Land Ownership and Catastrophic Risk Management in Agriculture: The Case of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan

Abstract

The agricultural sector faces numerous threats arising mainly due to adverse weather conditions. These climatic risks are usually beyond the control of farmers and are mostly uncertain. Managing these risks and uncertainties is crucial in an effort to alleviate poverty and ensure food security for the masses who depend on farm sector for their livelihoods. Land tenure agreements along with other socioeconomic factors play an important role in farmers' decisions to adopt risk coping tools. This study is aimed at investigating the effect of tenure agreements on farmers' decisions to adopt three risk coping tools, namely off-farm diversification, precautionary savings and credit reserves, to mitigate climatic risks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan. The results revealed that the adoption of traditional risk coping tools is relatively higher among landless tenants when compared with owner-cum-tenant farmers and owner farmers. However, for formal risk coping tools (credit reserves) tenant farmers have significantly lower access when compared with owner farmers. Owner farmers, on the other hand, can access financial institutions to lessen their burden of risks. The findings of the logit models also indicated the significant role of land ownership status, along with perceptions of risk sources and attitude towards risk, on farmers' decisions of adopting off-farm diversification and credit reserves. Therefore, it is suggested that financial institutions should facilitate tenant farmers' access to credit facilities by simplifying and shortening the credit sanction procedure.

Mitigating Catastrophic Risks and Food Security Threats: Effects of Land Ownership in Southern Punjab, Pakistan

“…Institutional characteristics involved variables such as access to extension, information, urban linkage, and social participation. All of these variables were previously used in multiple studies related to risk perception and management [ 4 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 20 , 23 , 42 , 43 ]. Access extension was taken if the extension department visited or contacted in any form each month: if yes, then = 1; otherwise, 0.…”

“…Farming is the most dominant source of income and is responsible for feeding the ever-growing population of Pakistan; it is imperative to secure it from environmental hazards and climatic uncertainty [ 5 , 6 ]. Previous studies have suggested the adoption of multiple risk management strategies to minimize climatic risks [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 ]. Risk management can be termed as an approach for agricultural risk reduction and enhancing food security [ 14 ].…”

“…Moreover, another type of land tenancy agreement exists in the Pakistani context that is often called owner-cum-tenant, where farmers lease or rent another piece of land for further cultivation [ 13 ], whereas simple tenants do not own the land in any capacity and cultivate the rented or leased land. To the best of our knowledge, a very limited amount of studies have discussed the potential effects of land tenancy on climate risk management.…”

“…To the best of our knowledge, a very limited amount of studies have discussed the potential effects of land tenancy on climate risk management. Therefore, we investigated the impact of land rights on the selection of credit reserves, savings, and off-farm diversification in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), Pakistan [ 13 ].…”

Agricultural and Natural Resources Adaptations to Climate Change: Governance Challenges in Asia

“…While the first study from Pakistan discussed the issue of climate change adaptation problems faced by rain-fed farmers in plain areas of Punjab Pakistan, the second study has focused on land ownership and catastrophic risk management in agriculture from analysis of the Case of rugged areas in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan (Ullah et al 2019). The paper identifies a number of threats in agriculture sector from the growing instability in production levels arising mainly due to adverse weather conditions and these climatic risks are usually beyond the control of farmers and are mostly uncertain.…”