IJEP 45(1): 31-53 : Vol. 45 Issue. 1 (January 2025)
Ratna Kumari Tamang and Utpal Kumar De*
North Eastern Hill University, Department of Economics, Shillong – 793022, Meghalaya, India
Abstract
The paper examines the components of agricultural vulnerability in Assam in terms of adaptive capacity, exposure and sensitivity for rice cultivation. Such comprehensive assessment would help locate vulnerable hotspots and guide planners to mitigate associated risks. The study aims to identify the key drivers of agricultural vulnerability across agro-climatic zones of Assam. The temporal variation of rainfall and temperature has also been analyzed for three different periods from 1951 to 2020. The indicator-based approach method was used to calculate the indices of exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity and vulnerability. principal component analysis (PCA) was used to calculate the weightage of indicators after normalizing and standardizing the value of the variables. The long-term trend of climatic conditions revealed that erratic rainfall patterns and rise in minimum and maximum temperature have led to adverse climatic events for high levels of exposure. Assessment of vulnerability cannot be understood simply with the help of meteorological conditions but also from prevailing socio-economic and environmental pressure. The highest weightage in the case of adaptive capacity was recorded for literacy rate, livestock population and irrigation; for sensitivity, the highest weightage was for population, fallow and uncultivated land. The results show that the highly vulnerable zone had a high level of sensitivity and exposure but low adaptive capacity. Upper Brahmaputra valley zone (UBVZ), north bank plain zone (NBPZ) and lower Brahmaputra valley zone (LBVZ) were some of the zones found to be highly vulnerable for autumn, winter and summer paddy, which calls for urgent attention to mitigation of the impact of such risks.
Keywords
Climate change, Agricultural vulnerability, Rice yield, Sensitivity, Exposure, Agro-climatic zone, Assam
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