Complexities of drought adaptive behaviour: Linking theory to data on smallholder farmer adaptation decisions
This study brings focus to smallholder farmers' adaptive behavior in the face of perennial drought risk in semi-arid regions. Drought risk entails recurring crop damage, income loss and food insecurity, pushing farmers to take adaptive measures to cope. By comparing and combining empirical data and existing behavioral theories, the study analyzed the complexity of smallholder farmers' adaptive behavior in Kitui, Kenya, seen as highly vulnerable to drought disasters. Interviews were conducted with key informants, a structured questionnaire among disaster managers, a semi-structured questionnaire among farm households, and a choice experiment among farm households.
The survey found that mistrust in forecasting and a strong belief in God appeared to be barriers to adaptation, while farm groups and past adaptation decisions seemed to stimulate the intention to adopt new measures. The results also confirmed the importance of several components of existing bounded rational theories in that risk appraisal, social norm, self-efficacy and response cost and efficacy significantly influence adaptive behavior under drought risk. However, none of the theories could fully described the behavior observed in the respondents. The findings also demonstrated that tailored extension services, improved early warning systems, ex-ante cash aid and low interest credit schemes increase the intention to adapt. While a general aversion to the current situation was evident, there was great heterogeneity in the preferences for these policies. Findings of the extensive data collection and analysis can be used to identify the most vulnerable groups and develop well-targeted adaptation policies, including outside semi-arid Kenya or a smallholder context, and for designing, calibrating and validating of utility functions to model heterogeneous adjustment decisions in dynamic drought risk models.