Cyclone Induced Paddy Yield Losses and Smallholder Adaptation: Structural Equation Evidence from Balasore District in Coastal Odisha

Abstract

This paper examines the character and scale of tropical cyclone effects on paddy production and systematically evaluates the socio-economic and institutional factors of climate adaptation behaviour among small holder paddy farmers in Balasore district, Odisha- one of the most at risk cyclone landfall regions in India. The study used a quantitative and cross-sectional survey design, which resulted into 300 paddy farming households stratified multi-stage random sampling that was stratified into 12 administrative blocks. The SPSS 26.0 and AMOS 26.0 were used to analyse the data based on descriptive statistics, hierarchical multiple regression, one-way ANOVA, and covariance-based structural equation modelling (CB-SEM) with maximum-likelihood estimation. The intensity of cyclones decreased average paddy production by 42.38 (SD = 18.76), and blocks with high exposure to coastlines registered a loss of 52.64. Practises of adaptation, namely the adoption of flood-tolerant varieties, adjusted sowing schedules, and diversification of crops, play a significant role with regards to mitigating the relationship between cyclone and yield loss (β = -.38, p <.001; interaction β = -.21, p <.001). The 68 percent of the variation in the production loss was jointly explained by socio-economic factors and institutional support. The structural model was found to fit well (CFI = .963; RMSEA = .041; SRMR = .048) and all the four hypothesised pathways were confirmed. The cross-sectional nature of the design does not allow causal inference. The results apply only to the Balasore district, but the experimented structural model can serve as a template to be reproduced in other cyclone prone coastal agricultural districts. It is the first district-level analysis to use CB-SEM to simulate cyclone intensity, adaptation determinants, recovery capacity, and resilience across the paddy farming system of Odisha that incorporates the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework with the technology adoption theory to produce policy implications.