Farm programs and climate change

The view that the agricultural sector could largely offset any negative impacts of climate change by altering production practices assumes the government will not create disincentives for farmers to adapt. U.S. farm programs, however, often discourage such obvious adaptations as switching crops, investing in water conserving technologies, and entry or exit. We outline a simple portfolio model describing producer decision making: we then use this framework to assess how specific U.S. farm programs might affect adaption to climate change. Three future climate scenarios are considered and in each the present structure of U.S. farm programs discourages adaptation.     

North Florida Dairy Farmer Perceptions Toward the Use of Seasonal Climate Forecast Technology

Evidence of increasing nitrogen levels in the Suwannee River Basin in North Florida demands a collaborative effort to find creative ways to reduce N pollution. This study explores the perspectives, perceptions, and attitudes of dairy farmers regarding adoption of climate forecasts as a potential way to mitigate the problem. These farmers are heavily scrutinized because of their nitrogen emissions. By contrasting scientists' pre-conceived attitudes about the usefulness of ENSO-based forecasts with dairy farmers' perceptions, gathered in a participatory and consensual manner, valuable lessons were learned. A deeper understanding of the day to day realities of dairy farming systems help researchers pinpoint management adaptations that are not only useful, but feasible, in light of improved seasonal climate forecasts. Furthermore, dairy farmers' perceptions regarding the use of seasonal climate information to mitigate the nitrate problem are critical for designing future dairy systems.     

Indian agriculture and climate sensitivity

This study estimates the relationship between farm level net-revenue and climate variables in India using cross-sectional evidence. Using the observed reactions of farmers, the study seeks to understand how they have adapted to different climatic conditions across India. District level data is used for the analysis. The study also explores the influence of annual weather and crop prices on the climate response function. The estimated climate response function is used to assess the possible impacts of a ‘best-guess’ climate change scenario on Indian agriculture.     

Farm-Level Adaptation to Climatic Variability and Change: Crop Diversification in the Canadian Prairies

Among other foci, recent research on adaptation to climatic variability and change has sought to evaluate the merit of adaptation generally, as well as the suitability of particular adaptations. Additionally, there is a need to better understand the likely uptake of adaptations. For example, diversification is one adaptation that has been identified as a potential farm-level response to climatic variability and change, but its adoption by farmers for this reason is not well understood. This paper serves two purposes. The first is to document the adoption of crop diversification in Canadian prairie agriculture for the period 1994–2002, reflect upon its strengths and limitations for managing a variety of risks, including climatic ones, and gauge its likely adoption by producers in response to anticipated climate change. The second purpose is to draw on this case to refine our current understanding of climate change adaptation more generally. Based upon data from over 15 000 operations, it was determined that individual farms have become more specialized in their cropping patterns since 1994, and this trend is unlikely to change in the immediate future, notwithstanding anticipated climate change and the known risk-reducing benefits of crop diversification. More broadly, the analysis suggests that suitable and even possible climate change adaptations need to be more rigorously assessed in order to understand their wider strengths and limitations.     

Assessing climatic exposure of grassland-based livestock systems with seasonal-scale indicators

Research aiming to reduce the vulnerability of agricultural systems to climate variability and change requires practical appraisal of their climatic exposure. We propose a method to map local climatic conditions over a given period to a set of productivity and management-related indicators that are specific to grassland-based livestock systems. Our method based on a reference system balances herbage production and feed requirements over a long period (≥ 30 years) and provides boundaries for productivity-defined seasons and indicators for surplus or shortage of herbage at seasonal and annual scales. This exposure-assessment method was applied to five climatically contrasting locations in south-western France. The trends and variability of the exposure indicators were analysed for past (1980–2010) and future (2035–2065) periods, considering the A1B scenario of the IPCC. Despite high year-to-year variability and the heterogeneity of the climatic situations studied, we show that climate change can modify the boundaries of productivity-defined seasons and seasonal herbage surplus or shortage. Moreover, the exposure indicators succeed in detecting climate-induced changes and distinguishing situations where a classical exposure indicator, such as annual forage production, could not. The exposure indicators highlight the forage productivity and the timing of production associated with local climatic conditions. These features fit the temporal scale at which farmers consider farm management and are highly suitable for identifying adaptation strategies that reduce the vulnerability of grassland-based livestock systems.     

