An Empirical Economic Assessment of Impacts of Climate Change on Agriculture in Zambia

Jain, Suman

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ADVERSE IMPACTS;    AGRICULTURAL INPUTS;    AGRICULTURAL LAND;    AGRICULTURAL PRACTICES;    AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-4291
RP-ID  :  WPS4291

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This report assesses the economicimpacts of climate change on agriculture in Zambia, usingthe Ricardian method. A multiple linear regression modelwith net revenue per hectare as response variable has beenfitted with climate, hydrological, soil, and socioeconomicvariables as explanatory variables. There is one maincropping season in Zambia, lasting from November to April.Crop production in this period depends solely on rains.Considering crop progression in three stages-germination,growing, and maturing, which require different amounts ofwater and temperature-the climate variables included in themodel are long-term averages of the temperature and wetnessindex for the periods November to December, January toFebruary, and March to April. Assuming a nonlinearrelationship of farm revenue with the climate variables,quadratic terms for climate variables were also included inthe model. The results indicate that most socioeconomicvariables are not significant, whereas some climatevariables and the corresponding quadratic variables aresignificant in the model. Further findings are that anincrease in the November-December mean temperature and adecrease in the January-February mean rainfall have negativeimpacts on net farm revenue, whereas an increase in theJanuary-February mean temperature and mean annual runoff hasa positive impact.