Impacts of climate change on cereal farming in Tunisia: a panel ARDL–PMG approach

We used an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) modeling to investigate the short- and long-term effects of climate change on Tunisian cereal farming. The Pooled Mean Group (PMG) estimation as well as Granger causality tests conducted on a regional panel of the country, covering a time horizon from 1975 to 2014, showed that climate change issues still persist in Tunisia, affecting negatively and increasingly the cereal output. This study proves that negative effects of climate are rather felt when there is a shortage of rainfall, whereas the current temperature levels are still in favor of cereal crop. The findings indicate that cereal farming requires a continuous technology pack deployment and a favorable climate. However, an unanticipated long-run relationship has been observed between cereal production and labor. As a result of this research, recommendations were built around two major strategies, namely yield improvement and farmers’ income stabilization to mitigate the unpredictable effects of climate change and hazardous events. The implementation of a production and regional specialization map and the adoption of an anti-drought insurance system in addition to compensation payment would be a suitable adaptation policy to climate change effects and for the sustainability of Tunisian agriculture.