Assessment of Arable Crop Farmers' Perception and Adaptation to Climate Change in Ondo State, Nigeria

The study investigated the perception and adaptation of arable crop farmers to climate change in Ondo State, Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select one hundred and twenty-eight respondents for the study. Structured questionnaire was used to collect primary data for the study while descriptive statistics (frequency and percentage), 5-point Likert type scale and Logistic regression model were used for data analysis. The results of the socio-economic characteristics of the respondents showed that, the mean age was 42.6 years, male accounted for 65.3%, married were 52.4% with mean household size of 7.0 members per household and respondents with primary education was represented by 50.5%. Furthermore, the arable crop farmers that indicated their awareness about climate change accounted for 56.8% while the mean score from the Likert scale revealed that, climate change leads to variability in agriculture production (M = 3.78), influences food insecurity (M = 4.58), affects livestock production (M = 4.53), influences rainfall and temperature extremes (M = 4.64), among others. The result of the logistic regression model showed the significant factors which influenced climate change adaptation included; age (p<0.05), education (p<0.05), years of experience (p<0.05), access to credit (p< 0.01), among others. Climate change affects arable crop production due to the fact that it is climate dependent. Climate change pattern such as; increased intensity and frequency of extreme temperature impact negatively on food production, environment and the population that depend on it for food security. It was recommended that arable crop farmers should be trained on climate change adaptation and be given access to credit for the adoption of technologies to cope with climate change.