Geomatics tools for agricultural and farm disaster risk management and reduction: A survey of farmers in South-South coastal communities, Nigeria

This paper examined how geomatics, a technology, reduces and manages agricultural risk disasters in the coastal areas of South-South, Nigeria. A total of 450 farmers was randomly selected from 18 coastal communities of the South-South, Nigeria, known to have experienced disasters. Questionnaire and oral interview were used to elicit information from the farmers. Descriptive tools were used to analyze and interpret data obtained. Results showed the common agricultural risks/hazards in the area include flooding (100%), soil erosion (69.3%), oil spillage (99.7%), drying up of rivers and streams (91.1%), resource conflicts (98.8%) among other risks. Tools such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS), remote sensing (88.8%), digital elevation models (67.5%), and land use planning (58.4%), oil spill risk mapping (99.3%) among others, are in use the study area. Geomatics reduce disaster by mapping out agricultural lands (M=3.37), helps to identify soil types (M=3.87), monitor rainfall (M=3.06), helps to identify flood-prone areas (M=3.66), pests/diseases surveillance (M=3.38) among others. The challenges that limit use of geomatics include weak disaster coordination (84.4%), inadequate manpower (68.2%), high cost of technology (77.7%), financial sustainability (84.3%), and lack of awareness (73.3%). Solutions to the problems include developing agro-based risk & hazard maps, promotion of farmer-friendly geospatial information use, building institutions for effective governance.