Abstract:

Empirical evidence suggests that there has been an increasing negative impact of climate change on the production of arable crops in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), particularly in Nigeria. Farmers must critically evaluate and adjust to the challenges presented by climate change in order to build resilience. Global, national, and local adaptation efforts have progressed through international debate, national programs, and community-based initiatives.Adaptation has been seen as a vital component of the all-encompassing, long-term global response to climate change, protecting farmers, livelihoods, and ecosystems. However, even though there are several studies regarding the factors influencing farmers' decisions to adapt to climate change. There is still a need for the present study for a deeper understanding and new knowledge about the discourse. Therefore, it is critical to understand the factors that influence farmers' decisions about climate change adaptation in order to guarantee that the right policies are put in place to support their efforts.In light of this, our study examined the factors that influence arable crop farmers' decisions about climate change adaptation. We made use of cross-sectional data from 144 arable crop farmers who were chosen from critical farming villages in Southeast Nigeria using a standardized questionnaire. To choose farmers who farmed arable crops, we used purposive and multistage sampling techniques. The purposive sampling approach was employed in order to identify regions with a high concentration of farmers producing arable crops.Multinomial logit regression and descriptive statistics were used to analyze the gathered data. Our study found that the arable crop farmers employed a variety of adaptation strategies to manage the climate risks, including migration (Y1), changing the dates of planting and harvesting (Y2), altering tillage operations (Y3), intercropping crops (Y4), crop rotation (Y5), mixed cropping (Y6), agroforestry practices (Y7), introducing well-acclimated crop varieties (Y8), mulching (Y9), and crop and livelihood diversification (Y10). Our study also demonstrates that the following factors influenced the climate change adaptation strategies of arable crop farmers in the study area: sex (X2), age (X1), education (X3), farming experience (X4), household size (X5), farm income (X6), participation in a cooperative (X7), and extension contact (X8). We found that the high cost of climate change adaptation strategies and inadequate knowledge on adaptation strategies, among others, were the barriers facing arable crop farmers adaptation decisions to climate change in the study area. Our study recommended that the arable crop farmers should take advantage of their various cooperative societies so as to jointly pool productive resources and adapt adequately to climate change in the area. Ultimately, it is important that the government strengthen the agricultural extension service system so as to provide up-to-date modern climate change information, training, and capacity building to arable crop farmers for improved yield, income, and standard of living in the study area.