Farmers Adaptation Strategies to Climate Change in Obowo Local Government Area of Imo State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study examined farmers' adaptation strategies to climate change in Obowo Local Government Area of Imo state, Nigeria. The specific objectives of the study were to determine the socioeconomic characteristics of the farmers in the area, ascertain the level of awareness of farmers on the effects of climate change, and assess the adaptation strategies of different farming systems to climate change. Validated and well structured questionnaire were used to collect data from sixty randomly selected farmers. Data analysis was done using simple and inferential statistical tools such as frequency counts, mean, and ordinary least square multiple regression. The study showed that majority of the farmers were males (60%) with a mean annual income of N155844.58 and mean age of 47.16 years. Their major source of information on climate change was from friends/neighbours (informal sources) (mean = 2.70) and very few (mean = 0.92) sourced information from the print media (newspaper). Their major idea of climate change was excessive rainfall. Their major adaptation strategies in the area were by the use of mixed cropping (Mean = 2.75), mulching (mean = 2.50) and cover crops (mean = 2.60). Only very few of them adopted minimum tillage and practiced afforestation as a measure with very low mean adaptation of 0.10 and 0.50 respectively. None of them practiced irrigation farming. The factors influencing farmers' adaptation to climate change included level of education, farm size, farm income and age. The study showed that age has an inverse relationship to climate change adaptation. It was therefore recommended that agricultural extension workers should increase their level of service on the use of afforestation as a mitigation measure on climate change.