The impact of climate variability on tobacco productivity over Temanggung Regency, Indonesia

¹ Faculty of Agriculture, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia
² Faculty of Geography, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia
³ Master Student, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Yogyakarta, Indonesia

^* Corresponding author: andi.syahid@mail.ugm.ac.id

Abstract

Indonesia is among the most affected regions by climate variability and change. Located between the Pacific and the Indian Ocean, Indonesia is mostly influenced by some climate variabilities, such as the monsoon, El-Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO), and Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD). These climate variabilities affect significantly on the Indonesian rainfall that further increase the chances of crop failure, specifically on the tobacco yield over Temanggung Regency which is known as the producer of good quality tobacco in Indonesia. Tobacco needs a sufficient dry condition prior to the harvest stage due to maintains its productivity and leaf quality. This ideal condition could be achieved when the dry season, typically in the mid of the year for Temanggung, is not affected by any wet climate variability. Moreover, based on this study, it was found that there was the most remarkable decline in tobacco productivity in 2016 since the required dry condition was interrupted by the prolonged significant rainfall which depicted by strong mid-year negative-IOD indices. The analysis utilized the dataset of tobacco productivity, daily rainfall intensity, and the indices of monsoon, ENSO, and IOD for the period of seven years, from 2010– 2016. This study concludes that the climate variabilities give a huge contribution to the profitable tobacco cultivation. Furthermore, efforts to adapt and to mitigate the impacts of the climate variability in Indonesia, specifically for the agriculture sector, is needed by way of increasing the various stakeholder's knowledge that involved in policy planning and decision-making as well as involving the farmers in the training on climate adaptation and mitigation.