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Abstract How farmers perceive climate change has an influence on how they adapt to climate change. Climate change perception and vulnerability were assessed based on the household survey information collected from randomly selected 118 farmers of Kalapara subdistrict in Bangladesh. This paper identified the socio-economic covariates of climate change perception and vulnerability in relation to agricultural adaptation. It was also determined whether their perception was consistent with meteorological information. Findings revealed that the farmers had a moderate level of perception of and vulnerability to climate change. An overwhelming majority (98%) of the respondents perceived a warmer summer and 96% of them observed a colder winter compared to the past. Among the farmers, 91% believed that rainfall had increased and 97% thought that the timing of rainfall had changed. The belief of increase in soil salinity and associated loss was prevailing among 98 and 99% of them, respectively. Observed climate data were mostly aligned with the farmers' perception with respect to temperature, rainfall, floods, droughts and salinity. Positive correlations were found among the perception of climate change, the perception of vulnerability and the number of adopted adaptation practices. Farmers' level of understanding of climate change, vulnerability and adaptation practices could be improved by involving them in different organizations, such as climate field school and farmer associations. It could accelerate the dissemination of agricultural adaptation practices among them to cope with adverse agricultural impacts of climate change. Highlights • Farmer climate change perceptions mostly tracked with meteorological data. • General farmers and climate field school farmers had the same level of perceptions. • Climate change perception and adaptation practices were positively correlated. • Climate field school farmers had better level of adoption of adaptation practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bangladesh is very vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, and adaptation is emerging as a key policy response. Place based programs that build adaptive capacity are needed. This paper explores the effectiveness of formal institutions in climate change adaptation for agriculture from the perspectives of farmers and institutional communities of practice within two drought-prone areas in Bangladesh. Our findings show that formal institutions via their communities of practice play an important role in building place based capacity for mitigation and adaptation strategies in agriculture. Over-emphasis on technology, lack of acknowledgement of cultural factors and a failure of institutional communities of practice to mediate and create linkages with informal institutional communities of practice remain barriers. We argue that in order for formal institutions to play an ongoing and crucial role in building adaptive agriculture in Bangladesh, they must incorporate cultural mechanisms and build partnerships with more community based informal institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]