Smallholder Maize Production and Climatic Risk: A Case Study from Mexico

The article explores the strategies employed by smallholder farmers in Mexico to cope with the affects of climatic variability, and how seasonal climate forecasts may assist these farmers in mitigating climatic risk. Recognizing that the decisions of smallholder farmers are intricately tied to the political-economic circumstances in which they operate, the article discusses how agricultural policy in Mexico affects the vulnerability of small-scale producers and may inhibit their ability to use climatic forecasts to their advantage. The article first reviews the literature on smallholder adaptation in Mexico, and discusses briefly policy and institutional issues affecting adaptation at the farm-level. Using the case of small-scale maize producers in Tlaxcala, Mexico, as an illustration, the article then argues that political-economic uncertainty outweighs climatic variability as a determinant of the production strategies of small-scale producers. In these circumstances, the farmers are unlikely to use new seasonal climate forecasts.     

Analysis of farm performance in Europe under different climatic and management conditions to improve understanding of adaptive capacity

The aim of this paper is to improve understanding of the adaptive capacity of European agriculture to climate change. Extensive data on farm characteristics of individual farms from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) have been combined with climatic and socio-economic data to analyze the influence of climate and management on crop yields and income and to identify factors that determine adaptive capacity. A multilevel analysis was performed to account for regional differences in the studied relationships. Our results suggest that socio-economic conditions and farm characteristics should be considered when analyzing effects of climate conditions on farm yields and income. Next to climate, input intensity, economic size and the type of land use were identified as important factors influencing spatial variability in crop yields and income. Generally, crop yields and income are increasing with farm size and farm intensity. However, effects differed among crops and high crop yields were not always related to high incomes, suggesting that impacts of climate and management differ by impact variable. As farm characteristics influence climate impacts on crop yields and income, they are good indicators of adaptive capacity at farm level and should be considered in impact assessment models. Different farm types with different management strategies will adapt differently.     

An essay on the impact of climate change on US agriculture: weather fluctuations, climatic shifts, and adaptation strategies

The impact of climate change on US agriculture has been debated for more than two decades, but the estimates ranged from no damage at the lower end to 80 % losses of grain yields at the higher end. This essay aims to help understand such divergent predictions by clarifying the concepts of weather and climate. First, the widely-read panel fixed effects models capture only the impacts of weather fluctuations but not of climate normals. Random weather fluctuations and climatic shifts are two different meteorological events and they have distinct implications on farming decisions. The former is perceived as random while the latter is perceived as non-random by the farmers. Using the historical corn yield data in the US, I explain the differences between the impact of random weather and that of climate change. Second, adaptation strategies to climatic changes and increased climate risks cannot be accounted for by the panel fixed effects models. Using the farm household data collected in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, I discuss quantitative significance of modeling adaptation strategies in the estimates of climate damage. Distinction between random weather fluctuations and climatic shifts is critical in modeling farming decisions, as they are fundamental to climate science, but is poorly understood by the impact researchers.     

How stable are Australian farmers’ climate change risk perceptions? New evidence of the feedback loop between risk perceptions and behaviour

