Small-Scale Farmers’ Perception of Climate Change Vulnerabilities to their Crops and Adaptation Behaviours in Punjab, Pakistan

Abstract

The rudimentary focus of this research is to explore the climate-change perception of small-scale farmers in the Punjab and to shed light on their adaptation behaviour. Historically, the past agri-climate actions construed farmers as a collective community, neglecting their distinct roles, obscuring their understanding of climate knowledge and restraining the government from introducing techno-economic solutions. Resultantly, the small-scale farmers continued to adhere to traditional farming, posing peril to climate change and food security. The data collected through eight semi-structured interviews conducted in Sialkot and Faisalabad districts suggests that small-scale farmers do not perceive climate change as an unusual threat. Further, due to their limited adaptive capacity and fatalist approach against climate change, the farmers consistently are at loss and have resorted to autonomous adaptation behaviour involving slight adjustments to conventional farming practices, compared to government’s high-end artificial inputs and farm mechanisation. Ergo, this study recommends modernisation of the small-scale farmers to address these syndromes.