Farmers' resilience index: A tool to metricize the resilience of the farmers towards natural disasters affecting agriculture in India

• Published in: Water policy Vol. 26; no. 1; pp. 79 - 93
• Main Authors: Raahalya, Sandipamu, Balasubramaniam, P., Devi, M. Nirmala, Maragatham, N., Selvi, R. Gangai
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: IWA Publishing 01.01.2024
• Subjects: capitals; confirmatory factor analysis; natural disasters; principal component analysis; resilience index; structural equation model
• ISSN: 1366-7017; 1996-9759
• DOI: 10.2166/wp.2023.152

Abstract In the present paper farmers' resilience index (FRI) was constructed considering the natural disaster using five dimensions including physical, social, economic, human and natural. The scale is administered to the 240 paddy farmers in two coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh. Principal component analysis was performed in order to fix the weightage for each variable. About (39.58%) of farmers are resilient to natural disasters with the highest resilience score for financial capital (0.641) and natural capital with less resilience score (0.401). Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed to determine how well the generated model of the scale fits the data. The structural equation modelling (SEM) path diagram was developed based on the conceptual model, which uses resilience as a latent variable. The SEM analysis revealed that four dimensions of capital positively affect farmers' resilience except for the human capital which negatively affects resilience. To reduce the effects of natural catastrophes in the upcoming years, the adaptation strategies from the highly resilient places can be examined and put into practice in the less resilient areas. It is imperative that development programmes at all levels incorporate climate awareness and stakeholder capacity building.