The exact relationship between people’s climate change attitudes and behaviour is a topic that engages policy-makers and researchers worldwide. Do climate change attitudes influence behaviour or is it possible that behaviour can change attitudes? This study uses a unique repeated survey dataset of 275 farmers (irrigators) in the southern Murray-Darling Basin from 2010–11 to 2015–16, to explore the dynamic relationship between climate change risk perceptions and farm adaptation behaviour. Farmers who had an increased risk exposure (expressed through higher debt, larger irrigated areas, greater share of permanent crops, and located in areas with higher temperatures and less rainfall) were more likely to agree climate change posed a risk. Whilst farmers became more accepting towards climate change over the time-period, a significant percentage of these attitudes were unstable. One reason suggested for this instability is the presence of a feedback loop between risk perceptions and behaviour. Namely, new evidence was found that farmers who agreed climate change was a risk in 2010–11, were more likely to undertake farm production decisions to reduce that risk (e.g. changing crop mix, reducing irrigated area and consequently selling water entitlements) – which had the impact of negatively feeding back and reducing their stated climate change risk perceptions in 2015–16. Conversely, farmers who were originally deniers were more likely to undertake somewhat riskier farm production decisions (e.g. increasing water utilisation rates and irrigation areas) – which consequently had the impact of positively increasing their climate change risk perceptions in 2015–16.     

Maize seed choice and perceptions of climate variability among smallholder farmers

Despite decades of research and interventions, crop yields for smallholder farmers across sub-Saharan Africa are dramatically lower than in developed countries. Attempts to address low yields of staple crops in Africa since the Green Revolution through policies and investments in advanced seed cultivars have had mixed results. Numerous countries have heartily embraced and promoted hybrid cultivars through government subsidy programs and investments in research and seed multiplication. One possible explanation for why these programs have not resulted in more significant yield improvements is the challenge faced by farmers to select cultivars that are suited to their local environmental conditions. The question of what seeds farmers choose is exceptionally complex as it is often affected by local seed availability, the availability of information on seed performance, and the transfer of that information to farmers. At the foundation of this choice are farmers’ perceptions of different seed varieties coupled with their perceptions of climate variability. We examine seed choice in Zambia, a country with decades of hybrid maize seed development and supporting policies. We demonstrate how input subsidy programs and seed market liberalization have led to choice overload and a discontinuity in information exchange between farmers and seed companies. The decision making environment is further complicated by the heterogeneity in growing conditions and its variable impact on seed performance, which complicates characterization of seed duration at the farm level. Perceptions and biases related to climate variability effect seed choice, and potentially lead farmers to make risk averse decisions, which ultimately depress maize yields.     

Multiple exposures and dynamic vulnerability: Evidence from the grape industry in the Okanagan Valley, Canada

This paper assesses the vulnerability of grape growers and winery operators in the Okanagan Valley, British Columbia to climate variability and change, in the context of other sources of risk. Through interviews and focus groups, producers identified the climatic and non-climatic risks relevant to them and the strategies employed to manage these risks. The results show that the presence of multiple exposures affects the way in which producers are vulnerable to climate change. Producers are vulnerable to conditions that not only affect crop yield, but also affect their ability to compete in or sell to the market. Their sensitivity to these conditions is influenced in part by institutional factors such as trade liberalization and a “markup-free delivery” policy. Producers’ ability to adapt or cope with these risks varies depending on such factors as the availability of resources and technology, and access to government programmes. Producers will likely face challenges associated with the supply of water for irrigation due to a combination of climatic changes and changing demographics in the Okanagan Valley, which in turn affect their ability to adapt to climatic conditions. Finally, adaptations made by producers can change the nature of the operation and its vulnerability, demonstrating the dynamic nature of vulnerability.     

Farmer beliefs and concerns about climate change and attitudes toward adaptation and mitigation: Evidence from Iowa

Agriculture is both vulnerable to climate change impacts and a significant source of greenhouse gases. Increasing agriculture’s resilience and reducing its contribution to climate change are societal priorities. Survey data collected from Iowa farmers are analyzed to answer the related research questions: (1) do farmers support adaptation and mitigation actions, and (2) do beliefs and concerns about climate change influence those attitudes. Results indicate that farmers who were concerned about the impacts of climate change on agriculture and attributed it to human activities had more positive attitudes toward both adaptive and mitigative management strategies. Farmers who believed that climate change is not a problem because human ingenuity will enable adaptations and who did not believe climate change is occurring or believed it is a natural phenomenon—a substantial percentage of farmers—tended not to support mitigation.     

