PERCEPTION OF FARMERS ON MAIZE AS A POTENTIAL CROP FOR CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION

Abstract

The major purposes of the study was to find out perception of farmers on maize as a potential crop for climate change adaptation and to determine problems faced by the farmers in maize production. Data were collected from the farmers of four villages of Biral Upazila of Dinajpur district during 28 March to April 28 2018. The sample size of the study was 90 farmers and it was drawn from a population of 291 using random sampling technique. Almost three-fifths (61.10 percent) of the farmers had medium perception while 20.00 percent of them had low perception and 18.90 percent had high perception of maize as a potential crop for climate change adaption. Correlation analysis indicated that age, education, cosmopoliteness, training received, knowledge on climate change and extension media contact of the farmers had significant positive relationships with their perception of maize as a potential crop for climate change adaption. On other hand farm size, maize cultivation area, farming experience and annual income had no significant relationship with their perception of maize as a potential crop for climate change adaption. Among the problems, ‘non-availability of storage facilities’ rank i st and other problems (in descending order) were getting ‘fair price is difficult due to interfere of middleman’, ‘non-availability of farm labour’, ‘lack of /or inadequate access to weather forecast technologies’, ‘no hybrid seed production in Bangladesh’, ‘non-habit of human for consumption as food’, ‘poor access to climate change adaptation strategies information by maize farmers’, ‘lack of production inputs in time’, ‘non-suitability of land for maize cultivation’, and ‘poor agricultural extension service delivery’.