Citrus fruit farmers’ adaptation capacities to climate variability in Ngora district, Eastern Uganda
Over the past three decades the government of Uganda prioritized fruits growing in Teso sub-region as a means to promote socioeconomic development. However, climate variability threatens the realization of this initiative and yet inadequate research has been done to address this gap. This study a...
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| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Published: |
Kabale University Interdisciplinary Research Journal (KURJ)
2022
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12493/664 |
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| Summary: | Over the past three decades the government of Uganda prioritized fruits growing in Teso
sub-region as a means to promote socioeconomic development. However, climate variability
threatens the realization of this initiative and yet inadequate research has been done to
address this gap. This study assessed citrus fruit farmers’ adaptation capacities to climate
variability in Ngora district, eastern Uganda. Longitudinal and cross-sectional research designs
were adopted in which 135 randomly selected farmers were interviewed. Findings indicated
that 82% of the respondents attested that rainfall amounts and temperature patterns had
changed with the highest rainfall of 1686 mm received in 1991, and the lowest amount of
785mm received in 2009. Average annual temperatures in the same period varied between
23.8ºC and 25.7ºC. These variations contributed to a drop in orange fruit yields from 90%
in 2015 to below 54% in 2016. Overall, 94.8% of citrus farmers were aware of the term
climate variability and they associated it to variation in rainfall amounts and distribution,
rise in surface temperature and occurrence of droughts; 73.3% of the farmers had positive
attitude towards climate variability adaptation especially in instances where it directly
affected their livelihoods. Only 21% of the farmers did something to adapt to climate
variability through irrigating young orange trees. Conclusively, citrus growing provided an
option to poverty eradication, however climate variability threatens farmer’s efforts. In a
short-run farmers may be encouraged to work in groups. Overall capital investment on
irrigation technology by government and or other stakeholders will offer lasting solution |
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