Adaptation measures by crop farmers in the southeast rainforest zone of Nigeria to climate change

Abstract

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) defines climate change as: “a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global and/or regional atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods”. In other words, the UNFCCC uses the term climate change to mean only those changes that are brought about by human activities. In recent usage, the term “climate change” often refers to changes in modern climate which according to the IPCC (2007) are 90-95 percent likely to have been in part caused by human action. Climate changes reflect variations within the earth’s atmosphere, processes in other parts of the earth such as oceans, and the effects of human activity (Miller & Edwards, 2001). Broad scientific agreement now exists that continued accumulation of heat-trapping “greenhouse” gases in the atmosphere is contributing to changes in the global climate, and in the climates of regions around the world (Crosson, 1997). It is known that sub- Saharan Africa is a marginal contributor of global climate change but it is the region that is mostly affected by climate change. Climate is an important resource to crop production in Nigeria especially in the rainforest zone of Nigeria as farmers depend largely on rainfed agriculture (Onyeneke, 2010). The key point therefore is how farmers in the zone respond to climate change through their farming activities.