Farmers' perceptions of climate variability, their adaptation strategies and agricultural productivity: a case of Limpopo province, South Africa

D B Afful,K Ayisi

doi:10.17159/2413-3221/2020/v48n2a536

Abstract

ABSTRACT The provision of farm management decision support and advisory services to insure climate resilient agricultural production systems, especially for subsistence farmers, depends on data on such producers. The main objective of the paper was to generate such data by comparing the status quo regarding dryland, subsistence grain farmers' perceptions of climate variability, their adaptation strategies and crop productivity. Using a survey questionnaire, the comparison was made across time (2014 and 2017) in selected municipalities of Limpopo province. The findings across time and aggregated for all the different local municipalities investigated were similar regarding respondents' perceptions of climate variability, adaptation strategies used and crop productivity. The perceptions revealed that respondents were aware of the reality of climate variability and its negative effects on their crop and livestock production, Agricultural productivity amongst extension and non-extension recipients was low, with minimal differences. These findings auger well for the development of common strategies to improve the effectiveness of the support for farm management including climate variability that is provided by the public agricultural extension service to the group of producers in this study to reduce the negative effects of climate variability on their crop productivity. This will eventually help to improve their food security. Keywords: Perceptions, Climate variability, Productivity, Spatial and temporal variation, Subsistence farming.

Highlights

Scientific evidence shows that there has been a warming of the global atmosphere over the past 1,500 years (Marcott Shakun, Clark, & Mix, 2013)
An independent samples t-test was conducted to test the study hypothesis to compare the statistical significance of crop yields for recipients and non-recipients of public extension farm management information including climate variability across time and municipalities
The similar findings across time (2014 and 2017) and aggregated for all the different local municipalities investigated regarding respondents’ perceptions of climate variability, their views of influence of climate variability on crop and livestock production, their adaptation strategies and agricultural productivity suggest that we have data for evidence-based decision making regarding the type of support for these producers

Summary

Introduction

Scientific evidence shows that there has been a warming of the global atmosphere over the past 1,500 years (Marcott Shakun, Clark, & Mix, 2013). The evidence is found in rising temperatures, changes in rainfall cycles, resulting in droughts and flooding in some areas with concomitant increase in diseases and pests. These changing weather phenomena affect agricultural production and productivity (Clements, Haggar, Quezada & Torres, 2011). A large proportion of South Africa’s agricultural production depends on climatic variables such as temperature and precipitation. The semi-arid nature of the country, coupled with its scarce ground water resources, make the agricultural sector vulnerable to climate change and variability. South Africa is a region that is very prone to severe drought and flood events and significant intra-seasonal variability during the core rainy season (December– February) when farmers in the summer rainfall areas begin to plant

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion