Abstract:
Climate change poses a great threat to human security through erratic rainfall patterns
and decreasing crop yields, contributing to increased hunger. Adaptation is considered
an appropriate response to climate change, especially for women farmers. Therefore, this
study investigates whether women farmers in Haramaya recognize climate change and
consequently adapt to it in their agricultural activities. The study also examines the
factors influencing woman’s decision to adapt to climate change and identifying the types
of climate change adaptation options practiced by women in Haramaya district, eastern
Ethiopia. A multi-stage sampling procedure was employed to obtain a total of 150 rural
women households in Haramaya district, while descriptive statistics and multinomial
logit model (MNL) were used to analyze the data obtained from the households. The
results showed that the most widely used adaptation method by women farmers were soil
and water conservation measures (37.3percent). The multinomial logit analysis revealed
that the factors influencing women’s decision to adapt to climate change include age of
women, education, family size, farming experience, access to credit, access to
information on climate change, total annual income, perception of women households on
climate change and women empowerment. Therefore, the government needs to help
farmers overcome constraints they face in taking up adaptation to climate change.
Furthermore, the government can play a significant role by promoting policies aimed to
enhance adaptation at household level through empowering women and the support of
extension services, meteorological service by reporting and alerting households about
weather changes in an understandable way so that they can be able to plan for their
future farming.
Language:
English
Date of publication:
2015
Country:
Region Focus:
East Africa
University/affiliation:
Collection:
RUFORUM Theses and Dissertations
Agris Subject Categories:
Agrovoc terms:
Additional keywords:
Licence conditions:
Open Access
Access restriction:
Form:
Printed resource
Extent:
xi,78