Magister Artium (Development Studies) - MA(DVS) / Growing urban food insecurity has prompted many researchers, NGOs, international agencies and governments to advocate for urban agriculture as a livelihood strategy to improve the household food security of the urban poor. Urban agriculture is an instrument for ensuring greater food security and a livelihood strategy for urban households. In South Africa increased attention on urban agriculture is triggered by current trends of urbanization, economic instability, high unemployment rates among the urban poor, and high food prices. Unemployment and urban food insecurity are high in low-income areas. In the Cape Flats, households with no or little disposable income, are food insecure and vulnerable to food insecurity. Income and wage employment are the main determinants of food security in urban areas. However, urban agriculture projects by two NGOs assist communities to be resourceful. Abalimi Bezekhaya, an NGO assists individuals and communities to start and maintain their own community gardens while Soil for Life promotes home food gardens. Abalimi Bezekhaya and Soil for Life seek to address the urban challenge by promoting self-sustained agriculture for food security and livelihoods. There has, however, been little empirical evidence suggesting that urban agriculture projects improve the food security and livelihoods of participants. This study assessed the potential of urban agriculture to address food security, examined the ways in which agriculture is used as a livelihood strategy for household food security, determined other livelihood strategies and coping mechanisms assumed by gardeners to become food secure, and demonstrates the contribution of NGOs in promoting agriculture in poor urban areas. Furthermore, this study addressed the following research questions: do community and household gardens provide a way of improving food and nutrition security and in what way are these impacts observable within participating households. The research followed a mixed-method methodology. The literature is mapped out using international and local papers and empirical evidence collected on the subject. This study used the sustainable livelihoods approach as the theoretical lens through which to analyse the ways in which urban agriculture can be used as a viable livelihood strategy by urban gardeners. It also classified the constraints and opportunities, assets accessible, policies and institutions that exist, livelihood strategies and outcomes of the urban gardeners. The findings of the study reveal that community and home gardens contribute moderately to livelihoods and food security in Khayelitsha. The results also reveal that 85% of the gardeners were either moderately or severely food insecure. Furthermore, 76.67% of gardeners purchased their food from supermarkets and local shops. Urban agriculture therefore plays a supplementary role in addressing household food security in Khayelitsha. The potential of community and home gardens to contribute to urban household food security and livelihoods is limited access to land and government assistance. There is a need for the City of Cape Town and the Department of Agriculture to assist and strengthen the practice of community and home gardens in Khayelitsha.

<p>For close to a decade, Zimbabwe has experienced a protracted socio-economic crisis. Although it is affecting both rural and urban areas, major forms of formal safety nets by the Government and Non-Governmental Organisations have been confined to rural areas. On the other hand the virtual collapse of the formal food marketing system in urban areas and the high formal unemployment rates have contributed to increased vulnerability of low income urban households to food insecurity. Using qualitative research methods, the study set out to understand livelihoods of low income urban households in Dzivaresekwa. In particular strategies low income households employ to cope with the negative macro-economic environment prevailing in Zimbabwe.</p>

Since the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami devastated coastal areas of several countries in South East Asia, there has been renewed interest in disaster recovery operations. Although governments and aid organizations have increasingly focused on improving living conditions and reducing vulnerability to future disaster events during the recovery period, there has been limited understanding of what effective disaster recovery entails, and a lack of empirical assessments of longer-term recovery initiatives. Researchers, governments and aid organizations alike have increasingly identified the need for a systematic, independent, and replicable framework and approach for monitoring, evaluating and measuring the longer-term relief and recovery operations of major disaster events. Within this context, the research contends that a conceptualization of effective disaster recovery, referred to as ‘resilient disaster recovery’, should be built upon the holistic concepts of vulnerability, resilience and sustainable livelihoods. Using the resilient disaster recovery framework, the research aimed to develop an evaluative strategy to holistically and critically assess disaster recovery efforts. Using a case study of the 2006 Yogyakarta, Indonesia earthquake event, the research examined one long-term recovery effort in order to develop and test the usefulness and applicability of the resilient disaster recovery conceptualization and assessment framework. The research results further contributed to disaster recovery knowledge and academic literature through a refined conceptualization of resilient disaster recovery and further understanding of recovery as a process. The research used qualitative research approaches to examine the opinions and experiences of impacted individuals, households, and communities, as well as key government, academic and humanitarian stakeholders, in order to understand their perceptions of the long-term recovery process. Using the resilient disaster recovery approach, the research found that the recovery programming after the 2006 Yogyakarta earthquake contributed to reductions in visible manifestations of vulnerability, although the root causes of vulnerability were not addressed, and many villagers suffer from ongoing lack of access to assets and resources. While some aspects of resilience were improved, particularly through earthquake-resistant housing structures, resilience in other forms remained the same or decreased. Furthermore, livelihood initiatives did not appear to be successful due to a lack of a holistic approach that matched the skill and capital levels of impacted populations. Using the evidence from the 2006 Yogyakarta recovery effort, the research furthered knowledge and understanding of disaster recovery as a complex and highly dynamic process. The roles of a variety of actors and stakeholders were explored, particularly highlighting the role of civil society and the private sector in facilitating response and recovery. Furthermore, issues of conflict, the context and characteristics of place and scale, and the impact of disasters on income equality were explored. Through this research, an improved understanding of disaster resilient recovery and long-term recovery processes has been highlighted in order to facilitate improved and resilient recovery for future disaster events.

