Livelihood Change Research Articles

Are community forests delivering livelihood benefits? Insights from Uganda

ABSTRACT Most developing countries in the tropics have embraced various forms of community-based forest management. Uganda’s Community Forestry (CF) approach grants de jure rights to community groups to manage and own proceeds from specified forest resources to enhance socio-ecological benefits. However, two decades following its implementation, there is insufficient empirical evidence linking changes in local community livelihoods to participation in CF. Guided by insights from the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA), we conducted a cross-sectional survey in seven villages surrounding two de facto CFs in mid-western Uganda to quantify and compare livelihood capitals, strategies and outcomes among 40 households that were members of Communal Land Associations (CLAs) that are mandated to manage the CFs and 91 non-member households. Our results indicate significant improvements in access to natural, social and financial capitals of CLA member households. On-farm income was the main household income source in the area, but households also exhibited heavy dependence on forest environmental income observed to reduce poverty incidence by 12.5% and 5.5% among CLA member and non-member households, respectively. In order to significantly contribute to rural livelihoods, conservation and development interventions should amplify both economic and non-economic incentives to consolidate the gains that have been made while developing human and physical capital.

Awareness of villagers about the occurrence of signs of climate change and its relationship with sustainable livelihoods of local communities (Case study: Oghan Watershed in Golestan province)

Adverse climate change, drought, and floods have a negative impact on natural resources, crops, and livestock production as the main sources of livelihood for the villagers. Therefore, it is important to study the perception of rural communities about the occurrence of climate change and its relationship with a sustainable livelihood. The present study was conducted for this purpose by descriptive-survey research method. In this study, 297 residents Age 35 years and older in 10 villages of the Oghan watershed in Golestan province were surveyed. The data collection tool of the questionnaire was developed by the researcher; its content validity was confirmed using the opinions of university academics and natural resources experts. The results showed that age, number of livestock, history of animal husbandry, length of stay in the village, and income of individuals with their perception of the symptoms of climate change have a positive and significant relationship. Findings of structural equation model evaluation showed a causal relationship between the perception of the occurrence of climate change symptoms and individuals' livelihood changes so that with increasing awareness of villagers about the occurrence of climate change symptoms, their livelihood is facing more changes.

PERUBAHAN KONDISI SOSIAL EKONOMI MASYARAKAT SEBAGAI DAMPAK ADANYA PENGEMBANGAN OBJEK WISATA PANTAI OLELE

The research objective is to find out the Socioeconomic Of Community After The Development Of Olele Beach Tourist Attraction Olele Village Olele Villag Kabila Bone Sub-District Bone Bolango District. It applies a quantitative descriptive method while the data were collected through techniques of observasi, interview, and documentation. Research samples are determined by applying purposive sampling. Technique of processing data uses editing, sorting, tabulating, and interpreting. Meanwhile, technique of data analysis employes table of percentage and diagram. Findings of research show that the inpact of development of beach tourist attractionis positive on the change of livelihood or job, business opportunity, and community income. In addition, the developmentof Olele Beach Tourist Attraaction inpacts community positively as the open new businesses as employment opportunity around the spot such as food and drink stalls, other types of stalls, and bost whereas gazebo, snorkeling, and oksigen tank are othertypes new services that are for rent for the visitors or tourists. In total, 26 unit of new business have opened after the development, and they employ 34 people. Lastly, the change of socioeconomic after the devepolment of beach touist attraction in Olele Village is an increase of 26,4% in respondents’ incomes who open a new business opportunity.

