Stakeholders' views in reducing rural vulnerability to natural disasters in Southern Mexico: Hazard exposure and coping and adaptive capacity

This paper examines how climatic events affect agricultural livelihoods. Special emphasis is given to the effects of natural disasters on migration patterns. In addition, this manuscript aims to assess policy options to reduce the vulnerability of small-scale farmers (e.g. government-supported insurance schemes) in the context of the Mexican government's withdrawal from directly subsidizing the agricultural sector over the past 18 years. To further this aim, this work draws on stakeholder consultations (based on questionnaires and interviews) and descriptive analysis in three communities in the southern state of Chiapas, Mexico. It also puts forward stakeholder-based solutions, which embrace loss-sharing and risk-transfer mechanisms. The coping strategies revealed in this study encompass both immediate responses (e.g. sources of off-farm income, post-disaster financing sources, and emigration plans), and more structural and long-term strategies, such as re-orientation of production and improvement of infrastructure for production. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.