This research is situated in the community of Vilcabamba in the province of Loja, Ecuador. Vilcabamba is a small village in the southern Andes of Ecuador, approximately 28 miles (45km) from Loja city. Many people were drawn to the area because of stories they heard about people there living to be over 100 years old. Books and articles have been written in attempts to establish the veracity of these claims and to explore why the people of Vilcabamba are living so long. This dissertation is a qualitative case study that explores how the recent surge of tourism and immigration in Vilcabamba is impacting the people and sustainable way of life of the village and its surrounding communities. Through gender analysis the study also explores if tourism and immigration are affecting men and women differently and the way that women respond to this impact. The literature review provides different lenses to understand what types of conflicts and opportunities are present in the area and how these conflicts affect the livelihood strategies of the locals. The methodological approach of this research is case study analysis, which explored what is happening to the people of the Vilcabamba community and their land. To explore this phenomenon, I used certain methods developed by ethnographers, such as field observation. The study is based on the experiences of four women living in poverty from the local community of Vilcabamba. I wanted to understand the vulnerabilities that exist for them. I explored the livelihood strategies of women in their everyday lives. The use of the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework assisted me in understanding the concepts of assets and vulnerabilities. This research is expected to contribute to the field of conflict analysis and resolution by elucidating the relationship between gender and tourism in Vilcabamba. It will bring awareness to the issues women experience that keep them rooted in poverty. An exploration of how other communities have met and overcome the challenges of tourism and colonization is presented and the final outcome suggests possible resolutions for social change.

Problem Statement: The world population is expected to rapidly increase, raising food security concerns across the world. This will impact Africa most severely. The use of innovative farming techniques and technology has proven to accelerate the production yields and improve resilience to vulnerabilities which impact agricultural productivity. The use of smart technologies in farming is mainly present among largescale commercial farms, with minimal representation in the smallholder farming sector. On the other hand, a substantial amount of food in developing countries is produced by small scale farmers. Research Objective: The purpose of the study is to investigate the usage of smart technologies by smallholder farmers in South Africa, and to establish how smart technology could support smallholder farmers in increasing productivity through a three-dimensional view that takes into consideration capital, labour, and land utilization. To this end, an interpretive research philosophy was adopted. Research Design: The study collected the data using semi-structured interviews. The sample for the study constituted of 10 smallholder farmers and 12 subject matter experts within the agriculture and technology domain. To strengthen rigour within the study, the interviews were supported by documents containing viewpoints about how technology is applied in the African context and how it may be introduced and ultimately applied in the South African context. The study employed a deductive approach to theory, applying the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA) as theoretical underpinning for the study. SLA consists of a pentagon of livelihood assets: physical, social, human, natural, and financial assets. The framework was extended to include technology as an asset due to its potential to contribute to improving the livelihoods of smallholder farmers. Findings: The study found minimal to no use of smart technologies by smallholder farmers in South Africa. The factors which limited the use of technology include PEST (Political, Environmental, Social and Technological) factors. To achieve successful usage of smart technologies, collaboration is required from government, the private sector, smallholder farmers, and communities. Research Contribution: The study aimed to expand on the limited literature on the use of smart farming in the context of smallholder farmers in a developing country context. In addition, it contributed to extending the pentagon of livelihoods to include smart technologies with respect to smallholder farmer livelihoods. Therefore, the findings of this study contributed to the broader body of knowledge. In addition, insights from this study may be gained by the Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, smallholder farmers, agricultural entrepreneurs and technologists in formulate developmental strategies and policies to improve the productivity of smallholder farmers as well as their livelihoods as a strategy to increase their contribution to food security in Africa while alleviating household poverty.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(地球環境学) / 甲第20594号 / 地環博第165号 / 新制||地環||33(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院地球環境学舎環境マネジメント専攻 / (主査)教授 星野 敏, 教授 柴田 昌三, 准教授 西前 出 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Global Environmental Studies / Kyoto University / DFAM

