Use and economic benefits of indigenous seasonal climate forecasts: evidence from Benin, West Africa

ABSTRACT

Since immemorial times, farmers especially in Africa have built and transmitted orally from one generation to another a complex network of seasonal climate knowledge enabling them to lower climate variabilities and vagaries. Despite the prominent role of this knowledge system in smallholder farming, empirical studies relative to the production process, use and economic valuation of this knowledge to inform decision-making are scanty. Travel cost method, descriptive statistics and a two-step Heckman method are used to analyse the use and economic value of indigenous seasonal climate forecasts (ISCF) in Benin. ISCF were produced based on the observation of abiotic and biotic indicators in Kandi, Glazoué and Zè with the observations largely undertaken by local elders and professional traditional forecasters. Most farmers got ISCF either by travelling to visit a source of knowledge or by sacrificing their time. The use of ISCF increased a maize producer's net income by at least 3%, implying that ISCF are valuables goods. The main factors driving the use and value of ISCF were the use of fertilizer, large farm size, traditional African religions and access to market. Therefore, policy to promote the integration of indigenous forecasting knowledge with modern forecasting system should be taken.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous seasonal climate forecasts
• maize
• total expenses approach
• usefulness
• valuation of forecasts
• weak complementary assumption

Acknowledgements

We thank all the participating farmers, chiefs and opinion leaders in the maize-producing regions of Benin for their extensive support and assistance towards the completion of this study. The contents of this document are solely the liability of its authors and under no circumstances may be considered as a reflection of the position of the Cuomo Foundation and/or the IPCC.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 In this study, external sources mean forecasts that are not produced by the end-users of the forecasts. External sources include local elders, professional traditional forecasters, religious leaders and friends.

2 The optimal sample size for the number of farmers selected for the whole study was 323. The determination of the optimal sample size is based on works of Babbie (2016) dealing with the sampling from very large population sizes.

 

Additional information

Funding

This document was produced with the financial support of the Cuomo Foundation/IPCC and Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA).

Notes on contributors

Cocou Jaurès Amegnaglo

Cocou Jaurès Amegnaglo A national of Benin, Cocou is an Assistant Professor at the School of Agribusiness and Policy Analysis of the National University of Agriculture in Benin. Cocou holds a PhD from the University of Ghana, Legon, in Applied Agricultural Economics and Policy with a specialty in Environmental Economics and Production. He also obtained a masters degree in Rural, Industrial and Environmental Economics. He has worked and conducted research on climate change impacts and financing solutions, agro-meteorology, production and institutional economics. His research has been published in different journals and presented at various international conferences. He was a recipient of the IPCC scholarship for his PhD research.

Akwasi Mensah-Bonsu

Akwasi Mensah-Bonsu is Associate Professor and Head, Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, University of Ghana, Legon. He holds a PhD in Development Economics from Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam. His areas of research include development economics and policy analysis for agriculture, modelling of the agricultural sector resources use and production efficiency analysis, benefit cost analysis, project managing (including monitoring and evaluation) and environmental issues. He has undertaken a number of research as well as other extension works for both local and international agencies, including Ghana's Ministries of Food and Agriculture, and Finance, FAO, USAID/feed the future, DANIDA, UNDP, NEPAD and icipe.

Kwabena Asomanin Anaman

Kwabena Asomanin Anaman is a graduate of the University of Ghana (Bachelor in Agricultural Economics in 1977), and the University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, United States (Master and PhD degrees in Food and Resource Economics in 1981 and 1985 respectively). He is currently a Professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, College of Basic and Applied Sciences, University of Ghana, Legon, Accra, Ghana. He has a 36-year post-doctoral professional work experience in university/academia, government sector and private sector in civil society organizations. This work experience includes 19 years of full-time research, teaching and government advisory work in three countries in the Asian-Pacific Region (Australia, Brunei and Papua New Guinea) and 15 years work in Ghana.Professor Anaman was a member of the Joint Scientific Committee of the World Climate Research Programme, World Meteorological Organization (WMO) from 2007 to 2010 and served as a member of three other expert panels of WMO from 1999 to 2016. He was also a member of the International Editorial Advisory Board of the Preventive Veterinary Medicine journal (Elsevier Science Publishers) from December 1994 to December 2014. He was the Editor of the Ghana Policy Journal produced by the Institute of Economic Affairs, Accra over the period, March 2006 to July 2009 and the Editor of the Ghana Social Science Journal, produced by the School of Social Sciences, University of Ghana from February 2012 to July 2015. Professor Anaman served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Bank of Ghana from July 2013 to January 2017.Professor Anaman has teaching, research, community service and extension interests in resource and environmental economics, political economy and development, economic growth (firm, industry and macroeconomy), economics of agriculture and rural development, business economics/managerial economics, economics of family and marriage, applied econometrics and statistics, and operations research. He has published three books, co-authored 19 book chapters, and over 100 papers and articles, including 64 refereed articles in 33 academic journals.