Assessing the determinants of women farmers' targeted adaptation measures in response to climate extremes in rural Ghana

Abstract

Weather and climate extremes affect food crop production of women farmers in sub-Saharan Africa. Women farmers use specific adaptation strategies to respond to weather and climate extremes confronting them. Most studies on the role of gender in the uptake of adaptation strategies have focused on gender differentiation and the ex-ante adaptation strategies that women farmers in Ghana use to respond to climate extremes. The aim of the present study is to analyze the ex-post targeted strategies women farmers' use to respond to weather and climate extremes, and the factors that explain the use of those strategies. The study estimated a multivariate probit model to analyze the problem using a cross-sectional data collected from sample of women farmers who have been exposed to climate extremes in the Upper West Region of Ghana. The study revealed that the women farmers used changing of planting dates as targeted adaptation strategy in response to drought, creation of drains and moving away from flood-prone areas as targeted adaptation strategies in response to flood, and creation of fire belts around farms as targeted adaptation strategy in response to bushfire. The study further identified the age of the farmer, climate information, asset holdings, credit and agricultural extension services as important determinants of the various ex-post targeted strategies the women farmers used to adapt to weather extremes in the region. The study recommends that policy should promote the uptake of adaptation strategies among women farmers through the removal of institutional barriers on the use of climate information, credit acquisition, liquid asset holdings, and agricultural extension services. Profiling the age of women farmers before targeting them with specific adaptation interventions is also a necessary policy instrument.