Misperception of drivers of risk alters willingness to adapt in the case of sargassum influxes in West Africa

Abstract

Since 2011, large influxes of a brown macroalgae (pelagic sargassum seaweed) have proliferated across the Tropical Atlantic basin, its dispersal and seasonality theorized to be driven by localized and large scale winds and currents, in combination with changes in the Atlantic Meridional Mode and ocean upwelling. These influxes seasonally affect coastal populations across the breadth of the Tropical Atlantic (from central America to West Africa), causing damage to: economies, marine-based and non-marine coastal livelihoods, social functioning, health, ecology, and the aesthetics of the local environment. We use the ongoing sargassum influx in West Africa as a case study of adaptation to an emergent (and compound) risk in progress that also contributes to the empirical gap in sargassum adaptation research in West Africa. The research, in four sites in the Western Region of Ghana employs data from 16 focus group discussions, six key informant interviews, and participant observation. We finds that due to a series of coincidences, participant communities perceive that sargassum influxes were seeded by and then annually driven by oil and gas exploration in Western Ghana. This is in contrast to scientific research that indicates that pelagic sargassum was initially seeded in the tropical Atlantic basin (from the Sargasso Sea) in 2010 following an anomalous weather event in winter 2009–2010. Following Rogers’ Protection Motivation Theory, we explore the sources of information and the processing of that information to understand the divergence between scientific and community perceptions of the physical drivers. We find that community perceptions of oil and gas company responsibility for causing the sargassum problem leads the communities to perceive that the oil and gas companies should be responsible for the clean-up activities. Communities are further constrained by a perceived lack of capacity to act. Solutions to address this adaptation impasse could involve the government working with communities and the oil and gas industry to clarify the actual drivers of sargassum. Such guidance may open opportunities for the government and industry to work with communities to address misperceptions of the scientific nature of the influxes. Collaborative approaches, while addressing extant tensions, may also change the narrative about the problem, support affected communities to engage with adaptive measures, including re-use opportunities, and enhance community capacity to act. As a present-day emergent risk, pelagic sargassum provides an unusual yet contemporary empirical study of real-time adaptation and the central role of perceptions in shaping proactive adaptation and seeking exploitable opportunities from new environmental risks.

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ORCID for Emma L. Tompkins: orcid.org/0000-0002-4825-9797

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