Global: Women and youth incur higher farm income losses due to heat stress and floods

Every year, agricultural income losses due to climate stressors is higher in households headed by women than those where men are the primary breadwinner in low-and-middle-income countries (LMIC), including India, a new report highlighted. Women-headed households experience losses 8 per cent higher due to heat stress and 3 per cent higher due to floods, compared to men-headed households. Similarly, households headed by young people (younger than 35) were found to be more likely to lose agricultural income due to extreme weather events, relative to those headed by older people. This happens because their capacity to react and adapt to extreme weather events is unequal, according to the authors of the new report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The research paper, for the first time, provides concrete evidence from 24 countries on the magnitude of the challenge posed by the climate crisis for rural people in socially and economically vulnerable ...