1. Background
Climate change and extremes have posed a serious risk to the coastal communities in the Asia-Pacific region (UNISDR, 2012). Fisheries and aquaculture play a vital role in the local economy of these communities, especially Taiwan. It is anticipated that where the risks of climate change, flooding and sea-level rise are predicted to increase, this will severely reduce the fishery production and affect the livelihoods of fishing villages. Although many public measures are applied to encourage autonomous adaptations, there are limited effects and potential for maladaptation (Poussin et al., 2014). Existing studies have paid relatively little attention to the social network and social capital factors that contribute to autonomous adaptations (Hung et al., 2016). This study aims to offer insights into fisherman’s adaptation decisions for climate risk, as well as to map their social networks of implementing adaptation strategies and to examine their determinants.
2. Methods and data
Combining a social network with social-psychological theory (Rogers, 1975; Varda et al., 2009), we develop a Social Network Model of Fishermen Adaptation to Climatic Hazards (SOMFACH) to explain fisherman’s decisions to take adaptation actions. A survey was conducted among fishermen in three fishing communities in Taiwan. These communities are located in both the most important aquaculture and the riskiest areas to climate-related hazards. The survey was conducted through a face-to-face and door-to-door interview, which was designed by integrating focus group meetings with pre-test surveys in the same sampling areas. Then, using a stratified random sampling, 350 fishermen were selected. Finally, 305 respondents were used in the analysis with a response rate of 87%.
3. Results
We map the distributions of the social networks between the fishermen and related stakeholders, which can enhance the understanding of the social capital factors that affect fisherman’s adaptation behavior. Then, we used a Logit regression to test the SOMFACH. Results show that the social networks play a role in determining fisherman’s adaptation behavior. The number of fisherman’s social networks connected to other fishermen and local financial institutes is significantly positive to encourage adaptation actions. The findings show that risk information and risk appraisals have only minor effects on adaptive behavior, while the coping appraisals are a strong predictor. Public resources and financial aids were shown to be influential in fisherman’s adaptation decisions. Thus, public measures can focus more on communicating available adaptation strategies to fishermen, as well as improving the institutions that can provide various channels and types of assistance to increase fishermen coping appraisals, and, thereby, enhance resilience and adaptive capacity.