Climate change and the livelihoods of food crop farmers in Lesotho: Lessons for the implementation of the national climate change adaptation strategy.

The vast majority of Lesotho's rural population is reliant on agriculture for survival. However, Lesotho, Southern Africa is extremely vulnerable to the effects of climate change, which has a negative impact on rural livelihoods. Furthermore, despite the fiscal challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, Lesotho's National Climate Change Policy Implementation Strategy has been hampered by implementation issues and has yet to be implemented. This sparked the necessity for this research, which aims to inform the government of Lesotho on how farmers are combating climate change in their own tiny way. This study employs a survey to gather data from 200 farmers from farming villages across the country's 10 regions. According to the findings of this study, farmers have experienced climate change in the areas of drying rivers, delayed on-set of rainfall, and excessive frost or cold. As a result of these events, farmers have experienced poorer agricultural yields, increased insect and disease attacks, and lower-than-normal harvests. The adaptation methods the farmers are using include the employment of indigenous technology for pest and disease control, fruit tree planting, conservation agriculture (water and soil conservation), and rainwater harvest storage for use during dry seasons. Some of these adaptation strategies are feared to cause further environmental challenges for Lesotho. Therefore, in order to enhance the lives of Lesotho's farmers, the government of Lesotho should consider implementing the National Climate Change Policy Implementation Strategy.

Facilitators of tertiary students' entrepreneurial intentions: Insights for Lesotho's national entrepreneurship policy.

This study provides insightful information to guide the Lesotho government's drive to address rising youth unemployment. Through quota sampling technique, this study selected 930 students from 31 departments at National University of Lesotho. Grounded in the theory of planned behaviour (TPB), the study examined the facilitators of students' entrepreneurial intentions using mean, standard deviation, mean rank, correlation, and Mann-Whitney U test. Structural equation modelling was used to determine the relationship between the three components of TPB (attitudes, perceived behavioural control, and subjective norm), and students' entrepreneurial intention. The findings show that attitudes and perceived behavioural control were positive predictors of entrepreneurial intention while subjective norm was a negative predictor. The major findings indicate that students from Business and Management Development, Business Administration, Economics, Nutrition, and Pharmacy departments had higher entrepreneurial intentions, with postgraduate students (at master level) having higher entrepreneurial decisions than undergraduate students. Policy, practice, and research implications are teased out from the findings to improve entrepreneurial education.