Tourism has become an important option for economic development and the cultural survival of aboriginal people, yet the academic work has overlooked an issue of cultural sustainability and the majority of the literature on indigenous tourism is from a non-indigenous perspective. Although the sustainable livelihood framework does not clearly address the cultural part of life, the approach requires that activities, such as tourism, are placed in a broader context so that they can be examined from an indigenous perspective on sustainability. The purpose of this study is to assess the role that tourism is playing in two indigenous communities' livelihood strategies in Taiwan from an indigenous perspective using the sustainable livelihood framework as an organizing framework. The examination of the evolution of livelihood strategies is the main focus of the study. A review of literature identifies weaknesses in the concepts of sustainable development and sustainable tourism and provides legitimacy for using the sustainable livelihood approach to examine the roles that tourism plays in indigenous people's daily lives. Culture is embedded in daily life and the approach allows the researcher to explore the meanings behind people's daily activities. Also, tourism needs to be placed in a broader context in order to identify whether any linkages exist between it and other sectors of the economy and how tourism can better fit in with exiting livelihood strategies. The research is a collaborative study of two Cou aboriginal communities (i. e. , Shanmei and Chashan) in central Taiwan using qualitative research methods. The sustainable livelihood framework is used as a vehicle for guiding research and analysis. Results indicate that Cou traditional livelihoods and their traditional social structure have been closely linked. The shift of Cou livelihoods from self-sustaining in the past to being linked increasingly to the global economic market system at present comes from a variety of external and internal factors (e. g. , policy, history, politics, macro-economic conditions). The promotion of tourism development and cultural industries by the government in recent years has provided aboriginal people with a new opportunity (tourism) in which they can make use of their culture as an advantage (culture as an attraction) to possibly reverse the inferior position. In addition to being an attraction for economic development, culture has many implications for the way things are done and for the distribution of benefits. In both villages, people employ a wide range of resources and livelihoods strategies to support themselves. Tourism has been incorporated into the livelihoods of both villages in forms of employment (regular and occasional) and various collective and self-owned enterprises (e. g. , restaurants, homestays, café, food stalls, handicraft stores and campsites). Tourism activities have the potential both to complement and to compete with other economic activities in various forms. Conflicts between tourism-related economic activities and other activities may not be obvious in terms of the use of land, water and time. The benefits and costs of each tourism activity experienced by different stakeholder groups (mainly by age and gender) vary, depending on different personal situations. The sustainable livelihoods framework was examined and used to assess the context and forms in which tourism might contribute to sustainable livelihood outcomes. Institutional processes and organizational structures are one main factor determining whether different assets, tangible and intangible, are accumulated or depleted on individual, household, and community scales. The comparison of the two cases revealed that, in the context of capitalist market economy in which people pursue the maximization of individual interests, the following situation is most likely to lead to sustainable outcome (socio-culturally, economically, and environmentally) in the context of indigenous communities. That is tourism enterprises need to be operated through institutions with a communal mechanism and through efficient operation of the communities' organizations based on collective knowledge guided by Cou culture. Sustainable livelihood thinking is useful to the concept of sustainable development because it can be used as an analytical and practical tool for guiding studies of environment and development. It also serves as a means of integrating three modes of thinking: environmental thinking which stresses sustainability, development thinking which stresses production and growth, and livelihood thinking which stresses sustenance for the poor. The approach facilitates examination of the reality of aboriginal people and poor people in rural and remote areas. The approach focuses on the local impacts of change, recognizes the complexity of people's lives, acknowledges that people have different and sometimes complex livelihood strategies and addresses benefits that are defined by the marginalized communities themselves. It acknowledges the dynamism of the factors that influence livelihoods: it recognizes that change occurs and people accommodate, learn from change and plan, adapt and respond to change. It focuses on accommodating traditional knowledge and skills to create conditions for marginalized communities to enhance their well-being. It assists in understanding that traditional knowledge and its innovation provide a basis for the development of coping mechanisms and adaptive strategies to buffer the forces which threaten livelihoods. The sustainable livelihood framework is useful because it places the interests of local people at the centre. Such an approach incorporates tourism as one component of development, particularly for indigenous people, and explores how positive development impacts can be expanded and negative ones can be reduced. However, unless supplemented, the framework may not do justice to the importance of culture and the prominent roles played by key individuals. Keywords: Indigenous people, sustainable livelihoods, culture, sustainability, Taiwan </>

