Farmers' Adaptation Strategies to Drought (PDF)

Thesis (M.A.) from the year 2017 in the subject Agrarian Studies, grade: Very Good (3.5), , course: Regional and Rural Development Planning, language: English, abstract: This thesis studies the field of drought hazard and its findings are consistent with existing literature on drought in Thailand and other regions. In the country and study area, the findings and results of this study may provide effective and useful adaptation strategies to drought and also help understand drought's impacts on agricultural production and farmers' livelihoods, because of the little existing research on drought in the study area. In addition, maybe this thesis can assist the regional and rural planners and extension officials and other agro and rural related sectors and departments to formulate development plans, policies and extend useful and effective services in order to facilitate farmers to be able to sustain their livelihood against the drought by adapting the most effective adaptation strategies.

Drought is one of the major threats among all natural hazards to people's livelihoods and socio-economic development. Drought is a normal characteristic of climate and is considered to be the most complex but least realized of all natural hazards which affects more people than any other hazards particularly the farmers and their livelihoods. The firs and the most consequence of drought lies on Agriculture and threatened both agriculture sector and those who are dependent on it in that drought affected area. Nong Ya Sai district of Thailand is a drought prone area which the farmers have been suffering from drought during the recent years. Since, it is a long time that the farmers have experienced the drought and its consequences on their farming and their livelihoods, they could have a good perception of drought and its impacts on their agro-based livelihood. Thus, they have applied some adaptation strategies to reduce the drought impacts on their farming and livelihood in that area.

Therefore, this study has attempted to focus on farmers' adaptation strategies to drought in order to find out what strategies or techniques are adapted by farmers to reduce the drought impacts on their both farming and livelihoods. Furthermore, this study has assessed the farmers' perception and understanding of drought and what are the drought impacts on agriculture and farmers livelihoods. To achieve these objectives, the Nong Ya Sai district of Thailand has defined as the target area of this study where it is a drought affected area and the farmers have experienced and adapted some strategies to reduce the drought impacts.