Perception of Climate Change and Adaptability of Irrigated Farms in Southeastern Tunisia

The aim of this paper is to study the individual perception and adaptation strategies of irrigating to climate change (CC) in southeastern Tunisia. A survey questionnaire was administered to 60 randomly selected households in the El Bsissi-Oued El Akarit area. The climatic variability felt by irrigating people is explained by a decrease in precipitation, the increase in temperature, the randomness of the rains and the increase in the occurrence rate of extreme weather events. To cope with these three individual strategies are distinguished. A first category is called offensive. It consists in investing to acquire water necessary to maintain the production system of the farm. The second strategy is called defensive or adaptive. It aims to adapt production systems to the water available on the farm, taking into account existing deep and shallow wells. Finally, the third category is said to be contractive, consisting in reducing the scale of operation of the farm by resorting to the reduction of the irrigated area and the conversion to rain-fed agriculture.