Rural Migration in India: How Important is Weather Variability?

By Brinda Viswanathan and K.S. Kavi Kumar

Introduction

Response strategies to global climate change crucially depend on potential impacts due to climate change on several climate sensitive sectors. From developing country perspective, in order to design adaptation strategies, it is important to not only know the overall impacts; but also the factors that could, in principle, play a crucial role in minimizing the impacts of climate change. 

Several studies have shown that climate change could have significantly adverse impacts on Indian agriculture. The available evidence shows significant drops in yields of important cereal crops like rice and wheat under various climate change scenarios. While several planned adaptation strategies could work towards ameliorating the adverse impacts of climate change, there is a considerable likelihood of migration associated with agriculture sector. Thus, for a large majority, migration could be an effective adaptation strategy1 . 

While some studies have analyzed the linkages between weather variability (and climate change) and migration per se in the past (see, McLeman and Smit, 2006; Perch-Nielsen et al., 2008, Bardsley and Hugo, 2010), the linkages through the agriculture channel and rural-urban wage differentials have recently been analyzed by researchers such as, Feng et al. (2010, 2012); Barbieri et al. (2010); Dillon et al. (2011); and Marchiori et al. (2012).

Following the methodology used by Feng et al. (2010), a recent study in India, explored the linkages between weather variability, agricultural performance, and migration, using state level Census data over the period 1981 to 2001 and district level Census data covering the period 1992-2001. The weather data is sourced from grid level meteorological data released recently by the India Meteorological Department. The analysis is carried out separately for the two main cereal crops: wheat and rice. 

Impacts of Global Climate Change on Inclusive Growth in Sri Lanka

By Kanchana Wickramasinghe

Research Officer, IPS  

The scientific evidence proves that climate change is a reality.  Despite the negligible contributions towards global greenhouse gas emissions, and consequently to global climate change, Sri Lanka is a victim of the impacts of global climate change.  These impacts are numerous in Sri Lanka and a number of economic sectors will be drastically affected.  As the “National Climate Change Adaptation Strategy for Sri Lanka - 2011 to 2016” highlights; the major impacts would come in the form of increased frequency and intensity of disasters such as droughts, floods and landslides, variability and unpredictability of rainfall patterns, increase in temperature and sea level rise.  These impacts will have numerous impacts on agriculture, coastal zone, forests and natural ecosystems, human settlements and infrastructure, human health, energy, and industry1.

The increased intensity and frequency of natural disasters and its cost in terms of human, physical, financial and environmental losses have a significant impact on growth. The vulnerability to and impacts of natural disasters also differ across segments of society, which then becomes an additional dimension to existing economic disparities. Natural disasters affect inclusive growth by constraining the participation of vulnerable segments in the development process. They also lead to the diversion of resources, which otherwise could be allocated for pro-poor development activities. 

Impact of Climate Change on Agriculture in Sri Lanka and Possible Response Strategies

By B.V.R. Punyawardena

In spite of the technological advances made on improved crop management, irrigation, plant protection and fertilization; weather and climate remain the key factors of agricultural productivity in any country.  Farming systems and agronomic practices in most agricultural regions of Sri Lanka have evolved in close harmony with the prevailing conditions of the respective climatic regions of the island.  However, it has been made evident during recent decades that the heritage of farming experiences and accumulated weather lore of centuries are no longer useful in the process of agricultural planning at any level.  The Climate of the island has undergone a change to such an extent that the expected rainfall does not come at the correct time and severely handicapping farmers during growing season.  Variability of both summer and winter monsoon rains and rains of convectional origin has increased significantly during recent decades (Table 1).  As a result, both extremes, i.e., water scarcity and excess water have become a recurrent problem faced by crop production in Sri Lanka.  Meanwhile, increasing ambient temperature has also resulted in several direct and indirect negative impacts on crop growth.  However, intensively managed livestock sector of the country is not so vulnerable to climate change compared to the food crops sector.  But, the situation is obviously different for extensively managed livestock sector where it is purely dependent on the rain-fed pastoral systems.  Meanwhile, additional pressure coming from ever-increasing population, poor terms of trade, weak infrastructure, lack of access to modern technology, and information and civil disturbances will restrict the options available for people to cope with the negative consequences of climate change (Punyawardena, 2002).