Child poverty remains a global challenge with millions of children living in extreme income poverty in multidimensionally poor households (UNICEF, 2019a:20). This prompted the international call under the Sustainable Development Goals to end extreme child poverty and reduce by half children living in multidimensional poverty by 2030 (UNICEF, 2016a:85). In Zimbabwe, Mushunje and Mafico (2010:261) emphasise the need to find innovative ways to reduce child poverty. The goal of the study was to explore and describe how asset-based community development can reduce child poverty in Bindura district, Zimbabwe. The study employed the explanatory sequential mixed methods research design, which combined quantitative and qualitative research approaches in a two-phased study. Survey and case study designs were adopted in the respective phases. Quantitative data was first collected by means of a survey from a sample of 73 heads of households. Qualitative data which explained and interpreted the quantitative findings was then gathered through field observations, document analysis and semi-structured interviews with 23 participants, namely nine heads of households, three key informants and 11 children. The findings show that the multidimensional and overlapping manifestations of child poverty in the health, education and child protection domains are rooted in the multiple deprivations that characterise the households in which children live, namely constrained income sources, low income, low consumption expenditure, overcrowded housing conditions, constrained access to water and sanitation, limited ownership of durable household goods, and lack of human, social, physical, financial and natural assets. The study concludes that assets are central to child poverty reduction in the study area. In this regard, asset-based community development is identified as a strategy that can be employed to combine assets to reduce child poverty. In this context, the study recommends guidelines for an asset-based community development approach embedded in the principles of the sustainable livelihoods approach to reduce child poverty in Bindura district, Zimbabwe. / Thesis (PhD (Social Work))--University of Pretoria, 2020. / Social Work and Criminology / PhD (Social Work)

Human activities are a major driver of biodiversity degradation and loss, especially in tropical forest areas, where forest-fringe towns and villages depend on the forests for their livelihoods. In order to reduce threats that human activities pose to biodiversity, livelihoods support programs are employed as economic incentives for biodiversity conservation. These programs support the livelihoods activities of local communities, with the aim of triggering favorable attitudes and behaviors towards conservation, and ultimately reduce biodiversity degradation. Their effectiveness as conservation tools has not been evaluated. I investigated the effects of livelihoods programs on conservation attitudes and the consequent effects on biodiversity in the Afadjato-Agumatsa and Atewa forest areas in southeastern Ghana. The study areas are coupled human and natural systems, which are excellent for research in the theoretical framework of biocomplexity in the environment. Using literature reviews and field visits, I documented the specific livelihoods support activities (LSAs) used for biodiversity conservation, their historical trend and geographical distribution in Ghana. I used ex-post costbenefit analysis to determine socio-economic estimates of the LSAs in the two forest areas. Since communities were not randomly assigned to the interventions, I employed quasi-experimental design to evaluate the effects of LSAs on environmental attitudes. I evaluated the effect of conservation attitudes on biodiversity at two levels. These levels included 1) functional biodiversity at the landscape level represented by mean Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) of forest; and 2) compositional biodiversity at the species level represented by species diversity of fruit bats. iv The earliest record of LSAs used for biodiversity conservation in Ghana was in 1993. I identified 71 different activities belonging to eight categories. Some of these activities are beekeeping, animal husbandry, crop farming, and snail rearing. Most LSA programs have been in northern Ghana. There was an increasing tendency to make LSAs part of every conservation program in Ghana and this satisfies the current policy of collaborative conservation. The socio-economic estimates of LSAs included: 1) capital investment; 2) net socio-economic benefits; and 3) the benefit-cost ratio. The per-community values of the three estimates were not different between the two study areas. The per capita values of capital investment and net economic benefit were not significantly different between the two study areas. However, benefitcost ratio per capita was higher in Afadjato-Agumatsa than in Atewa. Estimates of economic returns from LSAs were marginal but the perceptions of success were relatively high. Environmental attitudes in LSA communities and non-LSA communities were not significantly different, and this was confirmed by an estimate of infinitesimal effects of LSAs on forest conservation attitudes. Among LSA communities, benefit-cost ratio of LSAs predicted favorable forest conservation attitudes; and change in pro-conservation attitudes were significantly higher in communities that had active LSAs than in communities which had no active LSA. Mean NDVI of the forests decreased from 1991 to 2000 and decreased further but at a slower rate to 2010. Higher forest conservation attitudes predicted higher mean NDVI in 2010. Higher change in mean NDVI from 1991 to 2000 predicted higher change in mean NDVI from 2000 to 2010. Eleven of the 13 fruit bat species in Ghana were recorded in the study areas. Longer v distances between a local community and its forest predicted higher species diversity of forestspecialist fruit bats. The results indicate that LSAs have become a major contribution to Ghana’s current collaborative forest policy. The fact that perceptions of LSA success were moderate even though the economic returns from them were marginal suggest that other factors such as provision of employment, training in new skills and community cohesion played a part in how communities viewed the success as LSAs. Evaluations of conservation attitudes suggest that just participating in LSAs did not improve attitudes; but higher benefit-cost ratio predicted favorable conservation attitudes, and conservation attitudes were higher in communities that sustained their LSAs. Therefore, it may serve biodiversity conservation to invest in LSAs that can be sustained and involve the least costs to local communities. Primary production of the forests, a proxy for a functional habitat, continued to decrease. Preventing communities from locating closer to forests could improve fruit bat diversity, which contributes to natural forest regeneration. Improving conservation attitudes should be an objective of conservation at the landscape scale. On the basis of the results, I developed a conceptual model for forest biodiversity conservation in a biocomplexity framework. This model could be useful for evaluating conservation in tropical forest areas. Lessons from this study can be applied in other incentive-based conservation programs such as payments for ecosystem services systems and carbon market schemes. I suggest that this study be repeated after a decade and that other socio-political and biogeochemical variables be integrated into future studies.