Landscapes, Settlements and Traditional Housing in Samtskhe-Javakheti, Georgia

Abstract A change in livelihood and folk architecture is an indicator of cultural landscape transformation, which is often the result of changes occurring in the natural and socio-political realms. The diversity of architectural types of buildings as an element of landscape diversity distinguishes our research region. The presented study deals with a long-term change of housing and architectural types of settlements. Our goal was to identify, geolocalise, and classify the vernacular architecture of Samtskhe-Javakheti within the different types of natural landscapes. For this purpose, we used the HGIS (Historical Geoinformation System) approach, which comprises the application of both historic sources and GIS technologies. We identified seven types of buildings in the study area, the characteristics of which depended on the natural landscape features. The following factors had been determining the geography of the construction: geology, seismicity, terrain, climate, access to building materials and defence. Dominant architectural types of buildings in the study region were as follows: fortress Rabat with stone houses, stone houses, semi-underground houses mixed with stone houses, semi-underground houses, terraced semi-underground houses, cave dwellings and wooden log houses. In modern times, it is quite rare to come across these kinds of architectural buildings, and there is a tendency of their disappearance.

The Agrarian, Structural and Cultural Constraints of Smallholders’ Readiness for Sustainability Standards Implementation: The Case of Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil in East Kalimantan

The expansion of oil palm plantation has caused adverse impacts on the ecosystem. It has been associated with deforestation, biodiversity loss, disturbances to environmental services and livelihood change. The government of Indonesia has made an effort to control the negative effects by issuing relevant policies. One of the policies is Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil (ISPO)’s sustainability standards to which large-scale plantations and smallholders are obliged to adhere. This study assesses the readiness of two types of smallholders, namely, the nucleus–plasma scheme and independent smallholders to adopt ISPO standards. Using a case study research approach in two oil palm plantation villages in East Kalimantan, the study found out a number of ISPO implementation challenges, grouped into structural and socio-cultural challenges, which make smallholders less ready to adhere to this mandatory policy. Coping with these challenges, this study proposed that land and business legality programs be expedited to strengthen property rights, and that training and education programs be intensified to enhance awareness, knowledge and capacity of smallholders to enable them to comply with sustainability standards.

Community Preparation and Vulnerability Indices for Floods in Pahang State of Malaysia

The east coast of Malaysia is frequently hit by monsoon floods every year that severely impact people, particularly those living close to the river bank, which is considered to be the most vulnerable and high-risk areas. We aim to determine the most vulnerable area and understand affected residents of this community who are living in the most sensitive areas caused by flooding events in districts of Temerloh, Pekan, and Kuantan, Pahang. This study involved collecting data for vulnerability index components. A field survey and face-to-face interviews with 602 respondents were conducted 6 months after the floods by using a questionnaire evaluation based on the livelihood vulnerability index (LVI). The findings show that residents in the Temerloh district are at higher risk of flooding damage compared to those living in Pekan and Kuantan. Meanwhile, the contribution factor of LVI-Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) showed that Kuantan is more exposed to the impact of climate change, followed by Temerloh and Pekan. Among all the principal components shown, food components were considered to be the most vulnerable. Meanwhile, water components were categorised as the most invulnerable. Preventive planning involves preserving human life, minimising damage to household products, preserving crops and animals, adequate supply of clean water and food, good health and ensuring financial sustainability as an indication of changing livelihoods, sustainable food-storing systems, and other protective steps to curb damage and injury caused by annual flood strikes. Information generated on LVI assessment and adaptation procedures will help policymakers reduce people’s vulnerability in the face of floods and ensure proper plans are put in place in all relevant areas.

Socioenvironmental impacts of dam in the Jari Valley, Amapa, Brazil: community perceptions

Abstract The expansion of the Brazilian electricity sector is based on the construction of new dams. However, dams generate impacts, especially on riverine communities. Thus, this paper examined the local communities perceptions about the socioeconomic and environmental impacts of the Santo Antônio do Jari Dam, in Amapá. Data were obtained through surveys using the snowball sampling method. To analyze the perception data the Bardin’s analysis of content was used. The research showed that, before the construction of the dam, there was a very intimate bond between the communities, the environment and the nature, which influenced the communities perceptions mainly regarding environmental impacts, relocation, changes in livelihood and access to natural resources.

