Effects of Adaptation to Climate Change on Technical Efficiency of Paddy Farmers in Panamaram

Abstract

Growing body of scientific literature published by the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) undoubtedly states that ongoing climate change is real and anthropogenic. Every sector of the economy will be adversely affected by ongoing climate change; however, immediate effects are being felt on agriculture sector as it is the man-made adjacent to the natural ecosystem. Although, mitigation and adaptation are the two-policy response to climate change, vulnerability of the agricultural system to climate change may be lessened to a large extent by increasing adaptation capacity of the agriculture to climate change. An attempt is made to understand efficiency effects of coping strategies and adaptation practices of Panamaram paddy farmers to climate change in Wayanad district of Kerala. Panamaram is one of the four Community Development Block of the Wayanad District of Kerala State of India, has largest concentration of production and area under paddy. Majority of the farmers are small and marginal and practices paddy cultivation only once in a year on their unirrigated plots. Technical efficiency of farmers coping and adapting to climate change is investigated using stochastic frontier production function approach. Based on random sample of 138 paddy farmers, study found that efficiency effects of adaptation strategy of the paddy farmers is more effective compared to copingstrategies. In response to different climatic anomaly, especiallyirregular rainfall pattern and incidents of flood, majority of the farmers resort to delay in sowing as an important coping strategy. Whereas farmers in long term end in view adopt changes in the cropping pattern as an important adaptation practice to climate change. Therefore, study suggest importance of adaptation practices and coping strategies to climate change in farm level planning.