Tourism has become an important option for economic development and the cultural survival of aboriginal people, yet the academic work has overlooked an issue of cultural sustainability and the majority of the literature on indigenous tourism is from a non-indigenous perspective. Although the sustainable livelihood framework does not clearly address the cultural part of life, the approach requires that activities, such as tourism, are placed in a broader context so that they can be examined from an indigenous perspective on sustainability. The purpose of this study is to assess the role that tourism is playing in two indigenous communities' livelihood strategies in Taiwan from an indigenous perspective using the sustainable livelihood framework as an organizing framework. The examination of the evolution of livelihood strategies is the main focus of the study. A review of literature identifies weaknesses in the concepts of sustainable development and sustainable tourism and provides legitimacy for using the sustainable livelihood approach to examine the roles that tourism plays in indigenous people's daily lives. Culture is embedded in daily life and the approach allows the researcher to explore the meanings behind people's daily activities. Also, tourism needs to be placed in a broader context in order to identify whether any linkages exist between it and other sectors of the economy and how tourism can better fit in with exiting livelihood strategies. The research is a collaborative study of two Cou aboriginal communities (i. e. , Shanmei and Chashan) in central Taiwan using qualitative research methods. The sustainable livelihood framework is used as a vehicle for guiding research and analysis. Results indicate that Cou traditional livelihoods and their traditional social structure have been closely linked. The shift of Cou livelihoods from self-sustaining in the past to being linked increasingly to the global economic market system at present comes from a variety of external and internal factors (e. g. , policy, history, politics, macro-economic conditions). The promotion of tourism development and cultural industries by the government in recent years has provided aboriginal people with a new opportunity (tourism) in which they can make use of their culture as an advantage (culture as an attraction) to possibly reverse the inferior position. In addition to being an attraction for economic development, culture has many implications for the way things are done and for the distribution of benefits. In both villages, people employ a wide range of resources and livelihoods strategies to support themselves. Tourism has been incorporated into the livelihoods of both villages in forms of employment (regular and occasional) and various collective and self-owned enterprises (e. g. , restaurants, homestays, café, food stalls, handicraft stores and campsites). Tourism activities have the potential both to complement and to compete with other economic activities in various forms. Conflicts between tourism-related economic activities and other activities may not be obvious in terms of the use of land, water and time. The benefits and costs of each tourism activity experienced by different stakeholder groups (mainly by age and gender) vary, depending on different personal situations. The sustainable livelihoods framework was examined and used to assess the context and forms in which tourism might contribute to sustainable livelihood outcomes. Institutional processes and organizational structures are one main factor determining whether different assets, tangible and intangible, are accumulated or depleted on individual, household, and community scales. The comparison of the two cases revealed that, in the context of capitalist market economy in which people pursue the maximization of individual interests, the following situation is most likely to lead to sustainable outcome (socio-culturally, economically, and environmentally) in the context of indigenous communities. That is tourism enterprises need to be operated through institutions with a communal mechanism and through efficient operation of the communities' organizations based on collective knowledge guided by Cou culture. Sustainable livelihood thinking is useful to the concept of sustainable development because it can be used as an analytical and practical tool for guiding studies of environment and development. It also serves as a means of integrating three modes of thinking: environmental thinking which stresses sustainability, development thinking which stresses production and growth, and livelihood thinking which stresses sustenance for the poor. The approach facilitates examination of the reality of aboriginal people and poor people in rural and remote areas. The approach focuses on the local impacts of change, recognizes the complexity of people's lives, acknowledges that people have different and sometimes complex livelihood strategies and addresses benefits that are defined by the marginalized communities themselves. It acknowledges the dynamism of the factors that influence livelihoods: it recognizes that change occurs and people accommodate, learn from change and plan, adapt and respond to change. It focuses on accommodating traditional knowledge and skills to create conditions for marginalized communities to enhance their well-being. It assists in understanding that traditional knowledge and its innovation provide a basis for the development of coping mechanisms and adaptive strategies to buffer the forces which threaten livelihoods. The sustainable livelihood framework is useful because it places the interests of local people at the centre. Such an approach incorporates tourism as one component of development, particularly for indigenous people, and explores how positive development impacts can be expanded and negative ones can be reduced. However, unless supplemented, the framework may not do justice to the importance of culture and the prominent roles played by key individuals. Keywords: Indigenous people, sustainable livelihoods, culture, sustainability, Taiwan </>

