This report summarizes the results of a baseline household-level survey, designed by the CCAFS team and implemented in late 2010/early 2011 in 3 regions: East Africa, West Africa and South Asia (the Indo-Gangetic Plains). This survey was designed with the intent of developing simple, comparable cross-site household-level indicators, for which changes can be evaluated over time, of food security, households assets, agricultural production diversity, agricultural sales diversity, changes being made in farming practices (adaptation/innovation), changes in farming practices that also help reduce emissions or store greenhouse gases (mitigation), and gender indicators (e.g. men’s versus women’s reception of weather-related information).
The same questionnaire was implemented in 5 countries/sites in West Africa (Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Ghana); 4 countries/6 sites in East Africa (Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania); 3 countries/19 sites in South Asia (India, Nepal and Bangladesh). The survey exercise covered 203 villages and 4,060 households.
This summary report gives an overview of the farming practices, and assets, livelihoods and food security status of rural households in these sites. It describes what changes farmers have been making in recent years, and why they are making them. We explore what kinds of weather/climate and associated information these households are receiving, how and by whom (e.g. are women accessing such information?). This information provides important baseline information, as these households will be revisited in 5-10 years time in order to evaluate the changes in these indicators. This will give us important information as to if, how, and which households are adapting to a changing climate.