Charles Ndung'u lost 40 goats in three months. The animals, he says, paid his family's school fees. Now many are gone.
Ndung'u has kept livestock at Kiawara for more than two decades. He is one of a growing number of Kenyan farmers whose livelihoods unreliable weather is squeezing, a pattern doctors now link to emotional stress and mental health concerns. Global weather patterns haven't been dependable this year, and a looming super El Nino has added uncertainty over harvests and income, according to doctors cited in an Africanews report.
Who Is Affected
Goat farming has traditionally paid reliably in Kiawara, despite the area's semi-arid conditions. Not this year. March rainfall didn't produce enough pasture to feed the animals through a prolonged dry spell. A livestock disease outbreak in June made things worse, and losses piled up. From July, some goats grew too weak to stand.
The risk isn't over. Early rainfall could now wash away the small amount of dry feed the goats have survived on, while fresh pasture will take time to grow. "The seeds are in the ground and we are not sure if they will sprout. We are waiting to see if the rains continue. If they don't grow, that's more stress. We don't have money," Ndung'u said. "We depend on the goats for our children's school fees. You would sell one or two and send children to school. Without the goats and money, we have many problems."
In Nyeri, coffee farmer Josephine Kihu has worked her land for three decades. Prolonged sunshine forced her to switch to a more resilient variety of bean. Rain once watered her crops. "Before we never used to water our seedlings because the rain was good and it was enough but as from today," she said. Pointing to a light shower, she asked: "Is it really raining? This is drizzling. It cannot help the tree. So it forces us to employ someone to water the coffee tree." Now she faces a new labour cost on top of everything else.
Kihu says farmers pour money into their land without any guarantee of a return. "Can you imagine how much money, you have invested here? I have invested a lot and finally I don't harvest anything, I might die. As a farmer, you could go insane," she said. She believes unpredictable weather has affected farmers' mental wellbeing, though some may not recognise what is causing their distress.
What Clinicians Are Seeing
Kahindo Gacago, a clinical psychologist at Outspan Hospital in Nyeri, sees the effects in his consulting room. He believes about a third of his patients are farmers dealing with mental health issues linked to repeated agricultural losses.
"The cumulative losses and also the chronic stress that comes with always having to plan to know what to do at this time or when," he said. "Especially when you feel like you've lost control, because something like the weather it's not something in your control."
The damage isn't only financial. Changing climatic conditions can contribute to a loss of identity, Gacago said, when farmers must abandon familiar practices, adopt different lifestyles or relocate in search of more promising conditions. Some may turn to alcohol or other substances to cope.
The Policy Gap
Gacago didn't stop at diagnosis. He urged policymakers to include mental wellbeing in farmer support programmes, promote climate-smart agriculture and improve access to irrigation. Those calls point to public action, not individual resilience. Irrigation, for instance, requires infrastructure no single smallholder can build alone, and a farmer facing a failed harvest can't counsel himself out of a drought.
The farmers' accounts show just how little cushion exists. Kihu must hire a worker to water trees that rain once watered for free. Ndung'u has no money to fall back on while pasture grows. Both are absorbing shocks they didn't cause.
Why This Matters:
The farmers in this report aren't asking for charity. They're describing what happens when climate volatility hits households with few financial buffers and little public support. Ndung'u's goats paid for his children's schooling, so livestock loss also threatens their education. Gacago's estimate that a third of his patients are farmers suggests the strain is already reaching clinics. His call to include mental wellbeing in farmer support programmes, alongside irrigation and climate-smart agriculture, frames the problem as a matter of public policy, not private endurance. With a looming super El Nino, doctors warn the uncertainty may deepen, and the question is whether support systems will arrive before the next failed season.