Tropentag 2021, September 15 - 17, hybrid conference, Germany "Towards shifting paradigms in agriculture for a healthy and sustainable future"

Adoption of Climate Smart Agriculture among Smallholder Farmers in the Techiman Municipality, Ghana

University of Cape Coast, Dept. of Geography and Regional Planning, Ghana

Abstract

Globally, agriculture is one of the major sources of livelihood for most rural communities. However, climate change over the years has been a problem to farmers in most rural communities. Due to the vulnerability of smallholder farmers to climate change, an adaptive and mitigating initiative known as Climate Smart Agriculture was introduced to help reduce the adverse effect of climate change and variability on agriculture.
Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) has been proposed as one of the best ways forward to mitigate the impact of climate change on agriculture. The benefits of Climate Smart Agriculture are hinged on three main pillars thus, to sustainably increase the income of farmers, reduce the emission of Green House Gases (GHG), and to strengthen resilience against Climate Change and Variability. Despite the benefits of Climate Smart Agriculture to farmers, literature has it that its adoption rate is low especially in the Techiman Municipality. Employing the Innovation Diffusion Model, this study was conducted to assess the adoption of Climate Smart Agriculture among smallholder crop farmers in the Techiman Municipality.
The study will employ a pragmatic research design guided by both the interpretivist and positivist philosophies. 337 farmers were selected to represent 2,695 farmers that were trained by GIZ on CSA innovations, practices and technologies within the Techiman Municipality. Quantitative data was gathered by employing Simple Random sampling method whiles purposive and convenient sampling technique were used to gather qualitative data. The quantitative data was analyzed using T-test, regression and correlation. The qualitative data on the other hand was analyzed using the thematic analysis. All ethical issues that protect the researcher and participants were duly considered.
The study revealed that the concept of Climate Smart Agriculture is widely known in the Municipality and its adoption rate is increasing with time. Farmers who adopted CSA were found to earn more income and were more food secured as compared to non-adopters. The study recommends that, government should consider the integration of CSA practices into the sector’s policy and employ more extension officer to carry out such duties.

Keywords: Climate change and variability, climate smart agriculture, innovation diffusion model

Contact Address: Dorcas Gyan, University of Cape Coast, Dept. of Geography and Regional Planning, Cape Coast, Ghana, e-mail: dorcas.gyanstu.ucc.edu.gh