ECONOMIC IMPACT OF CLIMATE VARIABILITY ON AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION AND FARMERS VULNERABILITY IN SEMI-ARID TROPICS (SAT) OF INDIA: HOUSEHOLD LEVEL ANALYSIS
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Date
2019-10-22
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UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES, GKVK BENGALURU
Abstract
This study uses household level panel data to estimate the agriculture sensitivity and farmers
vulnerability to climate change in Semi-Arid Tropics of India. The data pertaining to 2009-2014
collected by International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in five
states of Southern India viz., Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Madhya
Pradesh from 664 panel farmers was used for the study. Further, farmers were classified into
small, medium and large farmers based on operational land holdings. Empirical results showed
inverted U shape relationship between farm income, major crops yield and return from livestock
with climate variables. The average production of milk and egg showed decreasing annual
growth rate of 5.20 per cent and 12.90 per cent, respectively. As temperature and rainfall
increases, return/yield initially increases up to a threshold level and then decreases. Across the
land classes, the impact was significant in case of small farmers due to less adaption capacity on
field as compared to higher end farmers. Significant effects of both agricultural revenue and crop
production diversity on dietary diversity were estimated. The results implied that one per cent
increase in agricultural revenue and crop diversity resulted in 1.03 per cent and 1.76 per cent
increase in dietary diversity, respectively. These results illustrate that increased crop diversity
ensure improved dietary diversity than the agricultural income. The medium farmers were more
vulnerable to climate variability compared to other farmers due to their high dependent on
agriculture. The study emphasizes the development of new seed varieties, adjustments in sowing
time, fodder bank, diversification of production and livelihood strategies could helps to
overcome the negative effects of livestock.