The perception of Climatic Change on Climatic Resilience Crop Cultivars among Arable Farmers in Adamawa state, Nigeria

Abstract

The study examines the perception of climatic change and climatic resilience crop cultivars among arable farmers in Adamawa State. With the specific objectives as to determine the socio-economics of arable farmers, examine the perception of change in temperature by farmers farming experience, examine the perception of farmers on rainfall pattern change due to climatic change, identify the source of information about climatic resilience crop cultivars, identify the varieties of climatic resilience crops cultivated by arable farmers, examine the farmer’s perception on the effects of climatic change on arable crop production, determine the level of farmers adoption of climatic resilience crop cultivars and examine the socio-economic factors influencing the adoption of climatic resilience crop cultivar for effects of climatic change on arable production. Primary data was the main sources of data for the study collected through the use of well-structured schedule. Descriptive statistics (tables, frequency and percentage) and inferential statistics such as Chi-square, and Probit regression were used as analytical tools for the analysis of data. The study revealed that majority of the respondents are in their most active age (21-40years), hence their strength could be effectively utilized to increase agricultural production and majority of them were males with 49.0% were married. The study shows that the household size in the study area is relatively large and most (60.8%) of the respondents are educated (they can read and write) and this could be effectively utilized to boost arable production in the study area and 60.8% of the respondents were full-time farmers with a good farming experience which will help them to improve their production techniques and to increase their productivity. The study therefore, concluded that climatic change have significant effects on arable production which reduces potential yield and farmers were aware of the climatic resilience crop cultivars of which their sources of information on it were NGOs and other farm associate but their level of adoption is low and recommended that Farmer exposure to and knowledge of climate-resilient crop cultivars should be increased. This can be achieved through organizing more training on climate change adaptation and encouraging farmers to attend.