Perceived effects of drought on household food security in South-western Uganda: Coping responses and determinants

Abstract

Abstract Food insecurity is a region–wide problem in Sub-Saharan Africa, exacerbated by severe drought, with devastating impacts at the household level. However, farmers' coping strategies and their determinants remain under–documented. In this study, we: 1) characterise relationships between perceptions of drought and food insecurity and corresponding household coping responses, 2) compare livelihood characteristics of farmers that perceived food insecurity as a problem and those who did not, and 3) investigate how household-level characteristics correspond to household coping strategies. Our study is exploratory in nature: we administered a questionnaire to 140 farmers in Isingiro district in South-west (SW) Uganda whose livelihood is predominantly dependent on crop production. We employ binomial and multinomial logistic regression models to identify the determinants of the respondents’ perceptions, how household characteristics correspond to household perceptions of food insecurity, and factors that affect coping responses. Our data show that 68.6% of the respondents perceived food insecurity as a problem in their household. Access to credit for crop cultivation increased the likelihood (p