ADAPTATION STRATEGIES OF RURAL COMMUNITIES TO CLIMATE CHANGE ALONG THE GONGOLA RIVER IN NORTH EASTERN NIGERIA

This study was carried out to examine rural communities' adaptation strategies to climate change along the Gongola River in North-Eastern Nigeria. Purposive sampling technique was used in the selection of 120 respondents for the study. Interview schedule was adopted in the collection of information from the sampled respondents. Both descriptive and inferential statistics was used for data analysis. The result revealed that the household heads perceived changes in climate in the study area as increase in temperature, reduction in the amount of rainfall and longer dry and shorter wet seasons. Additionally, 33% of the farmers perceived the effects of climate change as decline in crop yields, 16% observed low volume of water along the river and 32% detected more pests and diseases affecting crops. Consequently, more of fadama farming along River Gongola (69%) increase in non-farm activities (73%), more use of improved seeds (13%) and herbicides (15%) were strategies adopted to mitigate the impacts of climate change. However, low awareness and education on climate change (18%), poor access to credit facilities (26%), inadequate finance (33%) and longer period of fodder scarcity (27%) were identified as main barriers to the adaptation strategies in the study area. The correlation result revealed that family size and occupation of respondents were significant factors influencing adaptation decisions.Therefore, carefully targeted programmes on awareness creation on climate change, intensive adult education, dissemination of indigenous early warning information and improved frequencies of agricultural extension sendees among others are crucial to moderate the negative impacts of climate in the study area.