Farmers’ Perceptions and Coping Strategies on Drought: Implications for Disaster Mitigation Programs in North-East Region, Nigeria

Umar M. A., Medan P. T.

Abstract


Natural hazards cost farmers billions of dollars every year in the developing world, with drought emerging as the most damaging in a competitive landscape of challenges that often includes flooding, forest fires, plant pests and outbreaks of animal diseases. According to a report by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), natural disasters cost a whopping $96 billion in destroyed or missing crops and livestock production to the agricultural sectors of developed countries between 2005 and 2015. Little is known about how farmers in the study area perceived and adapted to drought. This exploratory study assessed the perceptions and coping-up strategies of 360 randomly selected farmers in the northeast region of Nigeria. Results demonstrate that farmers in the study area are facing challenges to their resources due to drought rather than resource loss. Resource loss is related to more emotion-focused coping, whereas when farmers perceived threats they were inclined to use less emotion-focused coping. A relationship was found between perceptions and problem-seeking social support. Farmers from very high drought-intense areas experience significantly more resource losses than farmers from medium or high drought-intense regions. Farmers from high drought areas, on the other hand, faced more risks than farmers from medium and very high drought-intensive areas. Farmers from very high areas with severe drought look for more social assistance than farmers from other areas. The paper discusses the implications of these findings for specialists who are serving farmers' needs during agricultural catastrophes.


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