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An Assessment Of The Perception Of Local Farmers On Climate Change
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1.2 Statement of the Problem
Climate change is a serious challenge to
socio economic developments even in the developed countries of the
world. In Nigeria and other parts of Africa, agriculture occupies a
critical position particularly in food production and generation of
employment. A significant proportion of actors in the agricultural
sectors are however, likely to have little or no idea about climate
change because of their level of awareness Thus although they suffer
more of the impact of climate change, they probably do not know the
depth of what is happening to the system. There is therefore a need to
gain an understanding of farmers’ perception of climate change so that
they can be appropriately targeted in climate change response actions.
Human
perception of environmental issues have been broadly categorized as
cognitive (related to knowledge and understanding), affective (related
to feelings, attitudes and emotions), behavioural (related to changes in
behaviour of the viewer) and physiological (biological or physical
effects on the observer's body) Zube, et al, 1982.
However,
perception decides over resource allocation, without perceiving the risk
adequately all other determents seem meaningless. The effects of
climate change leads to land degradation which reduces the quality and
productivity and manifest throughout the country while in the southern
part of Nigeria, the problem is coastal erosion and flooding, in the
Sahelian zone of north, the most pronounced climate changed related
reforms of land degradation are wind erosion and related sand dune
formation, drought and desertification, sheet erosion which results to
the complete removal of arable land is Nigeria's biggest threat to
agriculture especially in the sandy soils regions of south-eastern
Nigeria.
Perception determines the social mental picture of climate
change. But a number of other variables like socio-demographic and
socio-economic factors or ideological orientations, awareness level,
information source influence perception and the mental picture of
climate change (Sjoberg, 1995; Stedman, 2004). But the extent to which
these factors influence perception of climate change particularly among
local farmers have not received adequate attention in the literature and
thus remains a subject of research focus.
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