This study analyzed changes in livelihoods before and after tourism development at Khwai, Mababe and Sankoyo villages in the Okavango Delta. Specifically, it analyzed how people interacted with species like giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis), sable antelope (Hippotragus niger) and thatching grass (Cymbopogon excavatus) before and after tourism development. This analysis was expected to measure the effectiveness of tourism development as a tool to improve livelihoods and conservation. The concept of social capital, sustainable livelihoods framework and the Community- Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) paradigm informed the study. Qualitative and quantitative data were gathered through field-based research, using tools of participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and key informant interviews. Results indicate that local customs and institutions at Khwai, Mababe and Sankoyo ensured the conservation of resources in pre-colonial Botswana. However, British colonial rule (1885-1966) affected traditional institutions of resource use hence the beginning of resource decline. The British colonial rule and the first 15-20 years after Botswana’s independence from British rule saw an increase in resource degradation. Results also indicate that since CBNRM began in the 1990s, tourism development has positive and negative effects on rural livelihoods. On the positive side, tourism development in some ways is achieving its goals of improved livelihoods and conservation. Residents’ attitudes towards tourism development and conservation have also become positive compared to a decade ago when these communities were not involved in tourism development. On the negative side, tourism is emerging as the single livelihood option causing either a decline or abandonment of traditional options like hunting and gathering and agricultural production. Reliance on tourism alone as a livelihood option is risky in the event of a global social, economic and political instability especially in countries where most tourists that visit the Okavango originate or in Botswana itself. There is need, therefore, for communities to diversify into domestic tourism and small-scale enterprises. On the overall, tourism development through CBNRM indicates that it is a viable tool to achieve improved livelihoods and conservation in the Okavango Delta.

This research explores influences affecting livelihood decision-making of community members in rural Tanzania, especially the relationship between the decision-making process and conservation related actions and behaviours. The Theory of Planned Behaviour provides a framework to investigate such linkages. The selection of three villages within a study area which includes a formal conservation mechanism, Saadani National Park, provides a context for conservation policy, documented impacts on typical resource based rural livelihood activities and opportunities for livelihood diversification. The research documents the range of contextual and internal influences and their importance to people through reflection on both recent and potential future livelihood decisions. This research study employs a phenomenological qualitative research approach applied to a case study. Key informant interviews were conducted with two community leaders from each village, twelve senior tourism industry representatives from the three major local lodge operations and two representatives from the national park senior management team. Focus group discussions were also held in each village with a total of 82 participants. The groups were segregated by gender and age. Semi-structured interviews were held with thirty household representatives in each of the three study villages. Field data were supplemented with document analysis of materials related to local and regional community development and conservation initiatives. Results showed that in this resource based livelihood context, attitudes and perceived behavioural control emerged as the dominant influences on intended behaviour in part due to the importance of past experience on livelihood decisions. Participants expressed a lack of perceived behavioural control resulting from few livelihood options and changes in the environment resulting from external forces. Such perceptions of control, reinforced by past experience, led to attitudes that tended to be pessimistic or fatalistic. Secondary influences were a range of social norms including livelihood activities as hereditary occupations, notions of individual versus collective approaches to livelihood endeavours, and impacts of, and adaptations to, cultural and social change. Conservation had little direct influence on livelihood decision-making. The dominant attitude was one seeking to maximize returns from resource harvesting reflecting a priority on short-term necessity rather than long term sustainability. Relative to other external influences, people generally did not feel that their own use of resources played a significant role in the capacity of the resource to yield livelihood benefits. However, people did recognize environmental change and adapted their livelihood activities to maintain or maximize benefits. Such adaptations provide the basis for improving conservation behaviour through greater understanding and broadening livelihood options. Livelihood decision-making was also found to be highly constrained by the nature and scale of the local village economies. Scale restricts potential growth and limitations on land, and resources constrain outside private sector investment thus limiting expansion of wage employment. Significant influences from cultural and social norms were also found, especially with respect to the pursuit of hereditary occupations, the preference for individual versus cooperative enterprises and adaptations reflective of societal change. Information systems and flow were found to be relatively insignificant in the livelihood decision-making process of local villagers. / Graduate / 0366 / 0700 / 0768

