LECTURE:03

SUSTAINABLE RURAL LIVELIHOODS

M. A. Kamal, Ph.DDirector General

National Academy for Planning and Development

Out Line

1. Introduction2. Sustainable Rural Livelihoods- Concepts3. Determinants of livelihood 4. The nature of human livelihoods5. key Elements Livelihoods6. Rural Dilemma7. Comparative Advantage: Competitive Disadvantage8. Rural development and Land Reform9. Rural development Ideas Timeline10 Influence by Ideological Paradigm shifts11. GAPS: Asset-based Empowerment12. Interdependency of rural infrastructure13. Conclusion

1. Introduction: 1.1 The concept of ‘sustainable rural livelihoods’ is

increasingly central to the debate about rural development, poverty reduction and environmental management.

1.2 For policy and practice, new concepts and analysis are needed. Implications include personal environmental balance sheets for the better off, and for the poorer, policies and actions to enhance capabilities, improve equity, and increase social sustainability.

2. Concept of Sustainable Rural livelihoods

2.1 Rural Development

2.1.1 Strategy to enable a specific group of people, poor rural women and men, to gain for themselves and their children more of what they want and need. It involves the poorest to seek livelihood in the rural areas to demand and control more of the benefits of development (Chambers(1983) definition1983:147).

2.1.1 Rural development (RD)- is the improvement of the spatial and socioeconomic environment of rural space.It leads to the enhancement of the individual’s ability to care for and sustain his/her well-being (Madu, 2003b).

2. Concept of Sustainable Rural livelihoods

2.2 Livelihoods

2.2.1 A livelihood comprises the capabilities, assets (including both material and social resources) and activities required for a means of living. A livelihood is sustainable when it can cope with and recover from stresses and shocks maintain or enhance its capabilities and assets, while not undermining the natural resource base

(Chambers and Conway :1992)

2. Concept of Sustainable Rural livelihoods

2.2 Livelihoods 2.2.2 A livelihood comprises the capabilities, assets

(including both material and social resources) and activities required for a means of living.

2.2.3 Livelihood is defined as adequate stocks and flows of food and cash to meet basic needs.

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2.2.4 A household may gain sustainable livelihood security in many ways – through ownership of land, livestock or trees; rights to grazing, fishing, hunting or gathering; through stable employment with adequate remuneration; or through varied repertoires of activities.

3. Determinants of livelihood The initial determinants of livelihood strategy are: 3.1 Birth: Many livelihoods are largely predetermined by

accident of birth. Livelihoods of this sort may assign: in village India, children may be born into a caste with an assigned role as potters, shepherds, or washer people.

3.2 Gender : As socially defined, it is also a pervasive ascriptive determinant of livelihood activities.

3.3 Inherited livelihood: A person may be born, socialized and apprenticed into an inherited livelihood – as a cultivator with land and tools, a pastoralist with animals, a forest dweller with trees, a fisherperson with boat and tackle, or a shopkeeper with shop and stick. Each of these may create a new household or households in the same occupation.

4. The nature of human livelihoods4.1 The simple definition of a livelihoods as a means of securing

a living. It summarizes a reality which comes into focus as being complex as its parts are found and named, and its structure unraveled.

4.2 In our provisional anatomy of a household livelihood, we postulate four categories of parts:

People Their livelihood capabilities )Proprietorship

Activities What they do )

Assets Tangible (resources and stores)

And intangible (claims and access)

Which provide material and social means

portfolios

Gains or outputs

A living, what they gain from what They do

5. Key Elements of Livelihoods

Five key elements of Livelihoods are:

5.1 Creation of working days

5.2 Poverty reduction

5.3 Well-being and capabilities

5.4 Livelihood adaptation, vulnerability and resilience

5.5 Natural resource base sustainability

6. Rural Dilemma

6.1 Rural Poverty, Disease and Low Productivity

6.2 Feminization of rural areas = Feminization of agriculture = Feminization of poverty and disease (Youth exodus to cities)

6.3 Social protection (absolute poverty strategies) vs productive and sustainable livelihoods

6.4 Comparative advantage that does not translate to competitiveness

6.5 Spatial imbalances & Rural-urban disconnecting

6.6 Overdependence on subsistence agriculture

6.7 Food Insecurity.

6. Rural Dilemma

6.8 Limited access to off-farm employment

6.9 Skewed income distribution

6.10 Poor transport, basic services and market infrastructure

6.11 Low literacy rates

6.12 Climate change and ecosystem change

6.13 Threat to rural livelihoods

6.14 Vulnerability of rural sectors -agriculture, coastal resources, energy, forestry, tourism, and water

7.1 SRD Comparative Advantage: Competitive Disadvantage

Dependence on the export of primary products, absence of an industrial base, weak savings and investments, limited profit-earning capacity of capital, under-serviced basic and social needs (health, education, and social welfare)

8. Rural development and Land Reform: Addressing the Past, the Present and the Future

How can land reform redress injustices from colonial and apartheid regimes of dispossession and discrimination (racial/gender), the legacy of poverty and under- development, as well as tackle the challenges of population growth, increasing inequality, climate change and “financialisation” of the economic system.