The Dilemma and Adjustment of Livelihood Change in Tibetan Area in Sichuan—A Case Study of Chikalo Village, Aba County

What changes have taken place in the livelihood of farmers and herdsmen in Tibetan areas of Sichuan? In the long run, what is the problem with the changed livelihood model? This paper found the answer based on a field survey of villages. The author found that in the research process, the new compound livelihood mode of villages, such as farmland leasing, large-scale animal husbandry and concentrated extraction of medicinal materials, was not sustainable, and the villagers’ destructive use of local resources without any technical processing accelerated the consumption of grassland and farmland resources, breaking the ecological balance maintained by the local traditional livelihood. When income from animal husbandry and medicinal materials collection is dominant, problems such as unstable market, sharp decrease of medicinal materials resources, reduced yield and quality of grassland will only lead to uncertainty and high risk of new compound livelihood model of villages, and even lead to poverty.

“It's not enough:” Local experiences of social grants, economic precarity, and health inequity in Mpumalanga, South Africa

South Africa has received international recognition for taking an active role in addressing extreme poverty by establishing a national social grant program. Lauded as one example to alleviate poverty, the operating assumption is that these strategies provide alternatives to mainstream development assistance. Notwithstanding their potential effects, the pathways generating livelihood change and their long-term implications for processes of citizenship formation and state society relations remain unclear. Drawing from an interdisciplinary study of social and economic change in Mpumalanga Province, South Africa, we analyze household surveys and qualitative interviews to examine how individuals manage their limited income through a balance of social grants, economic remittances, labor migration and strategic task-shifting. Though more than half of the households receive some form of pension support from the national government, many continue depending on remittances from household members living elsewhere. Social grants additionally interrelate with health maintenance in complicated ways, evidenced by high HIV rates within the study region. We argue that while the distribution of grants helps alleviate financial stress, the structure of assistance programs is more symbolically than materially significant for many families. Despite government assistance, families require social network mobilization and resources to access and secure healthcare and other basic needs.

The impact of drought on the health and livelihoods of women and children in India: A systematic review

Climate change is expected to have severe consequences for the world, some of which are already being felt. According to projections, in some regions, droughts will be more frequent and intense in the 21st century. This calls for purposeful interventions by governments to mitigate the impacts.Drought-affected communities are more vulnerable to famine. The effects of drought are felt in people's education levels, nutrition, health, sanitation, and women and the safety of children in these communities. The impact of drought can be seen in the livelihoods of people affected by it. Against this backdrop, there is the need to document the effects of drought on women and children's health in the affected communities.Such a study calls for a systematic approach. This study explores the various dimensions of the effects of droughts. It accessed electronic databases, including Google Scholar, Scopus, Pub-Med, JSTOR to identify a substantial number of studies using key words and expressions. To begin with, the word drought was kept constant in all combinations of keywords and phrases. The search was then refined by using the word drought with keywords, such as livelihood, vulnerability, sustainable development, adaption and mitigation, migration, health impact, and risk management to search the required articles.Only studies conducted in the period 2000 – 2019 were considered for this review. The review's findings show that due to a lack of water during a drought, the burden of work on women and children increased considerably. Most faced severe health issues like malnutrition and anemia. The livelihoods of women were also affected because of which they were forced to adopt various strategies to overcome the problems posed by droughts.Droughts occur every year in different parts of India. Actions are required to mitigate the effects of drought, including the provision of drinking water, food, aid and relief aid to distressed farmers, employment support, support for changes in livelihoods, water security, and drought-proofing. State policies and actions must give particular attention to women and children because they are the most vulnerable. Employment-generation actions should also include youth by providing appropriate training for developing appropriate skills.

Meaning-Making Through Creativity During COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an abrupt change in routines and livelihoods all around the world. This public health crisis amplified a number of systemic inequalities that led to populations needing to grapple with universally difficult truths. Yet some individuals, firms, and countries displayed resilient and creative responses in coping with pressing demands on healthcare and basic sanity. Past work has suggested that engaging in creative acts can be an adaptive response to a changing environment. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to describe how entities at the personal, community, and national levels cultivated and expressed creativity in an effort to make meaning during COVID-19. By overlaying the Four C model of creativity on such responses, we aim to (a) to connect mini, little, Pro, and Big creative behaviors with our attempts to make meaning of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and (b) to suggest how engaging in creative expression can be used to guard against the adverse consequences of this outbreak. Acknowledging that this time has been and continues to be distressing and filled with uncertainty, we propose some ways of making sense of current events by applying original thinking across domains. Further, we propose how engaging in creativity can serve to buffer against the negative effects of living through the pandemic.

