Assessment of Perceived Trend, Impact and Adaptation Strategy of Rainfall Variability by Crop Farmers in Yandev District, Benue State, Nigeria

Abstract

Assessment of Perceived Trend, Impact and Adaptation Strategy of Rainfall Variability by Crop Farmers in Yandev District, Benue State, Nigeria Bernard Tarza Tyubee, Lubem Tsavhemba, Michael Terver Iwan Abstract The study assessed crop farmers’ perceived rainfall variability and its impact, and adaptation strategy in Yandev district, Benue State, Nigeria. A total of 107 farmers were sampled from six registered farming cooperative societies. Data on crop farmers were obtained from structured questionnaire, and rainfall data were acquired for 37 years (1981 – 2017) from Akperan Orshi College of Agriculture, Yandev. The data on farmers’ perception were analysed using descriptive statistics while correlation analysis was used to examine the trend in the variability of rainfall variables. Farmers’ perceived an increasing trend, decreasing trend and negligible change in onset and cessation of the rainy season and annual rainfall, while the observed variability showed increasing trend in all the rainfall variables. There is agreement between the perceived and observed variability for onset of the rainy season. Majority of the farmers (64% - 87%) perceived that variability in the three rainfall variables has huge influence on crop production. The farmers (74%) prefered diversifying livelihood sources as the major adaptation strategy to rainfall variability. The study concludes that crop farmers need insurance against climate related losses and recommends that crop farmers should incorporate meteorological predictions in planning their farming activities. Full Text: PDF DOI: 10.15640/jaes.v9n2a4