Smallholder farmers’ insight on climate change in rural Ghana

• Main Authors: Divine Odame Appiah, Alfred C.K. Akondoh, Rhoda Kromoh Tabiri, Amos Annan Donkor
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Taylor & Francis Group 2018-01-01
• Series: Cogent Food & Agriculture
• Subjects: climate variability; climate change; perception; smallholder; offinso; ghana
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23311932.2018.1436211

The Offinso Municipality in the Ashanti region of Ghana as an agricultural region, is vulnerable to climate variability and climate change. A greater segment of the population is least able to buffer and reverberate from climatic stress. This paper assesses the perceptual insights of rural smallholder farmers on climate change and how it influences their adaptation practices. Using a triangulation of the quantitative with qualitative methodological approach we purposively sampled 102 farmer respondents and 15 key informants from 3 communities in the Municipality. Quantitative and qualitative data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics technique of cross-tabulation and frequency tools in the statistical package for social sciences Version 17 and thematic content analysis respectively. The results from the respondents indicated that a myriad of factors are responsible for the anthropogenic climate change. These were the deforestation, bad farming practices, bush burning and emissions from light industrial and vehicular emissions. Also considered was the precarious effect of climate change on smallholder farmers’ crop yield, due to reduced rainfall and high temperatures, the proxy variables for climate variability and change. These adverse impacts accordingly have repercussions on their livelihood sustenance. Thus, the practicing of agroforestry as both adaptation and mitigation among smallholder farmers is essential to build local resilience, and to promote climate-smart agriculture.