Is Tourism the Beginning or the End? Livelihoods of Georgian Mountain People at Stake

This study is an attempt toempirically understand thetransformation of rootedlivelihoods after the arrival oftourism in the GreaterCaucasus. A case-specificmethodology combiningqualitative and geographicinformation methods enabled us to identify 4 types of tourism-ledlivelihood change: (1) expanding nonagricultural activities;(2) reducing agricultural activities; (3) developing agritourismactivities; and (4) increasing agricultural activities. Broad spatialcoverage ensured that the data collected were representative. Thefindings indicate that although tourism growth has increased theneed for supplementary services, only a few local residents havemanaged to develop tourism-related nonagricultural activities. Weargue that mountain residents see opportunities from tourismmainly in agriculture and hosting tourists. However, relatively fewof them actually expanded their agricultural activities in responseto tourism’s increased demand for agricultural products, as severalbarriers (lack of human resources, modern technology, andfinances) hindered other residents from taking this opportunity. Asour study reveals, households with traditional livelihoods mostoften replaced their agricultural activities, investing all theirresources in developing tourism-related livelihoods instead. Otherscreated added value from their integrated agriculture- and tourism-based livelihoods by providing visitors with locally made products.In addition to these findings on trends in livelihood changes, thestudy also provides an understanding of households’ economicpriorities. We hope the new insights surrounding tourism-ledlivelihood shifts will spark a debate on how people cope with therapid spread of tourism in the Georgian mountains.

Newly evolving pastoral and post-pastoral rangelands of Eastern Africa

Over the past two decades, the rangelands of Eastern Africa have experienced sweeping changes associated with growing human populations, shifting land use, expanding livestock marketing and trade, and greater investment by domestic and global capital. These trends have coincided with several large shocks that were turning points for how rangeland inhabitants make a living. As livelihoods in the region’s rangelands transform in seemingly paradoxical directions, away from customary pastoralist production systems, greater insight is required of how these transformations might affect poverty and vulnerability. This article reviews the state of what is known regarding directions of livelihood change in the rangelands of Eastern Africa, drawing on case studies of structural change in five settings in the region. It considers the implications of long-term change, as well as the emergence of very different livelihood mixes in pastoral rangelands, for efforts to reduce poverty and vulnerability in these places.

The Influences of Livelihood and Land Use on the Variation of Forest Transition in a Typical Mountainous Area of China

As one of the countries which has been experiencing a forest transition, China provides important insights into and theoretical and empirical knowledge of forest transition. In this study, through the framework of Sustainable Livelihood Analysis (SLA) and questionnaire surveys, we examined forest transition, farmers’ land-use activities and livelihood changes in Chicheng county, a typical mountainous area in Northern China, during 1975–2018. Most villages of Chicheng county experienced forest transition during the period of 2003–2005, but some villages experienced forest transition in 2010–2015. Forest transition variation over time was influenced by land use and livelihood changes. Livelihood resources, policy and institutional constraints and livelihood strategies had significant influences on land use and then caused variation in forest transition characteristics. The process of “livelihood–land use–forest transition” was the key to achieving and maintaining forest transition, and the interaction between livelihood and land use was a negative feedback relationship between society and ecology. The dominant path of forest transition in Chicheng county was the “economic development path”. Moreover, the “intensive agriculture path of small-scale farmers” enhanced the “economic development path”, and the “forest scarcity path” promoted both of the above two paths. This implies that the feedback and interactions between society and ecology should be taken into account so as to achieve a sustainable human and environmental system.