Several sustainable development indicators have been used to monitor and measure the progress of various countries. Similarly, reports and data available about countries progress prove that development has not been equal in all regions.  On the brighter side, the data can be used to inform decision making in areas that are experiencing deficiencies. In this research, a decision support system(DSS) is built to help governments and NGOs to properly choose projects that align with the needs of the people. We approached this research by utilizing Abraham Maslow’s proven psychological framework on the hierarchy of needs as the main criteria for choosing projects for sustainable development. The system ranks development projects based on the needs priority and how much it has been fulfilled. It ranks projects that meet an urgent need that is also lacking fulfillment higher than other project alternatives. The social progress index (SPI), a comprehensive open data that measures the social progress of counties were correlated to the needs indicated by Maslow’s Hierarchy. The needs were then used as criteria in the AHP decision analysis model to build a classic DSS to aid in selecting the most appropriate development project.

The new philanthropy is increasingly seen as a panacea and an alternative source of global development finance for rural development, especially in developing countries. The theoretical underpinning of the new philanthropy entails the idea that the private sector, led by philanthropists and civil society organisations in social policy issues can lead to more effective outcomes through partnership. The existing literature on the new philanthropy mainly focuses on its economic or commercial impact. This is particularly the case in the rural parts of Ghana; there has been very little research on the new philanthropy’s impact on the livelihoods of the poorest segments of society. Therefore, this research investigates the impact of new philanthropy on the livelihoods of smallholder farmers in Northern Ghana in order to fill the gap. The study employed ethnographic research, utilising qualitative techniques involving 20 stakeholders in philanthropy and livelihood affairs and 100 smallholder farmers. The research findings suggest that there is a significant relationship between philanthropic sponsored interventions in Ghana and an increase in smallholder farmers’ yields. The few farmers who purchased improved seeds and other agricultural inputs registered significant increases. However, this study identified some bottlenecks inhibiting access to agricultural inputs by smallholder farmers. Majority of smallholder farmers revealed that they could not afford them (seeds, chemical fertilizer and other inputs) despite the subsidies. Furthermore, rainfall variability gives rise to fluctuating food production from one season to another; meanwhile, there is a lack of strategy from philanthropic practitioners to address the variability in rainfall. Through philanthropy, other methods of faming such as irrigation farming agroecology, and permaculture could be exploited to the benefits of smallholder farmers. The outcomes of this study have policy implications for philanthropic practitioners. This study shows that the failure to involve farmers directly in decisions that affect their livelihoods is a major cause of livelihood interventionist programme failures in Ghana. Thus, this study argues that understanding the socioeconomic dynamics in the Northern Region and amongst the farmers should be an important part of policy formulation for philanthropic involvements seeking to improve livelihood of smallholder farmers. Lastly, the study called for a separate policy framework for philanthropy that would have a key objective of mobilising private philanthropic resources to support steady economic growth and sustainable development, dealing directly with recipients. / Government of Ghana.