Perceptions of risk and adaptation: Coffee producers,market shocks,and extreme weather in Central America and Mexico

This article explores the role of risk perception in adaptation to stress through comparative case studies of coffee farmers’ responses to climatic and non-climatic stressors. We hypothesized that farmers associating these changes with high risk would be more likely to make adaptations than those who saw the events as part of normal variation. Nevertheless, we found that farmers who associated events with high risk were not more likely to engage in specific adaptations. Adaptive responses were more clearly associated with access to land than perception of risk, suggesting that adaptation is more a function of exogenous constraints on decision making than perception.     

Climate Variability and Land-use Change in Danangou Watershed, China—Examples of Small-Scale Farmers' Adaptation

With global concern on climate change impacts, developing countries are given special attention due their susceptibility. In this paper, change and variability in climate, land use and farmers' perception, adaptation and response to change are examined in Danangou watershed in the Chinese Loess Plateau. The first focus is to look at how climate data recorded at meteorological stations recently have evolved, and how farmers perceived these changes. Further, we want to see how the farmers respond and adapt to climate variability and what the resulting impact on land use is. Finally, other factors causing change in land use are considered. Local precipitation and temperature instrumental data and interview data from farmers were used. The instrumental data shows that the climate is getting warmer and drier, the latter despite large interannual variability. The trend is seen on the local and regional level. Farmers' perception of climatic variability corresponds well with the data record. During the last 20 years, the farmers have become less dependent on agriculture by adopting a more diversified livelihood. This adaptation makes them less vulnerable to climate variability. It was found that government policies and reforms had a stronger influence on land use than climate variability. Small-scale farmers should therefore be considered as adaptive to changing situations, planned and non-consciously planned.     

A FARMer's View of the Ricardian Approach to Measuring Agricultural Effects of Climatic Change

During the past few years two new methods, each based on the analogous region concept, have been developed to account for farmer adaptation in response to global climatic change. The first, called 'Ricardian' by Mendelsohn, Nordhaus, and Shaw (1994), econometrically estimates the impact of climatic and other variables on the value of farm real estate. Under some conditions, estimates of climate-induced changes in farm real estate capture first-round adaptations by farmers and represent the economic value of climatic change on agriculture. The second method, promulgated by Darwin et al. (1994) in the Future Agricultural Resources Model (FARM), uses a geographic information system to empirically link climatically derived land classes with other inputs and agricultural outputs in an economic model of the world. FARM provides estimates of economic impacts that fully account for all responses by economic agents under global climate change as well as estimates of Ricardian rents. The primary objective of this analysis is to evaluate how well changes in Ricardian rents measure agricultural or other effects of climatic change after all economic agents around the world have responded. Results indicate that changes in Ricardian rents on agricultural land are poor quantitative, but good qualitative, measures of how global climatic change is likely to affect the welfare of agricultural landowners, if one recognizes that increases in Ricardian rents actually indicate losses in landowner welfare and vice versa. Results also indicate that regional changes in Ricardian rents on all land are good qualitative measures of changes in regional welfare. They are poor quantitative welfare measures because they systematically overestimate both benefits and losses and are on average upwardly biased because inflated benefits are larger than exaggerated losses. Results also indicate that, when based on existing land-use patterns, changes in Ricardian rents on all the world's land are poor quantitative and qualitative measures of changes in world welfare. Despite these shortcomings, changes in Ricardian rents can provide useful information when other measures are not available. In this analysis, for example, estimated changes in Ricardian rents on all land indicate that climatic change would likely have detrimental effects in Latin America and Africa, beneficial effects in the former Soviet Union, and either detrimental or beneficial impacts in eastern and northern Europe and western and southern Asia. This is consistent with previous studies showing that climatic change would likely have detrimental, beneficial, and mixed effects on economic welfare in, respectively, equatorial, high latitude, and temperate areas. Estimated changes in Ricardian rents also indicate that aggregating Africa, Latin America, the former Soviet Union, eastern and northern Europe, and western and southern Asia into one region causes FARM's economic model to generate upwardly biased changes in world welfare. Modified results from scenarios with moderately flexible land-use change and which account for current land-use patterns indicate that world welfare may increase if the average surface land temperature does not increase by more than 1.0 or 2.0°C. If the average surface land temperature increases by 3.0°C or more, however, then world welfare may decline.     

