VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT AND ADAPTIVE STRATEGIES OF GRAIN FARMERS TO CLIMATE CHANGE IN SHINKAFI LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, ZAMFARA STATE, NIGERIA
VULNERABILITY ASSESSMENT AND ADAPTIVE STRATEGIES OF GRAIN FARMERS TO CLIMATE CHANGE IN SHINKAFI LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, ZAMFARA STATE, NIGERIA
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Date
2014-01
Authors
NNACHI, Solomon Uduma
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Abstract
This study assessed the biophysical and socioeconomic vulnerabilities of climate change on grain
farming and the adaptive strategies employed in combating the scourge in Shinkafi Local Government
Area of Zamfara State. The results of the various statistical tests showed that the coefficients of
Skewness and Kurtosis for the rainfall series from 1971-2010 was normally distributed at 95%
confidence level. There was no significant trend in annual rainfall totals as against the years at the
same confidence limit using the Mann Kendall's test. The five-year and ten-year running means, the
10-year non-overlapping and 20-year overlapping sub-periodic means of annual rainfall all showed
lengthy dry periods below the long term mean from 1971-2001 with steady increases above the mean
from the early millennium to the end of the period. The Pearson's Product Moment Correlation was
also used to relate annual rainfall amounts with each of the state's prominent grain crops namely;
Millet, Sorghum and Maize from 1996-2010 and this showed an imperfect but positive correlation.
Biophysically, comparisons between the trends in the annual rainfall totals and pattern of grain crops;
sub-periodic rainfall means and rainfall requirements for each crop and the Normalized Rainfall Index
(NRI) generally revealed that climatic stress affected the outcome of grain production especially
within the severe drought years of 1971 to the late 90's, in which only Millet and Sorghum gained
more economic significance and wider patronage in the state due to their "drought tolerant" abilities;
while Maize came into economic limelight from 2002 to 2007 due to increases in the annual rainfall
tending towards flooding occurrences with great effects on yield. Furthermore, in assessing the
socioeconomic vulnerability of farmers to climate change in the Study area, only a total of 169
farming respondents (due to unusable data in some of the questionnaires administered) from three
systematically selected wards namely; Badarawa, Jangeru and Shinkafi were randomly selected and
analyzed based on Summer (2009) school district method. In-depth interview sessions and focus group
discussions with experts from the Zamfara State Agricultural and Rural Development Authority
(ZARDA) were also conducted. Generally, about 50% of respondents in Shinkafi ward, 31% from
Badarawa and 27% from Jangeru were unable to meet up with high food prices due to low income
capacity, large family size and high poverty rates resulting to severe repercussions on their means of
livelihood. Grain farmers' in the study area with the help of ZARDA have adopted traditional means
of combating climatic stress such as mulching, shifting cultivation, good storage facilities, irrigation
practices, use of insecticides and organic manure. However, the findings of this study recommends
several modem adaptive strategies: - planting the best short duration-seed variety of grains in periods
of drought, delaying the early planting of millet and sorghum in cases of accelerated rainfall increases,
application of fertilizers for maize in cases of drought, crop rotation to reduce pests attack, improving
rainfall data and continuous data monitoring as well as employing the best fiscal support and
government policies favouring sustainable grain production
Description
A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE SCHOOL OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES, AHMADU
BELLO UNIVERSITY, ZARIA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE AWARD OF MASTER OF SCIENCE DECREE IN GEOGRAPHY,
DEPARTMENT OF GEOGRAPHY, FACULTY OF SCIENCE, AHMADU BELLO
UNIVERSITY, ZARIA
FEBRUARY 2014
Keywords
VULNERABILITY,, ADAPTIVE STRATEGIES ,, GRAIN FARMERS ,, CLIMATE CHANGE,, SHINKAFI