The economic impact of climate change on small farms in Nigeria: A Ricardian approach

The negative effect of Climate Change (CC) on agriculture across Africa has been well established and hence the global policy interest. In Nigeria, crop farming is climate dependent and farmholders often employ measures that are sub-optimal against adverse conditions of climate. This raises the vulnerability of farming to CC uncertainty. For a long time, knowledge of CC perception by farmholders dominated the existing literature. The study employed econometric techniques to generate information on the net economic damages and benefits of climate change. Climate change impact was found to be huge for the whole country with impact variation across agricultural zones. It concludes that the ability of smallholder farms to sustain continual output of crops for local and regional markets depend critically on effective adaptation measures that seek to maintain optimal conditions of climate for agricultural production and government effective response