Abstract:
The adverse impact of climate change on agricultural productionand productivity is increasing
over time in Ethiopia. Smallholder farmers are the most vulnerable group of the society to the
effects of climate change in this country since their livelihood depended on rainfed agriculture.
This study was carried out to examine smallholder farmers’ vulnerability, perception, the choice
of adaptation strategies, and institutional adaptive capacity of local institutions to climate
change in East Hararghe Zone, Oromia Regional State, Ethiopia.A multi-stage sampling
procedure was used to select districts, kebeles, and sample respondents. Accordingly, four
districts, 17 kebeles, and 384 sample respondents were selected for the study. The 33 years
temperature and rainfall data were used to analyze the trend in climate. Descriptive statistics
and econometric models were employed to analyze the data. Vulnerability to the expected
poverty, binary logit, multivariteprobit models and adaptive capacity wheel were used to
measure vulnerability, identify determinants of vulnerability, investigate determinants of the
choice of adaptation strategies, and assess the institutional adaptive capacity of local institutions
respectively. Moreover, temperature and rainfall trends were analyzed using the Mann-Kendall
statistical test. According to the findings, 73 percent of the respondents were likely to be
vulnerable to climate change-related shocks next time. Households with better farm experience,
land size, livestock ownership, access to credit, access to extension service, social capital, access
to climate information, non-farm income, and headed by a male were less likely to be vulnerable
to climate change; whereas households who were living in low and midland agro-ecologies, far
from the market, and participating in productive safety-net programs were more likely to be
vulnerable to climate change. The study also found that smallholder farmers' vulnerability was
sensitive to the minimum income required to maintain daily life, implying the need to integrate
other income-generating activities that supplement farm income to reduce the farmhousehold's
vulnerability to climate change. Moreover, the trend analysis result of temperature and rainfall
indicated that temperature raised and rainfall decreased over the last 33 years. The result also
revealed that farmers’ perception of climate change was consistent with the metrological data
trends. Improved crop varieties, diversifying crop, adjusting planting dates, conserving soil and
water, reducing livestock size, planting trees, and small-scale irrigation are the most common
climate change adaptation strategies used by farm households in the study area. The
multivariate probit model revealed that sex of the household head, landholding size, livestock
ownership, access to extension, access to credit, social capital, market distance, access to
climate change-related training, non-farm income, agro-ecological setting, and poverty status of
the households significantly influenced farmers’ choice of adaptation strategies.As a result,
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strategies addressing climate change adaptation should concentrate on the aforementioned
factors to help smallholder farmers adapt to the changing climate. Furthermore, according to
the adaptive capacity wheel, the disaster risk management office has a very poor adaptive
capacity (score of -0.87), whereas farmers cooperatives and CARE have a higher adaptive
capacity (scores of +1.5 and +1.4, respectively). The finding of this study indicated thathigher
exposure to climate-induced shocks such as drought increased the vulnerability of farm
households. As a result, reducing vulnerability and improving smallholder farmers' adaptive
capacity by creating non-farm employment opportunities, strengthening local institutions, and
increasing access to various services should be part of climate change adaptation and poverty
reduction policies and strategies. Climate change adaptation strategies should also consider
demographic, economic, social, institutional, and geographic differences, as these distinctions
will help policymakers build specific adaptation techniques that fit the needs of different groups.