Abstract
Households combine capital assets in a process involving human agency and resourcefulness to construct livelihood strategies and generate well-being outcomes. Here, we (1) characterized types of livelihood strategies; (2) determined how different capital assets are associated with different livelihood strategies; and (3) determined how livelihood strategies differed in food security outcomes. We conducted a survey in southwestern Ethiopia and used principal component and cluster analyses. Five types of livelihood strategies, which differed mainly in food and cash crops comprising the strategy, were identified. These were, in order of decreasing food security: ‘three food crops, coffee and khat’, n = 68; ‘three food crops and khat’, n = 59; ‘two food crops, coffee and khat’, n = 78; ‘two food crops and khat’, n = 88; and ‘one food crop, coffee and khat’, n = 44. The livelihood strategy ‘three food crops, coffee and khat’ was associated with a wide range of capital assets, particularly having larger aggregate farm field size and learning from other farmers. A generalized linear model showed that livelihood strategies were significantly associated with food security outcomes. Particularly, a high number of food crops in a strategy was linked with relatively high food security. In this context, diversified livelihood strategies primarily through having a mix of food crops for subsistence, in combination with cash crops for income, are important for food security. This suggests a need to rethink dominant policy narratives, which have a narrow focus on increasing productivity and commercialization as the primary pathway to food security.
Highlights
IntroductionLivelihood strategies in agricultural landscapes are evolving in developing countries around the world
Driven by global change, livelihood strategies in agricultural landscapes are evolving in developing countries around the world
We focused on Ethiopia where, in 2015, about 81% of the population lived in rural areas and mainly relied on agriculture for their livelihoods (World Bank 2016)
Summary
Livelihood strategies in agricultural landscapes are evolving in developing countries around the world. A common change is from subsistence-oriented production to commercially oriented production of crops Such a shift is actively encouraged by some governments Gebrehiwot et al 2016; Vongvisouk et al 2014) on the grounds that it will improve food security through economic growth Outcomes of such a change have been mixed so that the ways in which different livelihood strategies influence household food security in different settings is less clear (Lang and Barling 2012). Understanding how livelihood strategies, different combinations of food crops and cash crops, influence the food security of smallholder farming households is important for identifying and supporting sustainable development trajectories of traditionally subsistence-oriented or semi-subsistent agricultural landscapes. Two plausible pathways of crop production have been advocated to increase food security, namely: (1) cash crop production (e.g. Achterbosch et al 2014); and (2) crop diversification (Lin 2011), with high productivity in either of these pathways being considered an important factor. Maxwell and Fernando (1989) defined cash crops as all marketed surplus, non-staple agriculture, non-food agriculture, and export agriculture. Sunderland (2011) described crop diversification as Bintegrating a diversity of crops and varieties into smallholder systems^
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