Climate Change, Smallholders’ Food Security And Agricultural Adaptation In Bangladesh

This study has been undertaken to investigate the effects of climate change on the yield and cropping area of major food crops in Bangladesh, smallholders’ food security in the changing climatic conditions and farmers’ adaptation decisions in response to climate change in the northwest high Barind tract (HBT) of Bangladesh.The crops that we grow for food need specific climatic conditions to show better performance in view of economic yield. A changing climate could have both beneficial and harmful effects on crops. Keeping the above view in mind, this study is undertaken to investigate the impacts of climate change (viz. changes in maximum temperature, minimum temperature, rainfall, humidity and sunshine) on the yield and cropping area of four major food crops (viz. Aus rice, Aman rice, Boro rice and wheat) in Bangladesh. Heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation consistent standard error (HAC) and feasible generalized least square (FGLS) methods were used to determine the climate-crop interrelations using national level time series data for the period of 1972-2010. Findings revealed that the effects of all the climate variables have had significant contributions to the yield and cropping area of major food crops with distinct variation among them. Maximum temperature statistically significantly affected all the food crops’ yield except Aus rice. Maximum temperature also insignificantly affected cropping area of all the crops. Minimum temperature insignificantly affected Aman rice but benefited other three crops’yield and cropping area. Rainfall significantly benefitted cropping area of Aus rice, but significantly affected both yield and cropping area of Aman rice. Humidity statistically positively contributed to the yield of Aus and Aman rice but, statistically, negatively influenced the cropping area of Aus rice. Sunshine statistically significantly benefitted only Boro rice yield. Overall, maximum temperature adversely affected yield and cropping area of all the major food crops and rainfall severely affected Aman rice only. Concerning the issue of climate change and ensuring food security, the respective authorities (i.e., government, policy makers and scientists) thus should give considerable attention to the generation, development and extension of drought (all major food crops) and flood (particularly Aman rice) tolerant varieties.In view of investigating smallholders’ food security in the perspective of climate change, drought-prone northwest HBT were selected for this micro level study. Farmers in this area have been experiencing higher temperature shocks and profound rainfall variability. Three Upazilas (sub-districts, such as Tanore, Nachole and Porsha) were purposively chosen from this area for conducting the research. Data were collected randomly from 503 farm households during the July 2013 to December 2013 by the researcher himself implementing a face-to-face interview. Frequency, percentage, range, mean, standard deviation, mean procedure, ANOVA and correlation coefficient (r) employed to satisfy the objective. Findings showed that temperature in this region has been chronologically increasing. Contrastingly, rainfall has been declining. These changing climatic situations have made the northwest HBT a most severely drought-prone area of Bangladesh. However, results of this farm level study revealed that households’ yearly income, irrigation facilities, net revenue and production loss have varied across the farmers. It is observed that in each of the above cases, smallholders’ food security has been severely affected by climate change. Pearson’s Product moment correlation coefficient (r) exposed that households’ education level, yearly income, farm size, access to electricity, farms’net revenue and irrigation coverage have depicted statistically positive significant influence on the food security. These findin further explored that household food security increases if the above factors increases accordingly. On the other hand, production loss showed negative relationship on the households’ food security. Therefore, it can be concluded that as the farmers’ production loss increases, household food security accordingly.Finally, farmers’ adaptation strategies and their influencing factors have also examined by using farm level data from the above mentioned northwest HBT of Bangladesh. To fulfill this research objective multinomial logit (MNL) regression method were administered along with the descriptive statistics. Firstly, farmers’ perceptions regarding climate change in their area were investigated by implementing questionnaire survey on the randomly selected 503 farm households. Then, a comparison between farmers’ perception regarding climate change and meteorological stations data were performed. Both micro level investigation and collected data from meteorological station showed that temperature and drought in the northwest HBT has increased while rainfall has decreased. Findings further revealed that, due to dramatic rainfall variability,30 percent of the farmers in the northwest HBT have adapted more and supplementary irrigation in their Aman rice farming,22 percent farmers have changed planting time,20 percent cultivate different Aman rice varieties,14 percent have shifted their rice fields to fruit garden (particularly mango) and agroforestry practices,8 percent have adapted crop diversification to mute adverse impacts of climate change. Surprisingly, only 6 percent farmers in the study area have not undertaken any adaptation strategies. MNL regression results demonstrated that among the determinants, households’age, gender, education level, farming experience, yearly income and farm size have greatly influenced farmers’ decisions regarding adaptation choices.To sum up, as most of the major food crops have been severely affected by increasing temperature and rainfall variability, therefore, government should emphasis on better policy options for the development and dissemination of climate smart crop varieties. Moreover, as smallholder farmers are most vulnerable to climate change impacts, thus farmer specific agricultural technologies should have to introduce. In addition, efforts should have to be taken on increasing farmers’ education level, annual income, net revenue and irrigation coverage as these factors showed positive influence on enhancing household food security in the changing climatic conditions. It is undoubtedly clear that among the significant determinants, education (both formal and extension education) can be increased through motivation and implementing better policy which will ultimately helps farmers to cope with changing climatic conditions.