Bhutan: Boosting adoption of resilient agriculture practices
Previous investments made in Bhutan need to be strengthened and expanded to explicitly take into consideration future climate change impacts, as opposed to responding to just current impacts. To increase the resilience of farmers to future climate change impacts, additional investments in water resource management, infrastructure development, and soil and land management need to be made.
Intervention
This 5-year project (2020-2025) seeks to enhance the resilience of smallholder farms to climate change in eight districts (Dagana, Punakha, Trongsa, Tsirang, Sarpang, Samtse, Wangdue Phodrang, and Zhemgang) of Buthan. The strategy is based on the following: i) the promotion of resilient agriculture practices; ii) the integration of climate change risks into water and land management practices; and iii) the reduction of risk and impact of climate change induced landslides. A soft component of the program is mainly related to the provision of agricultural extension services that promote the adoption of climate-resilient and sustainable agricultural practices and technologies, as well as the development, adoption, and effective use of weather information systems. The hard program component consists of infrastructure development, namely, irrigation systems and road building and maintenance. Analysis of the follow-up survey is currently ongoing.
Impact Evaluation timeline
Approaches to assess the impact
The impact evaluation of the soft component of the program was based following an experimental RCT approach, while a quasi-experimental Difference-in Difference approach was followed to assess the second hard component of the program related to infrastructure’s intervention. Evaluation revolves around indicators related to access to climate-resilient irrigation schemes, water harvesting and storage, adoption of innovative irrigation technologies and sustainable land management practices, access to farm roads, Gewog Connectivity roads, crop yield, diversification and multiple cropping. The endline survey of the impact evaluation is planned for 2025.