Since the mid-2000s, the production of the pseudo-cereal quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa) for export has increased due to growing demand in the United States and Europe. To meet demand, many of those living in the Bolivian high plateau or altiplano have transitioned from traditional livelihood strategies to commercial quinoa production oriented at the international export market. The following looks at how Bolivians living in the community of Pampa Aullagas have adapted to commercial production by looking at three vignettes of different actors living in the community. Looking at traditional agropastoralists, teachers, and modern producers, this thesis seeks to understand the nuances and complexities associated with integration into the global export market. / text

Abstract: This study examines how differential accessibility to regional markets and natural resources affects smallholder livelihoods in the northeastern Peruvian Amazon, particularly in terms of household income diversification or specialization. A combination of qualitative and quantitative methods were applied to semi-structured smallholder household (N = 319) and community leader interview data collected in 40 communities in 2006-2007, in addition to change detection performed on Landsat satellite imagery (1987, 1993, and 2001). First, the dissertation explores changes in smallholder land use patterns across the study region during a period of profound macroeconomic changes and continual urbanization, finding that overall land use trends of agricultural abandonment reflected national reductions in agrarian subsidies. Second, based on interview data, household processes of income diversification and specialization were analyzed in two sections of the study area, the Itaya and Nanay basins. In the Itaya Basin, it was observed that smallholder livelihood specialization was aided by road development increasing transportation accessibility to important regional markets. In the more isolated Nanay Basin, livelihood choices were found to be influenced by processes of livelihood displacement caused by conservation efforts, in addition to remoteness and river seasonality. This study concludes by reflecting on the importance of the spatial relations of access to resources and markets in the region and in similar places in the developing tropics. This kind of information can help make national and regional policy decisions on such issues such as conservation, agrarian credits, road development, which may differentially affect smallholder livelihoods and their environments. / text

Poverty analysis in fisheries is dominated by assumptions of a linear relationship between fishing, income and poverty. Poverty is seen as a function of income, and income as a function of fish catch. Thus, the analytical frameworks to understand poverty in fisheries, and the policies enacted to reduce it, have focused on issues of overexploitation, regulatory mechanisms to maximize rent extraction, and technological innovation to improve fisheries’ productivity. This set of relations is underpinned by the assumption that improving fish catch per se would reduce fishers’ poverty. The study of fishing livelihoods on Lake Kossou in Côte d’Ivoire problematizes some of these assumptions. I revisit the “essentialization” of fishers with fish by utilizing the Sustainable Livelihood Approach as a lens of analysis, and by demonstrating that fishers’ livelihoods are based on a diversified portfolio of activities that span multiple sectors. Looking at livelihoods also questions the validity of the conventional “sites” of poverty analysis in fisheries (i.e. the boat, the landing site) and how these lead to misrepresentations of fishers’ livelihoods by emphasizing the upstream elements (catches) to the detriment of downstream activities in the value chain (processing and trading) that are crucial in the realization of fishers’ sustainable livelihoods. Looking at the complexity of fishers’ livelihoods sheds light on the relations between poverty (as an outcome variable) and vulnerability as a constant condition that is linked to access to multiple types of assets, the institutional contexts in which they operate, and the ways in which access to natural resources is constantly re-negotiated. To that effect, this study shows how access to Lake Kossou took a completely new meaning when the coffee-cocoa economy collapsed and young Ivorians saw it as an opportunity being stolen from them by Malian fishers. The context of post-colonial national identity formation (epitomized in the search for “Ivoirité”) served as political justification for claiming new rights to natural resources that had been relatively unimportant until then in economic terms. Finally, this study provides an innovative approach to poverty analysis by emphasizing its multiple dimensions, and by utilizing the statistical fuzzy sets methodology to construct multidimensional poverty indices.