Does ICT-based farm advisory improve farmers' adaptation to climate change? Evidence from Pakistan

ABSTRACT

In the face of climate uncertainties, farmers need advice on adaptation measures to manage climate risk in an efficient and user-friendly way. This study takes the case of a major cropping zone of Punjab province, Pakistan, which is reported among the climate-susceptible regions, to explore farmers’ preferred ways of agricultural advisory and farmers’ climate change adaptation measures. We also analyze the interrelation between different advisory services (conventional and information and communication technology (ICT)-delivered) and their adaptation behaviours. We use multivariate and ordered probit models to analyze the cross-sectional data collected from four districts of Punjab province, Pakistan. The descriptive results show that farmers have used diverse sources of farm advisory for climate change adaptation, where television and mobile agro-advisory appear to be the most used sources. Farmers have adapted to climate change by planting trees, adopting climate-smart seeds, shuffling crop cultivation schedules, using better water management practices, and diversifying cultivated crops. The empirical results reveal that farmers’ socioeconomic attributes, particularly their farm and livestock herd sizes, access to irrigation water, and advisory access through face-to-face extension, television, and the internet, drive their adaptation choices and intensity. Our findings suggest that policymakers should consider improving these advisory services to expedite the adaptation of vulnerable rural communities.

KEYWORDS:

• Climate information services
• agricultural adaptation
• communication tools
• Pakistan

JEL:

• Codes: Q13
• Q16
• Q54

Disclosure statement

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

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from Nasir Abbas Khan upon request.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 Other top four nations that are most threatened by and vulnerable to climate change include Japan, Philippines, Germany, and Madagascar.

2 We also demonstrate the graphical results in Figure A4 in the Appendix to provide a more intuitive understanding.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Nasir Abbas Khan

Nasir Abbas Khan is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, China. His research areas include climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction, and information and communication technologies (ICT).

Wanglin Ma

Wanglin Ma is an Associate Professor of Applied Economics at the Department of Global Value Chains and Trade, Lincoln University, New Zealand. His research interests span Agricultural Economics and Development Economics.

Victor Owusu

Victor Owusu is a Professor in Development Economics at the Department of Agricultural Economics, Agribusiness and Extension, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.

Ashfaq Ahmad Shah

Ashfaq Ahmad Shah is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Hohai University China. His research areas include climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction, and information and communication technologies (ICT).