Carbon sequestration potential of parkland agroforestry in the Sahel

Establishing parkland agroforestry on currently treeless cropland in the West African Sahel may help mitigate climate change. To evaluate its potential, we used climatically suitable ranges for parklands for 19 climate scenarios, derived by ecological niche modeling, for estimating potential carbon stocks in parkland and treeless cropland. A biocarbon business model was used to evaluate profitability of hypothetical Terrestrial Carbon Projects (TCPs), across a range of farm sizes, farm numbers, carbon prices and benefit sharing mechanisms. Using climate analogues, we explored potential climate change trajectories for selected locations. If mature parklands covered their maximum range, carbon stocks in Sahelian productive land would be about 1,284?Tg, compared to 725?Tg in a treeless scenario. Due to slow increase rates of total system carbon by 0.4?Mg?C?ha^?1 a^?1, most TCPs at carbon prices that seem realistic today were not feasible, or required the participation of large numbers of farmers. For small farms, few TCP scenarios were feasible, and low Net Present Values for farmers made it unlikely that carbon payments would motivate many to participate in TCPs, unless additional benefits were provided. Climate analogue locations indicated an uncertain climate trajectory for the Sahel, but most scenarios projected increasing aridity and reduced suitability for parklands. The potentially severe impacts of climate change on Sahelian ecosystems and the uncertain profitability of TCPs make the Sahel highly risky for carbon investments. Given the likelihood of degrading environmental conditions, the search for appropriate adaptation strategies should take precedence over promoting mitigation activities.     

Exiting,enduring and innovating: Farm household adaptation to global zoonotic disease

Bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) has been found in 25 countries, costing billions of dollars in those affected economies, and has had profound social and environmental impacts at multiple scales of organization. As a global phenomenon, the impacts of BSE were mediated directly through the environment (animal and human health) but in Canada the indirect socioeconomic impacts of BSE were far more damaging, especially for farm households. Yet, very little research has been conducted on adaptation to the indirect impacts of global environmental change, such as those mediated through the market and governance. Our goal was to examine how farm households adapted to the Canadian BSE crisis in order to better understand rural adaptations to global zoonotic diseases and to agriculture-related global environmental change as a whole. We conducted our mixed methods research in 2004–2006. Data sources included 826 survey responses, 27 individual interviews and 12 group interviews with farmers and ranchers in western Canada. Factor analysis separated out responses into three general adaptation strategies: ‘innovating’ to pursue new opportunities; ‘enduring’ or adaptations that seek stability; and ‘exiting’ from beef production or agriculture altogether. Farm household and community level innovation was a crucial adaptive strategy in the absence of governmental and expert-based support. Enduring adaptations were important to farm household survival in the short term, yet “chronic enduring” can compromise long-term adaptive capacity. Farm exiting was highly problematic during the BSE crisis as these responses were largely unexpected and often left households more vulnerable. Government support at the farm level promoted stability, with little support provided for change-orientated adaptations. Effective farm adaptation will require support for all three types of adaptive strategies and ones that are both expert-based and grassroots in nature to enable farm households in their pursuit of pluriactive and multifunctional livelihood strategies.     

