Rethinking Climate-Smart Agriculture Adoption for Resilience-Building Among Smallholder Farmers: Gender-Sensitive Adoption Framework

Abstract

This study identifies the need for holistic understanding of gender-differentiated climate-smart agriculture (CSA) adoption by smallholder farmers who are at the frontline of climate-related hazards and disasters in Africa. CSA adoption is predominantly informed by a parochial linear approach to farmers’ decision-making processes. Resilience-building and adaptation, which forms the second pillar of CSA and can enhance understanding of the CSA adoption nuances at farmer level, often receives less attention in adoption investigations. To appreciate CSA adoption from a resilience perspective, this study focused on resilience-building based on the interlinkage between CSA and disaster risk reduction and applied a resilience perspective in a gendered approach to CSA adoption by smallholder farmers. Through primary data collected in an exploratory sequential mixed method design, the study presents a proposed normative gender-sensitive CSA adoption framework to guide CSA implementation strategies and policies. The framework is anchored in resilience thinking, and some of its key components include gender-sensitive CSA technology development, riskinformed decision-making by heterogeneous smallholder farmers, gender-sensitive enabling factors, resilience strategies, gender equitable and equal ownership, and control of and access to resilience capitals. The proposed framework can be used to improve CSA adoption by smallholder farmers by addressing gendered vulnerability and inequality that influence low adoption.