| dc.description.abstract | This study has revealed outcomes in the examining the adaptation measures to climate change and variability among maize crop farmers in Masaka district. The data sets used were rainfall data and temperature data for the period of 30 years (1987-2017) obtained from the Uganda National Meteorological Authority (UNMA) using Kamenyamiggo meteorological station sets of Masaka district. Adaptation measure and climate change information data sets were obtained from structured questionnaires that were prepared, pilot tested and administered to collect and generate primary data from the study participants (smallholder farmers) from the study sites and the respondents were selected using a simple random sampling approach basing on the objectives of the study.
The results from Mann-Kendalltests indicated trend in both rainfall and temperaturesin Masaka district, however, these trends were not statistically significant. Coefficient of variation results showed 21.82 %, for rainfall which implied moderately variable rainfall andfor temperature was 5.12 %, which implied less variability in temperatures in Masaka district. Results from socio-demographic characteristics of respondents’influenceon climate change and climate variability showed that, out of50 respondents, 52% were male and 48% were female. The majority of the maize farmers had attained certain level of education and this implied that over 78% of the maize famers in Masaka district were learned and could easily design different climate change and climate variability adaptation.Results obtained from questionnaires showed that among the various adaptation measures used by maize farmers in Masaka district, crop rotation takes the lead with 14% followed by tree planting with 10% and the least measure being rain water harvesting with 2%.
While maize farmers tried to develop different adaptation measures, they faced various challenges with biggest challenge being small land for farm activities, followed by expensive improved breed varieties, limited information about weather and climate, limited knowledge on the better crop systems, long distance between agricultural farms and water sourcesand the least being others.
Therefore understanding the effects of climate change and variability among maize crop farmers inMasaka districtwill help them to design the adaptation measures basing on what is likely to happen in the future basing on the past so that a better advice is given to the farmers. | en_US |
