Assessment of Climate Change Vulnerability among Smallholder Farmers in Cooch Behar, West Bengal
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.48165/IJEE.2026.62431Keywords:
Adaptive response, Climate change, Composite vulnerability, Smallholder farmers, Climate-resilient householdsAbstract
Climate change disproportionately affects smallholder farmers, yet assessments of climate vulnerability remain limited for under-studied regions such as Cooch Behar in West Bengal. This study assessed climate-change vulnerability and adaptive response among 120 smallholder households selected through multistage sampling during 2025 in two blocks of Cooch Behar. Composite Vulnerability and Adaptive Response Indices were constructed by normalising indicators within the exposure sensitivity adaptive capacity framework (higher scores indicate greater vulnerability and greater adaptive response, respectively). The 19 independent variables were correlated with each of the two indices, and multiple regression was used to determine the significant ones. The strongest relationship with both indices was with land holding, income, expenditure and educational status, the latter correlations being non significant with family size and extension contact. Vulnerability was significantly predicted by educational status alone (R² = 0.520) while educational status, land holding and family size predicted adaptive response (R² = 0.788). The findings highlight education as a practical policy consideration for building climate-resilient smallholder households and demonstrate the utility of composite indices for identifying vulnerable households.
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