Climate Smart Agriculture in Food Insecurity Mitigation in Nigeria: A Conceptual Evaluation

Climate-Smart agriculture and its impact on food security have been topical issues in policy and food security discusses by successive governments in Nigeria however, the extent of its awareness among the farmers as a food insecurity mitigation measure has not been adequately represented in contemporary local literature hence the need for this research to ascertain the extent of awareness through: an examination of literary works by scholars in the field, assessing the extent of climate-smart procedures in agriculture and suggest where possible ideas to enhance its adoption. The study therefore evaluated secondary data and studies on the impacts of climate change on agriculture and how it can be mitigated through the adoption of climate smart approaches. Climate-Smart Agriculture is an emerging agricultural strategy initiated to tackle the consequences of climate change in food security and sustain agriculture. It involves the combination of approaches in the management of agricultural lands, forests, fisheries and livestock. The study in this regard took a holistic view of the adoption of climate smart agriculture by the farmers, its benefits and approaches and considered objectives such as accessing and assessing other scholars works and views on climate smart agricultural practices utilized by rural farmers in parts of Nigeria, discussing climate smart agriculture and food security, deliberating on climate smart agriculture and resource use efficiency and, viewing the constraining factors hampering the adoption of Climate Smart Agricultural practices in Nigeria. This is because climate change presently is one of the challenges and problems facing the world and an important factor in agricultural productivity. Variations in climatic factors will have ripple effects on crop yield and animal production. Farmers may have been facing weather variability and uncertainty patterns, however, the increasing pace of these uncertainties caused by climate change exacerbate food insecurity and hunger incidences and will require some degree of flexibility and rapid response capacity that climate smart agriculture offers. Building resilience in agricultural and farming practices will reduce the risk of food insecurity outside increasing the adaptive capacity and coping capabilities of the farmers.