Macro Socio-economic Changes And Households’ Livelihood Strategies

Since 1990s, scientists persistently focus on how to resolve such problems as the rural area development, households’adaption and livelihood in ecologically fragile and poor rural areas. In traditional rural area, peasants hinge on the small peasant economy affected by social, economic as well as political factors, and they adjust their livelihood strategy according to their responses to some opportunities. It is a fact that the macro socio-economic changes affect households’choices. However, the related research did not explain the interaction process and mechanism well. Cognitive deficiency leads to locating deviation of the adaptive strategy drew up by the local government. Therefore, it is necessary to survey and study the interrelation between macro socio-economic changes and households’livelihood strategies in all aspects. Taking Danzamu, Shaerni, Keerma, Shidaan of upper Dadu watershed as typical villages, this dissertation focused on the rural household servey by making use of stratified random sampling survey and participatory rural appraisa and divided the household peasants into different types according to different characteristics. According to the division, this dissertation did a study on the interaction process and mechanism between macro socio-economic changes and households’livelihood strategies. This dissertation draws the following conclusion:I. The following are the characteristics of those experienced macro socio-economic changes. Firstly, there is some fluctuation for the population of the typical villages and the reproduction of the household. The number of the population grows, but the growth slows down and the family structure becomes simpler with fewer people. Secondly, influenced by such factors as policy, resource as well as market, workforce shifting presents some stage features. The workforce number slips down for the primary industry in the typical villages, while the workforce number for the secondary and third industries increases. With the rapid shift of the workforce, the workforce number for those three different industries stabilizes. On crop production, the grain yield of the typical village changes unobviously. The increasing degree of mountainside village is much more than that of valley village. At the same time, the planting structure also changes a lot. The wheat and konjac proportion decrease, while the proportion of corn increases. On the industry of planting forests or fruit, the output and planting quality of such fruit as pear, apple changes a lot. The market price affects fruit grower’s decision. And natural disaster influence the output. On livestock breeding,the household from the typical village enlarge their stockbreeding scale, and the total number of the livestock as well as the rate of domestic animals for sale changes a lot, too. On livestock breeding, the valley village differs greatly from Mountainside village, and livestock breeding is the most important way for households to increase their income. The total income of the households of the typical villages grows with fluctuation. The per capita income for the households from the valley village is much more than that of the mountainside village. The per capita income for Danzamu, Shaerni, Keerma, Shidaan increases steadily. The annual rate of growth for the mountainside village is much more than the valley village. Besides, the agricultural and forestry proportion declines obviously, while the proportion of the livestock breeding and secondary and third industry grows rapidly. The agricultural, forestry, and livestock proportion of the valley households is much lower than that of the mountainside village, while its secondary and third industry is much better. Abolishing the state monopoly of purchase and marketing of grain not only emancipates the productive forces, but also creates conveniences for non-agricultural livelihood. The marketization of the agricultural production factors makes production convenience and makes it possible to increase production. However, the households have to face the rise in price because of the complete marketization. Returning grain for green did not show a practical and ecological value in the typical villages. Abolishing taxation and giving subsidy did lighten the burden on the households to a certain degree, but agricultural subsidy contributes little to the rise in production and income. The new system of rural cooperative medical and health services does resolve such problems as the high cost of seeing a dactor and providing the aged, but it does not aim at the practical necessity of the households’livelihood. Making nine-year compulsory education basically universal does lighten the burden for the typical villages, especially the mountainside village. It is good for workforce shifting, because educational outlay is always the great pressure for the households. Good infrastructure construction is the focus of the Tibet anti-poverty project. But if the goverement only pay attention to the infrastructure construction and ignore exploiting potentialities for income rise, then we will be far away from our target.II. There are some stage features, regional and individual differences for responses to macro socio-economic changes. Natural resources and commercialization affect the households’livelihood greatly. The geographical condition of the mountain area is a great factor for the households’livelihood strategies. For different types of household peasants, their response strategies correlate with their choices. Livelihood diversification is the most popular response strategy. III. Livelihood assets is decisive to households’choice for livelihood strategy. The number of the workforce, the public infrastructure, special experiences, the proportion of the students affect the non-agricultural livelihood strategies positively. The per capita area of cultivated farmland, housing conditions, household production and the proportion of the aged also affect the households’livelihood strategies. And sociogram plays a more and more important role in improving households’livelihood level.Ⅳ. Livelihood diversification varies with the household types. For agricultural livelihood diversification, agricultural-dependent households, non-farming-dependent household and pure-agricultural household steadily decrease. For non-agricultural livelihood diversification, non-agricultural households, non-farming-agricultural household and agricultural-dependent household steadily decrease. For the whole livelihood diversification, the non-farming-dependent household, agricultural-dependent households, non-agricultural households and pure-agricultural households steadily decrease. The allocation of labor force and other factors lead female to be disadvantaged groups in non-agricultural diversification.Ⅴ.Macro socio-economic changes influence the changes of the households’ livelihood strategies. Households’livelihood diversification is an important way for peasants to adapt into macro socio-economic changes. State system, policy, economy and the background shape contribute greatly to the households’livelihood strategy. The domestic condition and other factors lead to household diversification.VI.The following are the most appropriate adaptive strategies for the government to take:stabilizing production price, cultivating new agricultural and social service organization, perfecting educational and medical care systems, setting up grass-roots for popularizing the agricultural technique, putting countermeasures of the soil testing and formula fertilizing subsidy policy into practice, cultivating new households, developing characteristic agriculture, etc. To different types of households, those pure-agricultural households or agricultural-dependent households could the potentiality of the traditional agriculture with the help of the governments’social service system. And to those non-farming-dependent household, they could optimize their non-agricultural activities and find new ways to increase their income. And to those non-agricultural households, they have to consolidate their fruit and strengthen their employment competitiveness.