Impact of Climate Change on Groundnut Yield and Its Variability in Andhra Pradesh, India

Abstract

This study investigated the impact of climate change variables viz., rainfall, maximum and minimum temperatures on mean groundnut yields and its variability during both Kharif and Rabi seasons across different agro-climatic zones in Andhra Pradesh through employing Just and Pope production function. For this study, groundnut was purposefully chosen because it is one of the main oilseed crops grown in Andhra Pradesh during both the Kharif and Rabi seasons. The results from Just and Pope quadratic and Cobb-Douglas models (2005-2019) revealed that rainfall and minimum temperature are yield increasing factors and yield risk shrinking factors, whereas maximum temperature is yield reducing and risk enhancing factor during Kharif season. It was found that in Rabi season all the climatic variables were yield increasing and risk shrinking factors. Time trend was positive and significant in influencing both mean yield and yield variability during both the seasons. These findings suggested that the farmers should improve their access towards agro-meteorological information, cultivate climate resilient groundnut varieties, capacity building to withstand diverse impacts of climate change events at field level etc., towards sustainable groundnut production in Andhra Pradesh.