Land use systems and livelihoods in demographically heterogeneous frontier stages in the amazon

We investigate how Amazonian smallholders' land use systems coevolve with household-level demographic factors associated with changing livelihood strategies over the different stages of frontier development. Few micro-level studies have investigated this association, particularly due to the paucity of longitudinal data on cohorts of farm colonist households and plots. Cohort analysis is the only way to depict how the structural conditions affecting individual and household livelihood decisions differ from earlier to later stages of frontier development. Our methodological approach involves a unique dataset, based on a micro-level panel of farm households depicting 25 years of settlement in the municipality of Machadinho, in the Brazilian Amazon. We use descriptive statistics with paired t-tests, land use classification analysis, latent transition analysis, and longitudinal multinomial regressions to understand which cohorts of households thrived or failed and, most importantly, why and when. Splitting the data into panels of settlement cohorts helped us understand the effect of demographic life cycle markers on land use choices over the different stages of frontier development and the ability of farm households to adapt their livelihoods at the frontier over time. We found that, as the colonization frontier integrated into markets, the most successful original settlers were those who diversified their portfolio of capitals and livelihood strategies as a response to new local and regional market conditions. We also found a progressive change from land use systems based on subsistence agriculture to diversified land use systems that combine on- and off-farm activities. Livelihood diversification is key to preventing households from becoming trapped in a long-term deprivation trajectory, particularly when the frontier becomes more urban and market-oriented. This explains why land use has become progressively independent of household demographic dynamics in advanced stages. We contend that, as frontiers integrate into markets, diversification should not only be incentivized, but should also be used as a technical strategy to enhance access to subsidized rural credit, as it seems to increase farmers’ likelihood to thrive and improve their resilience against shocks.

Impact of the 2013 super typhoon haiyan on the livelihood of small-scale coconut farmers in Leyte island, Philippines

The Philippine coconut industry is characterized by a high incidence of poverty among small-scale coconut farmers. We investigate how severely the farmers were impacted when the super typhoon hit central Philippines in 2013, causing massive damages to the coconut industry. We used a cross-sectional data set collected through face-to-face surveys to quantify the adverse effect of the super typhoon on the livelihood of coconut dependent farmers in Leyte island. The estimation was done through an empirical investigation that tackles the methodological issue in assessing the effect of extreme weather event shock on the socio-economic status of farmers. As households were not randomly assigned to the typhoon-affected group, the propensity score matching method was used in comparing the changes in livelihood between severely affected farmers and relatively less affected farmers. Results show that the onslaught of the super typhoon has significantly reduced the income of coconut farmers. The estimated reduction in income is at least 20,649.89 Philippine pesos (405 USD) per hectare annually. Replanting coconut will take around 7–9 years before it can return to full production capacity. With the drastic decrease in farm income due to the super typhoon, farmers coped by exploring other sources of income, such as by raising livestock, growing other crops, and intercropping coconut farms with coffee or cacao and working off-farm. None of the coconut farmers availed of crop insurance. Results suggest that there is a need to enhance the role of climate-resilient agricultural practices for farmers to cope with extreme weather events.

Assessing land use changes and livelihood outcomes of rural people in the Chittagong Hill Tracts region, Bangladesh

AbstractLand use change is a pressing concern for the livelihoods of people in tropical developing countries. Changes in land use from swidden (shifting cultivation) agriculture to smallholder tree‐dominated areas producing timber, fruits and cash crops can result in changing livelihood outcomes for rural communities. This paper examines land use patterns of rural households and the association with food production and income across three different zones of various forest proximity across a landscape gradient (remote, intermediate and on‐road) in the Chittagong Hill Tracts region of Bangladesh. We conducted in‐depth semi‐structured surveys of households (175–300) and farm owners (30) to collect information on people's perceptions of land use change, present land use patterns and contributions to food production and income. Our research found that more than half of the surveyed households experienced a decline in the land available for food production over the past 30 years. The land use patterns revealed decreasing crop lands (mainly swidden shifting cultivation/land rotation farms) and an increase in areas of planted trees within this landscape. However, household use of the reduced crop land has not affected food production in the on‐road zone, whereas the diversity of food sources has declined. People living in more remote areas engaged in swidden farming and used larger areas of crop and fallow lands, fruit orchard and accessed natural forest lands that provide a diverse reservoir of food sources. The current land uses contribute to variations in annual household income across zones, with remote dwelling people earning less to those living closer to urban areas in the intermediate and on‐road zones. In summary, this transition of land uses over three decades and changes in income and food availability cannot be generalised across the region because of zone specific differences. We recommend a broader and context‐reliant landscape management approach in consideration of the diversity of forest and tree benefits for the livelihoods of people in the region.

