AWARENESS AND ADAPTATION STRATEGIES TO CLIMATE CHANGE AMONG RURAL FARMERS IN UKUM LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF BENUE STATE

The study awareness and adaptation strategy to climate change among rural farmers was conducted in Ukum local Government area of Benue State, Nigeria. The objectives were to analyze the socioeconomic characteristics of the respondents, determine how knowledgeable farmers are about climate change and analyze the adaptation strategies employed by the rural farmers. Simple random and purposive sampling procedures were employed in selecting 108respondents; and questionnaires were used for data collection. Means, percentages, frequency distribution tables and multiple regression analysis were used for data analysis. The result showed that 55.56% fall within the age group of 36 to 50 years, 60% of the Respondents were males, majority of rural farmers could read and write, about 51% were married, the result showed that 28% of the respondents which were the majority cultivated yam. Result revealed that 54% of the respondents were knowledgeable about climate change effects .The results also revealed that adaptation strategies employed by rural farmers were use of mulching/planting of cover crops, early planting, delay in date of planting of some crops, increase in cultivated land, multiple cropping and application of organic manure to cope with the effects of climate change in the study area. In addition, the results of regression analysis revealed that age (0.01), household size (0.01), income (0.05) and farming experience (0.05) were the significant factors influencing farmer’s adaptation to climate change. The concludes that more than half of the farmers in the study area were aware of climate change and planting of cover crops, delay in planting and early planting were some strategies adopted by farmers to cope with it. The study recommends that more awareness be created to increase the percentage of farmers that are aware of the negative effects of climate change and farmers should be trained to embrace practices that will reduce the effect of climate change on agricultural productivity in the study area.