Assessing Farmers' Vulnerability to Climate Change: Insights and Adaptive Strategies

Vulnerability of farmers to climate change is intimately related to poverty, as the poor are least able to respond to climatic stimuli. Further, certain regions of the world are more harshly affected by the effects of climate change than others. With this background the study was conducted to know the vulnerability of farmers to climate change and their suggestions to overcome its ill effects. The data was collected from the Central Dry Zone (Zone - IV) of Karnataka. Tiptur and Chiknayakanahalli taluks from Tumakuru district, Kadur from Chikmagalore district, Arsikere from Hassan district and Challakere from Chitradurga district were selected purposively for the study. Totally, the data was collected from 150 respondents. With respect to exposure of farmers to climate change, rainfall and temperature were selected and majority of farmers in the study area were severely exposed (0.822) and sensitive (0.894) to climate change with lower adaptive capacity (0.576) between the year 2013-2017. Climate Vulnerability Index (CVI) of Arsikere, Kadur, Tiptur, Chiknayakanahalli and Challakere taluk was 0.186, 0.226, 0.224, 0.220 and 0.241, respectively. The overall CVI value of all selected taluks of Central Dry Zone of Karnataka was 0.218. The data revealed that, the majority of the farmers suggested, Government has to take necessary steps to fill the water bodies in villages (I) followed by Providing more number of drip/ sprinkler irrigation facility to cover maximum farm families (II), Subsidies/compensation has to be given for the crops to make up the cost of cultivation due to weather aberrations (II), Development department should ensure supplying of production inputs at appropriate time in the villages (III), Support price has to be given to all the crop produce based on cost of cultivation (IV), Creating awareness to the farmers about appropriate adaptation measures against climate change (V) etc.,