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Abstract:The negative impacts of climate change on agriculture could erode gains made toward gender equality in Ghana. Much of the literature on gender dimensions of climate change adaptation has focused on assessing differences in coping and adaptation practices of smallholder farmers. Mostly overlooked is whether gender influences influenced perception of effectiveness of adaptation practices and preferences for institutional support for future adaptation. Using key informant interviews, household surveys, and focus group discussions, we address these gaps by exploring coping and adaptation measures adopted by heads of farm households to counter climate change impacts on their livelihood activities and household well-being in the Guinea Savanna agroecological zone in Ghana. Additionally, we assessed the preferred institutional adaptation support of heads of farm households in adapting to future projected impacts. We find that female heads of farm households relied mainly on borrowed money from village savings and loans group as a coping measure; male heads of farm households depended primarily on sales of livestock. Varying planting and harvesting dates, crop diversification, and use of improved crop varieties were the major adaptation strategies adopted by farmers. We argue that provision of dams and/or dugouts, postharvest processing facilities, adaptation capacity-building resources, and improved access to markets and credit could enhance the adaptive capacity of male and female heads of farm households to mitigate projected climate change impacts on their livelihood activities and household well-being.

Diffusion of agricultural knowledge is vital to food security and capacity building in the developing world. Many developing world farmers still do not have access to extension and advisory services (EAS), and poor agricultural practices still exist. Diffusion of agricultural knowledge could lead to improved productivity, higher obtained prices, and increased incomes, but it is made more difficult in the developing world by poor infrastructure, high illiteracy rates, and too few extension agents. The rapid spread of mobile phones throughout the developing world has sparked many EAS programs that incorporate mobile technologies. Although they offer great potential for knowledge diffusion, research has not yet identified strong positive impacts of mobile technology-based interventions. The Grameen Foundation's Community Knowledge Worker (CKW) program provides model farmers in Ugandan communities with training and smartphones that are linked to a database with actionable agricultural information.The model farmers (CKWs) interact with their neighbors to share the information in the database. This relatively inexpensive program differs from other EAS initiatives by using a large number of lightly trained "extension agents" and mobile technology that provides those agents with easy-to-access information they share with and help interpret for the farmers in their communities. The program also incorporates ongoing data collection via the smartphones, allowing for a two-way exchange of information and enabling constant monitoring. Two recent studies have shown this program to have positive impacts. An ongoing randomized control trial promises to offer a comprehensive impact assessment.

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A sample of Michigan farmers was surveyed in 1996 and 1999 to examine trends in their informationseeking behaviors and preferred methods of information delivery. In addition, the relationship between demographic characteristics and types of information sources used were examined. Some key findings for both years include: (a) The vast majority of farmers do not use web-based information; (b) income and farm size was positively correlated with all types of information delivery (print, web-based, radio/TV, organizational events and personal sources); and (c) part-time farmers and those with outside employment tended to use fewer information sources than full-time farmers. Suggestions are offered to help educators make better choices in campaign and message delivery.