CHAPTER ONE 1.0       INTRODUCTION 1.1       Background of the Study

Climate change refers to any change in climate over time, whether due to natural variability or as a result of human activity (lPCC, 2006). Climate change refers to a change of climate variables that is attributed directly or indirectly to human activities which alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods by UN Framework Convention on Climate change (UNFCCC, 20O6). Man is the major cause of the current global climate change (Thick Tri Quang, 1996). In Nigeria, facts on climate change as reported by the Nigeria Environmental Study and Action Team (NEST, 2007) include issues such as poor nutrition, low Agricultural yields, poverty, proliferation of diseases vectors and insects, malaria, sleeping sickness, dengue fever, schistosomiasis etc. Other impacts of climate change include desertification and soil erosion in Northern and southern part of Nigeria (Okali, 2007). At present, the earth appears to be facing a rapid warming, which most scientists believe result mostly from human activities (Hart, 2006,

Ehrenfield, 2005, Rosenbaum et al., 2004).

Essentially, forest eco-systems are an important consideration in the development of climate change mitigation strategies because they can both be sources and sink of green house gases (Dinicola et al., 1997).

In agricultural sector, climate change will lead to reduction in soil fertility, change in the availability of feed and fodder, decreased livestock productivity, increased incidence of Pest attack and the manifestation of vector born diseases. Similarly, heat stress and drought are likely to have a negative impact on animal health, production of dairy products, meats, and reproduction (SCBD, 2007). This in turn could impact on food security leading to protein deficiency and malnutrition (McCarth et al., 2001).

The implication of this is that the rural people based on their knowledge of climate change involving of weather variable like temperature, rain, humidity, visibility emanating from fog or dust storm as they affect their farming activities (Chapman, 2010).

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