Climate change and eco-anxiety: The effect of altitude on farmers’ subjective wellbeing in low- and middle-income settings

Climate change poses significant threats to agricultural communities worldwide and may affect psychological wellbeing through increased environmental uncertainty. This study investigates the association between climate vulnerability and household subjective wellbeing among farmers in seven low- and middle-income countries (Argentina, India, Mauritania, Nicaragua, Solomon Islands, Vietnam, and Zambia). The dataset contains secondary survey data on approximately 15,000 farmers involved in International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) development programs. We estimate OLS regressions in which geographical altitude (distance above sea level) proxies climate vulnerability, controlling for socioeconomic and geographic characteristics including gender, age, education, income, distance from the equator, and country and wave fixed effects. Results show that altitude is positively and significantly associated with self-assessed household wellbeing: a 1000-meter increase in altitude corresponds to a 0.33 standard deviation higher wellbeing score (p < 0.001). The association remains robust to alternative specifications and holds when replacing altitude with average annual temperature, which is negatively and significantly associated with wellbeing. These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that farmers living in hotter and more climate-exposed areas experience lower subjective wellbeing, potentially reflecting both material vulnerability and anticipatory climate-related stress. Adaptation policies and loss-and-damage funds should account for geographic vulnerability when targeting prevention and resilience investments in rural areas.