Agricultural Vulnerability to Climate Change: A Case Study of Kerala

Vulnerability assessment has become a vital tool for policy response since it helps in identifying vulnerable regions or sections of the society. Indicator method has been used predominantly in literature as it provides single values, are easy to comprehend and assist policy makers in identifying vulnerable sectors as setting targets. Kerala being one the important state for its agricultural contribution, it saw erratic climate fluctuations in recent times which makes it more pressing for the need to study the climate change and its impacts on agriculture and livelihoods. The paper tries to capture macro-level vulnerable districts using secondary data sources and construct a composite Agricultural Climate Vulnerability Index of Kerala using a set of 17 indicators classes representing Exposure, Sensitivity, and Adaptive Capacity. The paper also includes a crop loss index to represent potential damages to agriculture due to climate change. Crop loss index was calculated for 9 principle crops of Kerala using de-trended time series data. The assessment reveals that Palakkad was highly vulnerable to crop loss, Alappuzha had highest scores of exposure and sensitivity, whereas, Ernakulam had highest adaptive capacity. Overall index suggests that Palakkad and Malappuram were highly vulnerable while the remaining districts were moderately vulnerable to climate change.