Awareness of climate change and indigenous coping strategies of women crop farmers in Kogi state, Nigeria

Abstract

The study assessed the awareness and indigenous coping mechanism employed by women crop farmers to cope with climate change in Kogi State, Nigeria. Respondents’ socioeconomic characteristic, level of awareness about climate change, and indigenous coping strategies to climate change as well as activities of women crop farmers that contributed to climate change were investigated. Four-stage sampling techniques were employed in selecting 200 women crop farmers used in the study. Analytical tools used include frequency counts, Percentage and Pearson Product moment correlation. Findings showed that crop rotation practices, planting of early maturing seed, reduced use of chemical fertilizers and changing of crop varieties as indicated by more than 60% were the indigenous coping strategies commonly used among the respondents. Also, some of the major activities of respondents that contributed to climate change as indicated by more than 50% of the respondents includes: bush burning, deforestation, continuous cropping, and complete tillage. Person Product Moment Correlation analysis result revealed that; educational level and farm size have significant (p<0.05) influence on the level of awareness and sources of information. It was concluded that greater number of women crop farmers in the study area use indigenous coping method to mitigate the effect of climate change. Therefore, future policy should focus on awareness creation on climate change through different sources such as mass media and extension, encouraging informal social net-works, facilitating the availability of credit, enhancing research on the use of new crop varieties that are more tolerant to changing climate.

Keywords: Awareness, climate change, indigenous, coping strategies, women farmers.