FACTORS AFFECTING THE INCOME OF HOUSEHOLDS IN THE COASTAL SANDY AREA OF THUA THIEN HUE PROVINCE
Abstract
Based on livelihood approach and using household survey data, this study mainly focuses on the assessment of factors affecting the income of households in the Coastal Sandy Area of Thua Thien Hue Province. Findings indicated that besides the assets, the livelihood strategies significantly contributed to considerable differences of the household income between household groups and among study sites. Although agriculture–based strategy is one of the most popular among livelihood strategies, there are considerable differences. Thanks to more specialization on livestock, non-farm business - aquaculture, the better-off category, has higher income. By contrast, due to more dependence on food crop, wage work and migration, income of the poor is lower. These findings implicate that in order to improve the poor's income, the government should introduce the policy to raise the poor’s capacity and their accessibility so that they could diversify their income sources, especially livestock and non-farm income. In practice, the support policies introduced by the government have positively influenced household income, but these general policies cannot meet the development needs from various locations as well as different household categories because there is marked difference in livelihood assets, human source, landholding, financial and social capitals.
Keywords: household, livelihood, assets, income
References
. Ashley, C & Carney, D., Sustainable Livelihoods: Lessons from early experience DFID, 1999.
. Carswell, G., Agricultural Intensification and Rural Sustainable Livelihoods: A “Think Piece”, IDS Working paper, No.64, (1997).
. Davies, S., Adaptable Livelihoods: Coping with Food Insecurity in the Malian Sahel, London: Macmillan Press, 1996.
. Dercon, S. and P.Krishnan., Income Portfolios in rural Ethiopia and Tanzania: choices and constraints, Journal of Development Studies, 32, 6, (1996), 850-875.
. DFID, Sustainable Livelihoods Guidance Sheets http://www.livelihoods.org, 2000a.
. Duflo, E., Poor but rational?, Mimeo, MIT, 2003.
. Ellis, F., Household strategies and rural livelihood diversification, Journal of Development Studies, Vol.35, No.1, (1998), 1–38.
. Ellis, F., Rural livelihoods and diversity in developing countries, Oxford: OUP, 2000.
. Hart, G., The Dynamics of Diversification in an Asian Rice Region, Chapter 2 in B. Koppel et al. (eds), Development or Deterioration?: Work in Rural Asia, Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Reinner, 1994.
. Morduch, J., Consumption Smoothing Across Space: Tests for Village-Level Responses to Risk, Harvard University, 1991.
. Morduch, J., Risk production and saving: Theory and evidence from Indian households, Mimeo, Harvard University, 1993.
. Morduch, J., Income smoothing and consumption smoothing, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 9(3), (1995), 103-114.
. Moser, C.O.N., The Asset Vulnerability Framework: Reassessing Urban Poverty Reduction Strategies, World Development, Vol.26, No.1, (1998), 1-19.
. Reardon, T., Using Evidence Household Income Diversification to Inform Study of the Rural Non-farm Labor Market in Africa, World Development, May, 1997.
. Rosenzweig, M. and H.Binswanger, Wealth, Weather Risk and the Composition and Profitability of Agricultural Investments, Economic Journal, vol.103, (1993), 56-78.
. Scoones, I., Sustainable rural livelihoods: A framework for analysis, IDS Working Paper No.72. Brighton: IDS, 1998.
. Singh et al., Agricultrual Household Models. Extensions and Applications, Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press. (1986), 17-69.