9.1 Difference between agricultural economics and rural economics

Agricultural economics

Elementary unit of analysis- farm

Major fields of analysis Farm production Marketing of agricultural

commodities Demand for food

Rural economicsElementary unit of analysis- household with the farm as a typical subset of economic activity

Major fields of analysis Resource allocation by

household Choices of income

strategies Poverty and inequality

(de Janvry et al., 2002).

Cont…

Performance of product and factor markets

Linkages between agriculture and other sectors of the economy, and the rest of the world

Agricultural and food policy (de Janvry et al., 2002).

Emergence of performance of agrarian institutions

Income levels Income and food

security Satisfaction of basic

needs (access to public goods and services e.g health and education)

Intergenerational equity Quality (standard) of life

(de Janvry et al., 2002).

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%

World

Developed economies

Developing economies

Sub-Saharan Africa

Countries in Transition

Latin America and Caribbean

Near East and North Africa

Asia and the Pacific

South Africa

Economically active in agriculture as percentage of total economically activeRural population as percentage of total

Rural Population and Agricultural Employment in the World, 2004

Calculated from FAO, The State of Food and Agriculture 2006 (Presidency 2008 )

Structural adjustmentFree marketsGetting prices rightRetreat of the stateRise of NGOsRapid rural appraisal

(RRA)Farming Systems

Research (FSR)Food security & famine

analysisRD as process and not

productWomen in Develpt(WID)Poverty Alleviation

Rural Development Ideas TimelineAdapted from Ellis & Biggs (2001)

1970s1980s

Transformational approachTechnology transferAgricultural extensionGrowth role of agricGreen revolution (start)Rational peasants

1960s 1990s1950s

ModernizationDual economy model‘backward’ agricultureCommunity DevelopmentLazy peasants

Redistribution with growthBasic needsIntegrated rural develptState agric policiesState led creditUrban biasInduced innovationGreen revolution (cont)Rural growth linkages

Micro creditParticipatory rural appraisal (PRA)Actor-oriented RDStakeholder analysisRural safety netsGender & Devlpt (GAD)Environment and sustainabilityPoverty reduction

Sustainable livelihoodsGood governanceDecentralizationCritique of participationSector-wide approachesSocial protectionPoverty eradication

2000s

9.

10. Influence by Ideological Paradigm shifts

10.1 Neo-classical economics- well functioning markets versus market distortions and ‘imperfections’;

10.2 New institutional economics- linking equity and productivity

10.3 Livelihoods- a developmentalist version: development as a livelihood improvement and poverty reduction;

10.4 Livelihoods- a welfarist version: poverty alleviation, and social protection;

105 Radical political economy- development as agrarian transformation;

10.6 Marxism- the agrarian question, focusing on the transition to capitalism in agriculture (Cousins and Scoones, 2010)

11. GAPS: Asset-based Empowerment

The World Development Report (WDR 2008) indicates that

 The asset endowments of rural households have been low for generations, and they continue to decline in places. Market and government failures affecting the returns on those assets are pervasive. Adverse shocks often deplete already limited assets, and the inability to cope with shocks induces households to adopt low risk, low-return activities (2008:72).

Asset-based empowerment, the causal variables critical for self-reliance and sustainability (human capabilities, resource access and conditions of exchange): Human, social, natural, financial and physical capital;

External environment

Impact on livelihoods

Capital assets

NaturalSocial Human

Physical Financial

Situation of rural people

Vulnerability contextChanges in:•Resource stocks•Climate•Population density•Conflict•Political change•Technology•Markets•Disease incidence

InstitutionsStructures•Levels of government•NGOs/CBOs•Private sector•Traditional•DonorsProcesses•Laws•Policies•Incentives•ServicesLivelihood outcomes desired

•More income•Improved well-being•Reduced vulnerability•Improved food security

Livelihood strategies chosen•Natural resource based•(on-farm, off-farm)•Non-NR based (eg rents)

Implementation•Partnership arrangements

Impact on institutions

Impact on vulnerability

Impact on assets

influence influence

Negotiation on agreed common objectives, eg for projects or services

Negotiation on appropriate processes and structures for the strategies

Deciding appropriate roles, degree of self-help

12. System Failure:Interdependency of rural infrastructure

12.1 Telecommunication, agro-industry, rural electrification, and development initiatives for rural areas are often dependent upon each other.

development of rural telecommunications programs is dependent upon electricity resources in one form or another;

appropriate and adequate water pumping requires power for agricultural sector expansion and development;

cottage and other rural industries and agro-processing under the form of small rural businesses can increase the productivity by using mechanized/ electrified technologies; and

quality of education and healthcare delivery systems increase proportionally with improvements in RE and other infrastructure investment.

13. Conclusion Review land reform and agriculture as a defining concept of Rural

Development Redefine the driving agenda and the interconnectedness of land

reform, agricultural transformation and Rural Development Recognise and clarify the spatial, policy, institutional and relational

linkages (rural-urban linkages, household-community-municipal-provincial-national, rural development policy & macroeconomic framework)

Rural Demography & Livelihood Patterns: Addressing Poverty and Inequality. Poverty reduction as a means, not an end, a component of, but not a rural development strategy. Households as an entry point and unit of analysis for enhancing capabilities and sustainable development.

The value of the rural space & sustainable resources use: Leveraging potential to sustain livelihoods, nurture socio-cultural coexistence and enhance productive potential.

Combination of development initiatives ought to be implemented on the basis of strategic goals determined in the national agenda for global benefits.