Climate Change, Agriculture and Rural Livelihoods in Developing Countries

Background information on climate change and agriculture.- Global scenario of greenhouse gas emission.- Effects of climate change on plant and animal physiology.- Agriculture in international climate change negotiations.- Cost and opportunities from mitigation and adaptation in agriculture.- Methodologies to assess the impact of climate change in agriculture.- Effects of climate change on regional agriculture production, food price and food insecurity.- Climate change in Nepalese context: Impacts, mitigation issues, and relation with poverty.- Effect of climate variables on yield of major food-crops in Nepal: A time-series analysis.- Community perceptions of climate change and its impacts.

Keshav Lall Maharjan (Dr. of Agriculture in Agricultural Economics, Kyoto University, Japan) is currently a professor at the Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation, Hiroshima University, Japan, where he has been teaching, conducting research, and chairing various steering and decision-making committees since its foundation in 1994. He gives lectures for graduate students on subjects including rural economics, south Asian studies, international development, and cooperation studies. He conducts weekly seminars at the graduate school that address pertinent issues in agricultural economics, rural development, sustainable development, cultural dynamics, climate change, and rural livelihood strategies in developing countries. He also offers support for graduate students writing their Master's theses and doctoral dissertations on the related topics of development sciences, educational development, and cultural and regional studies, which include issues concerning natural resource management, food security, poverty dynamics, local governance, rural society, and community dynamics. In doing so he considers agriculture and rural regions as not merely sources of cheap labor, cheap food and cheaper intermediate inputs, and subordinate to urban areas and centers as marginal and peripheral regions but also representing a dignifi ed way of life for people who are guardians of nature and are more conscious about the earth, humans, and their interaction, so as to sustain this culture and civilization for generations hereafter. Rural regions are the places that make these things happen. Hence, fi eldwork to grasp the diverse realities of rural regions location-specifi cally before generalizing the research is given importance in his research, lectures, and his work with graduate students in terms of their research, writing journal articlesand dissertations. Some 20 students have received their Ph.D. from Hiroshima University under his