Smallholder farmers' perceived evaluation of agricultural drought adaptation technologies used in Uganda: Constraints and opportunities

Many smallholder farmers in semi-arid areas continue to face increasing threats of agricultural drought exacerbated by a rapidly changing climate. This calls for increased understanding of farmers' drought response experiences and perceptions for better agricultural production. This study assessed the smallholder farmers' perceived evaluation of drought adaptation technologies, constraints and opportunities in drought prone districts of Uganda. A cross-sectional survey was conducted using semi-structured questionnaires. The evaluation indicators of the technologies included efficiency, effectiveness, equity, acceptability, urgency and institutional compatibility performance measures. The findings show that among the irrigation technologies, drip irrigation systems were the most efficient, effective, acceptable and urgent performance measures (p < 0 .05). The rainwater harvesting technologies used were perceived to be significant for all the considered performance measures (p < 0 .05). In the agroforestry category, agrisilviculture and agrosilvopastoral were significant (p < 0 .05) for the assessed indicators. The significant constraints were unreliable rainfall, high technology operational costs, limited labour and technical support (p < 0 .05). This study reveals that market prices, efficient use of water, improved labour and time saving are important for adoption and use of drought adaptation technologies. This study provides insights for policy and development planning processes geared towards drought risk reduction measures that are either structural or non-structural.