vulnerability of different social groups.•Adaptation strategies are inextricably linked with non-climatic stressors which have gender implications.•Understanding climate variability adaptation provides evidence of future adaptation options for climate change.•Current adaptations to climate variability by different social groups are shaped by culture and gender roles.•Future adaptation planning to climate change should consider the nexus of gender and social differentiation.

With the increasing impacts of climate change in Africa, a relationship between rainfall and yields in semi-arid Ghana has been observed. Drawing insights from three agrarian societies in the semi-arid region of Ghana using qualitative research methods, the study reports how people currently deal with climate variability as insight on how they will deal with climate change in the future. The findings indicate wide gender inequality in decision making processes and land access resulting from patriarchal local customs and institutions that shape adaptation responses of different vulnerable social groups to climatic or non-climatic stressors. Different adaptation practices of groups indicate that both climatic and non-climatic stressors shape the kind of responses that groups adopt. From the current adaptation practices, efforts to improve adaptation to future climate change at local levels must give attention to the nexus of both climatic and non-climatic stressors, gender, differential vulnerabilities and other subjectivities that produce a particular adaptation practice in a given place.