Post-disaster agricultural rehabilitation extension programs: Design principles and recovery effectiveness

Abstract

Riparian farmlands along Taiwan's western rivers have experienced increasingly severe flooding over the past two decades, with crop losses exceeding NT$3.8 billion during the 2021 typhoon season alone [1]. This research assessed how extension services can promote flood-resilient farming practices among 224 smallholder farmers in riparian zones of Changhua and Yunlin counties, central Taiwan, over an 18-month intervention period from January 2022 to June 2023. A quasi-experimental design compared 118 intervention farmers receiving a phased flood-resilience extension program with 106 control farmers under standard extension services. Four resilience practices were tracked: raised bed cultivation, improved drainage systems, flood-tolerant crop varieties, and early warning response capacity. By the 18-month endpoint, adoption rates for the four practices reached 61.4%, 49.7%, 54.3%, and 48.1% respectively in the intervention group, versus 14.8%, 11.3%, 18.6%, and 9.7% among controls (p < 0.001 for all). Flood-related crop losses dropped from 34.2% to 13.4% among intervention farmers while control losses declined only from 33.8% to 26.1%. Extension delivery through farmer group workshops, field demonstrations, and digital advisory messages proved effective when organized around a three-phase model addressing pre-flood, during-flood, and post-flood farmer needs.