This thesis sheds some light on how cash and voucher assistance (CVA) can promote sustainable livelihood outcomes in protracted crisis settings, analyzing the case study of Northeast Syria. It aims to contribute to the design of CVA programming in Syria and similar contexts in a way that fosters sustainable livelihoods and advances self-sufficiency among affected populations. The two core concepts – CVA and livelihoods – are first conceptualized separately, followed by an extensive literature review, which provides an empirical perspective and identifies some channels through which CVA can promote sustainable livelihoods. Eight semi-structured interviews, representing the views of a donor agency, INGOs, the humanitarian coordination architecture, and a CVA network of practitioners, then provide in-depth insights into Northeast Syria specifically. While this thesis identifies four CVA instruments that are implemented by humanitarian organizations to promote livelihoods in Northeast Syria, it equally finds that the context is characterized by structural barriers which cannot be addressed by humanitarian CVA alone. To tackle structural barriers and account for the paradigm shift the Syrian crisis is undergoing, the international community needs to adjust its funding approach in a way that promotes longer-term thinking and sustainable livelihoods both in Syria and other protracted crisis settings.

This thesis investigates the perceptions of female migrant household workers situated in Saudi Arabia and how remittances can be a sustainable livelihood for them and their households. There has been limited research surrounding female household workers' own perceptions of sustainable livelihoods and particularly of those situated in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, this thesis aims to fill a research gap surrounding both Saudi Arabia and female household workers perceptions. The research is focused on understanding livelihood outcomes for these women’s households and what assets are important to maintain and enhance remittances as a livelihood strategy. The study is a case study that was conducted by semi-structured face-to-face interviews involving 18 female household workers from Africa and Asia. Furthermore, the study was highly influenced by the Sustainable livelihood framework and the findings suggested that remittances have a positive impact on livelihood outcomes in terms of intangible and tangible well-being. The study also explores the complex dynamics of remittances and assets whereas the findings regarding assets suggest that different capitals and assets have been highly important in maintaining and enhancing both each other and the option to use remittances as a livelihood strategy. Lastly, the perceptions of the interviewed women fall under the criteria of what a sustainable livelihood should entail and the findings further highlight knowledge brought by theories from the Sustainable livelihood approach and New Economics of Labor Migration.

Bangladesh, a country situated in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta (GBM), is one of the most vulnerable countries to climatic stressors and changes. Low lying coastal region in the southern part of the country is highly vulnerable due to its exposure to frequent and intense cyclones, and other hydro-meteorological coastal hazards, such as projected sea-level rise, storm surges, monsoonal flooding and waterlogging, and saline water intrusion. In addition, there have been significant infrastructure development and land use change across Bangladesh’s coastal regions since the 1960s that contributed to increase environmental risk and vulnerability of coastal communities. This dissertation examines the risks and vulnerabilities faced by the coastal communities, particularly small-scale fisheries and aquaculture-based communities, in Bangladesh and how the households and the government respond to manage these risks and vulnerabilities. Three specific objectives of this dissertation are: a) to explore the risk and vulnerability that coastal households face in Bangladesh in conjunction with main climatic hazards and changes; b) to understand households' temporary internal migration decision-making in the context of climatic stressors and socio-ecological changes; and c) to explore the extent to which social protection programs in the coastal districts of Bangladesh are responsive to environmental and climatic changes facing coastal dwellers, with a focus on whether such programs help households build adaptive capacity. This research is primarily based on a fieldwork in three coastal districts of Bangladesh in 2017. During the fieldwork, the researcher conducted a household survey of 720 households, focus group discussions, and key informant interviews. The three research objectives lead to three research papers. The first paper of this dissertation constructs household-level vulnerability and risk indices by applying the risk framework offered in the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). With the help of these indices, this paper shows the levels of risk of hazards vary among geographical units, income levels and occupational groups. The indices also show that although vulnerability is well-correlated with poverty, risks of hazards are high for upper-income households as well. Applying the New Economics of Labour Migration (NELM) theory and the more recent environmental migration framework proposed by Black et al. (2011), the second paper shows that various types of environmental and climatic stressors impact households’ decisions on temporary migration differently, and alongside environmental and climatic factors, traditional socioeconomic drivers of migration also play significant roles in households’ temporary migration decisions. The third paper applies the adaptive social protection framework and finds poor targeting efficiency and the inability of the social protection system in scaling up when needed. However, the analysis does show poor households benefiting from social protection programs were less likely to use adverse coping strategies and were more likely to adopt productive livelihood strategies including production innovations and diversification. This dissertation contributes to the methods of measuring and understanding risk and vulnerability specific to stressors, locations, income levels and occupations. It also sheds light on the importance of temporary migration as a risk management strategy that received less attention in the literature than permanent migration. Finally, it identifies areas to improve existing social protection programs to make them responsive to emerging risks and vulnerabilities. While addressing three separate but related topics, the papers are consistent in their implication for adaptation planning for coastal communities.