Predicting the future climatic suitability for cocoa farming of the world’s leading producer countries, Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire

Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire are the world’s leading cocoa (Thebroma cacao) producing countries; together they produce 53 % of the world’s cocoa. Cocoa contributes 7.5 % of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Côte d’Ivoire and 3.4 % of that of Ghana and is an important cash crop for the rural population in the forest zones of these countries. If progressive climate change affected the climatic suitability for cocoa in West Africa, this would have implications for global cocoa output as well as the national economies and farmer livelihoods, with potential repercussions for forests and natural habitat as cocoa growing regions expand, shrink or shift. The objective of this paper is to present future climate scenarios for the main cocoa growing regions of Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire and to predict their impact on the relative suitability of these regions for growing cocoa. These analyses are intended to support the respective countries and supply chain actors in developing strategies for reducing the vulnerability of the cocoa sector to climate change. Based on the current distribution of cocoa growing areas and climate change predictions from 19 Global Circulation Models, we predict changes in relative climatic suitability for cocoa for 2050 using an adapted MAXENT model. According to the model, some current cocoa producing areas will become unsuitable (Lagunes and Sud-Comoe in Côte d’Ivoire) requiring crop change, while other areas will require adaptations in agronomic management, and in yet others the climatic suitability for growing cocoa will increase (Kwahu Plateu in Ghana and southwestern Côte d’Ivoire). We recommend the development of site-specific strategies to reduce the vulnerability of cocoa farmers and the sector to future climate change.     

Adaptation in Canadian Agriculture to Climatic Variability and Change

The effects of climatic variability and change on Canadian agriculture have become an important research field since the early 1980s. In this paper, we seek to synthesize this research, focusing on agricultural adaptation, a purposeful proactive or reactive response to changes associated with climate, and influenced by many factors. A distinctive feature of methods used in research on adaptation in Canadian agriculture is the focus on the important role of human agency. Many individual farmers perceive they are well adapted to climate, because of their extensive 'technological' tool-kit, giving them confidence in dealing with climatic change. In many regions, little concern is expressed over climatic change, except where there are particular types of climatic vulnerability. Farmers respond to biophysical factors, including climate, as they interact with a complex of human factors. Several of these, notably institutional and political ones, have tended to diminish the farm-level risks stemming from climatic variability and change, but may well increase the long term vulnerability of Canadian agriculture. Notwithstanding the technological and management adaptation measures available to producers, Canadian agriculture remains vulnerable to climatic variability and to climate change.     

Climate change and the agricultural sector in Ireland: examining farmer awareness and willingness to adopt new advisory mitigation tools

Agriculture is responsible for the bulk of Ireland’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. However, the potential to mitigate some of these emissions through the adoption of more efficient farm management practices may be hampered by farmers’ awareness and attitude towards climate change and agriculture’s role in contributing to GHG emissions. This paper presents results from a survey of 746 Irish farmers in 2014, with a view to understanding farmers’ awareness of, and attitudes to, climate change and GHG emissions. Survey results show that there was a general uncertainty towards a number of questions related to agricultural GHG emissions, e.g. if tilling of land causes GHG emissions, and that farmers were reluctant to take action to reduce GHG emissions on their farm. To further explore farmers’ attitudes towards climate change, a multinomial logit model was used to examine the socio-economic factors that affect farmers’ willingness to adopt an advisory tool that would show the potential reduction in GHG emissions from the adoption of new technologies. Results show that farmers’ awareness of human-induced global climate change was positively related to the tool’s adoption.

Key policy insights

• Irish farmers are generally not sufficiently aware of the impact of their activities on climate change.

• A quarter of farmers believed that climate change will only impact on their business in the long-term; such an attitude may lead to a reluctance amongst these farmers to adopt management practices that reduce GHG emissions.

• Awareness of climate change affects positively the adoption of new tools to reduce GHG emissions on farmers’ farms.

• IT literacy affects willingness to adopt new tools to address GHG emissions.

• Reception of agri-environmental advice can have a positive influence on farmers’ willingness to adopt new GHG emission abatement tools.

• Farmers in receipt of environmental subsidies are more likely to adopt new abatement tools, either because they are more environmentally conscious or because the subsidy raised their environmentally consciousness.

• Willingness to adopt differs between different farm enterprises; operating dairy enterprise increases the willingness to adopt new advisory mitigation tools.