Exploring Impact of Climate Change on Poultry Production in Nigeria

The study explored the impacts of climate change on poultry production in Africa’s most populous country, Nigeria. Other control variables such as gross national income (GNI) per capita (GNI), official exchange rate of the Naira and value of loans guaranteed to the poultry sector were also considered. Times-series data from 1981 to 2020 were obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria Statistical Bulletin, World Development Indicators, FAOSTAT and World Bank Climate Change Knowledge Portal. Leveraging on the autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL) and threshold analysis the study revealed that 1% increase in annual days with heat index > 35 °C will cause a significant decrease in poultry production by 0.14% in the long-run. In addition, the coefficient of annual maximum number of consecutive dry days was positively related to poultry production. It was revealed that 1% increase in rainfall will cause a significant increase in poultry production by 0.84% in the long-run and 0.60% in the short-run. The study further indicated that 1% increase in GNI per capita will lead to a 0.38% increase in poultry production in the short-run and 0.54% in the long-run. In accordance, the official exchange rate of the naira was also positively related to poultry production and 1% increase in official exchange rate tends to result in 0.04% and 0.05% increases in poultry production in the short-run and long-run. However, increase in value of loans guaranteed to the poultry sector appeared to be insignificant and could assist the poultry farmers in sourcing for poultry inputs targeted at increasing poultry production. According to threshold analysis, the country's poultry output may be negatively impacted by rainfall and dry days above certain threshold levels, which are 122–135 days and 1146–1237 mm, respectively. The findings of the study present an opportunity for poultry farmers in Nigeria to embrace climate smart agricultural practices in the face of changing climate in Nigeria. The Nigerian government should maintain stable and sustainable exchange rate of the naira and sustain the loans guaranteed to the poultry sector to improve the uptake of climate smart poultry production, increase agricultural gross domestic product and gross national income in the country.