Dynamics of socio-economic factors affecting climate vulnerability and technology adoption: Evidence from Jodhpur district of Rajasthan

Abstract

Climate change and extreme weather fluctuations are the most threatening challenges to the farming communities especially in semi-arid tropics. The paper investigates socio-economic factors affecting vulnerability and adoption of innovations using micro-level survey data of 100 systematically selected farmers in the Jodhpur district of Rajasthan, India. The results reveal that higher income, irrigation and provision of seeds reduce climate vulnerability to a great extent. Several farm level strategies have been adopted by the farmers against climate induced stress, including change in cropping pattern, reduction in irrigation usage, use of drips and sprinklers and water conservation. In case of pearl millet cropping system, we found that adoption of wide row spacing is significantly influenced by the level of the farmer’s education, land size category, climate awareness and trainings programs. The study suggests that diversified crop sequence involving pearl millet-wheat-cluster bean-barley-onion, farmers’ adoption of suitable adaptation strategies and climate resilient technologies will improve with better awareness, education and farm governance with regard to climate change. Moreover, technologies especially indigenous ones suitable to the local contextual needs must be developed or fine-tuned and disseminated for reducing climate-induced vulnerability.