Policies for sustainable development in the hillside areas of Honduras: a quantitative livelihoods approach

Abstract

In this article, we use data for 376 households, 1,066 parcels, and 2,143 plots located in 95 villages in the hillside areas in Honduras to generate information needed by decision makers to assess the needs and opportunities for public investments, and design policies that stimulate natural resource conservation. We develop a quantitative livelihood approach, using factor and cluster analysis to group households based on the use of their main assets. This resulted in seven household categories that pursue similar livelihood strategies. We use a multinomial logit model to show that livelihood strategies are determined by comparative advantages as reflected by a combination of biophysical and socioeconomic variables. While 92% of the rural hillsides population in Honduras lives on US$1.00/capita/day or less, households that follow a livelihood strategy based on basic grain farming are the poorest because they often live in isolated areas with relatively poor agro-ecological and socioeconomic conditions. Opportunities for off-farm work tend to be limited in these areas and household strategies that combine on-farm work with off-farm work earn higher incomes. Per capita incomes can be increased by improving road infrastructure, widening access to land, policies that reduce household size and dependency ratios, and adoption of sustainable land management technologies that restore soil fertility. We used probit models to show that the latter can be promoted by agricultural extension programs and land redistribution. Investments in physical assets should be directed toward households that pursue livelihood strategies based on off-farm employment or coffee production, while agricultural training programs are best focused on livestock producers. Copyright 2006 International Association of Agricultural Economics.

Household Livelihood Strategy Choices, Impact Factors, and Environmental Consequences in Miyun Reservoir Watershed, China

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“…Previous studies of rural household livelihood strategies have tended to divide households into categories on the basis of household income derived from different activities [7][8][9], or on the basis of asset use and labor distribution [10,11]. However, household and individual livelihood strategies are not fully-described only by income, asset use, or labor.…”

Livelihood Strategies for Coping with Land Loss among Households in Vietnam's Sub-Urban Areas

“…Following Van den Berg (2010) and Jansen, Pender, Damon, Wielemaker, and Schipper (2006), I assumed that a household's livelihood choice is determined by fixed or slowly changing factors, including the household's natural capital and human capital. In addition, other factors, in this case land loss and communal variables, were included as regressors in the model.…”

Household Livelihood Strategies and Implication for Poverty Reduction in Rural Areas of Central Nepal

“…Studies centered on the welfare outcome of a household's livelihood strategies have consistently found a positive relationship between livelihood diversification to the non-farm sector and poverty reduction [11,14,16,20,21]. There is also increasing evidence of the contribution of business or rural enterprises and commercial farming for minimizing rural poverty [7,10,12]. A number of authors have explored the influencing factors on the choice of a household's livelihood strategies [8,18,22,23].…”

“…To understand the poverty-livelihood nexus in rural areas of developing countries, several scholars have studied household livelihood strategies through different approaches, given different terminologies, and assessed their relevance to poverty reduction [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13]. They have classified household livelihood strategies based either on income quartiles [14], households' asset ownership [15,16], major livelihood activities [17], or on income composition [7,18,19].…”