Influence of Climate on Cropping Pattern and Enterprise Diversification in North Karnataka, India

Climate change is one of the severe challenges the world is facing today. The problem of climate change induced by humans came first into force and drew the attention of the scientists and policy makers when Inter Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was established. For achieving the objectives of the study both primary and secondary data was used. To analyse the impact of climate change on cropping pattern and enterprise diversification a tabular analysis was done by working out cropping intensity, mean and percentage. In order to negate/mitigate the impact of climate change in the study area especially the impact of drought or heat stress on majority crops cultivated in rain fed conditions, the suitable varieties need to be familiarize and introduced. Some of the important drought /heat resistance varieties suited to region are Vikash, Vijay and Pusa 362 (chickpea), TAG-24 and Girnaril (groundnut), K-8962 and PBW-527(wheat), DHM-121 (maize), CSH-19R and CHS15R (sorghum), ICPL332WR and Hanuma (pigeonpea), NRC-7 and JS-7 (soybean), HHB-67(pearl millet). Majority of sample farmers are looking towards non-farm employment opportunities and Government relief measures during events of natural calamities. Agriculture is certainly becoming an increasingly risky business because of adverse climatic situations. Hence, Government along with insurance agencies need to make the scheme more attractive and popularize apart from maintaining accountability of schemes in order to ensure greater participation and benefits of the scheme.