Peasant households’ land use decision-making analysis using social network analysis: A case of Tantou Village, China

Abstract In a long historical period, the social network based on kinship and neighborhood played an important role in the rural society of China. China's rural revitalization policy has brought rural development into a new era. In this research, we have explored whether the characteristics of the traditional rural social network have changed in the current period, and whether and how the social network, as an informal system, affects peasant households' land use decisions. We used social network analysis to portray the characteristics of peasant households' social network and adopted network autocorrelation analysis to test whether the social network affects peasant households' land use decision-making, and finally employed regression models to revel the mechanism among the social network, livelihoods, and peasant households' land use decision-making. Our research results showed that the social network of peasant households based on kinship and neighborhood was featured by subgroups and small-world phenomenon, indicating that the pattern of traditional rural social relationships has not changed. Besides, our results also revealed that the social network influences peasant households' land use decision-making by making it more similar, that is, the decision-making presented peer effects. In peer effects, the influence of the neighborhood network was greater than that of the kinship network, and when the social relationship reached the fourth-order, peer effects would no longer exist. Furthermore, the social network can not only regulate the simplification and food-crop preference of planting structure caused by livelihood changes but also directly reduces the food crop proportion and increases land investment intensity. Our research results emphasize the importance of using peasant households' social networks to guide land use in the process of rural revitalization to better implement agricultural policies.

Typology of the Peri-Urban Area in Demak District

Abstract. The increase in population has an impact on increasing the demand for land. In addition, the available land in the city is relatively limited. Therefore, the development leads to the peri-urban area. The development of the core city will have an impact on the physical, social, and economic transformation of the peri-urban area. Interactions that occur between rural-urban areas can affect the development of peri-urban areas. Interaction between rural-urban areas also occurs in Mranggen Sub – district as the peri – urban area of Semarang. This study aims to examine changes in the typology of peri-urban areas in Mranggen Sub – district, Demak District in 2008 - 2018. This research used a quantitative descriptive method with a spatial approach. The remote sensing data were used as the main data source and document review as secondary data. The change in the typology of Potential Urban to Semi Urban was caused by changes in people's livelihoods, increased education, percentage of permanent buildings, educational facilities, and health facilities. The change in typology from Semi Urban to Predominantly Urban is caused by various variables that cause increasingly urbanization. The results showed a change in the study area, 7 villages changed from the typology of Potential Urban to Semi Urban and 2 villages changed from the Semi Urban typology to Predominantly Urban.

The pro-poor impact of non-crop livelihood activities in rural Vietnam: A panel data quantile regression analysis

Using a household panel dataset for the 2008–2016 period, we analyze the heterogeneous effects of livelihood change on household well-being in rural Vietnam. We use an unconditional quantile regression (UQR) model with fixed effects to control for unobservable time-invariant household characteristics. We find that when a fixed-effects estimator is employed, households switching from a crop livelihood to any non-crop livelihood (e.g., livestock, wage-earning, nonfarm, private or transfer livelihoods) increase their per capita income and food consumption. However, the results from the UQR with fixed effects reveal a significant variation in the effect of such a switch in livelihood across various quantiles of well-being distribution, with a larger effect for poorer households. The income effect, however, tends to decline with higher quantiles and even turns negative with a switch to a wage-earning or public transfer livelihood for the better off. Notably, our study confirms the pro-poor impact of changing livelihood from crop to non-crop activities in rural Vietnam. Our research results also suggest that a mean regression approach that often assumes a homogeneous/mean effect of livelihoods on well-being, may miss some heterogeneity that is useful to researchers and policy makers.