MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF FORESTRY STUDENT THESIS Title FACTORS INFLUENCING MULTIDIMENSIONAL POVERTY OF HOUSEHOLDS IN LUONG THUONG COMMUNE, NA RI DISTRICT, BAC KAN PROVINCE, VIETNAM Major: Natural Resources Management Code: D850101 Faculty: Forest Resources and Environmental Management Student: Nguyen Lan Huong Student ID: 1453091144 Class: 59B Natural Resources Management Course: 2014-2018 Advanced Education Program Developed in collaboration with Colorado State University, USA Supervisor: PhD Le Dinh Hai Ha Noi, 2018 Page | i ABSTRACT The investigative result of interviewing 150 households (including 75 poor households and 75 non-poor households) in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Bac Kan province shows that the main causes on multidimensional poverty of households in study area include: (1) Average land area of the household, (2) Ability to access information by households, (3) Participation in agriculture extension activities, (4) Ethnicity of household head, and (5) Number of dependant in the household Based on this study, five groups of solution were proposed to contributorily help households in study area escape from poverty, including (1) Increasing the land area of the household (2) Improved access information for households (3) Renovation of agricultural extension (4) Sustainable poverty reduction for ethnic minorities (5) Reducing the number of dependants in the household These solutions can be used as valuable reference materials for determining policies of sustainable poverty-reduction for ethnic minority in Luong Thuong commune in particular and in Bac Kan province in general Keywords: multdimensional poverty, poverty escape, poverty relapse ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The first person that I would appreciate is my advisor Dr Le Dinh Hai, whom without, the study could not have been possible, for orientating me to tackle tough issues in fieldwork as well as at school, for expanding my knowledge and fulfilling my skills For giving me uncountably helpful support and devoted guidance throughout the entire thesis researching process I would also thank useful materials in Google that developed my understanding and background in statistical methods - a part of The Natural Resource Management sector Besides, I owe my friends and teachers in The Faculty of Forest Resources and Environmental Management for making a wonderful educating environment for me to study and thrive My thesis would not be completed and perfect without the kindness of authorities and civilians in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district Data and information about agriculture, society, economy, and climate of the area were cumulated by their unrelenting support Additionally, I am also grateful to forest rangers in Kim Hy Natural Reserve and Nam Xuan Lac Natural Reserve whom I have received their copious instructions about problems relating to my thesis, ranging from knowledge of forestry to feasible sustainable agriculture, from field surveys and data collection in the locality And finally, I want to deliver my gratitude to my family and colleagues in Action for Wildlife Organization They are my greatest source of motivation and energy, as well as the firmest foundation supporting me to pursuit my academic career Ha Noi, September 2018 Nguyen Lan Huong iii CONTENTS MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT i ABSTRACT ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii CONTENTS iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vii LIST OF TABLES viii LIST OF FIGURES ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION CHAPTER 2: STUDY GOALS AND OBJECTIVES 2.1 Goal 2.2 Specific objectives CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEWS 3.1 Biophysical conditions 3.1.1 Geographic location and topography 3.1.2 Climate 3.1.3 Natural resources 3.2 Socio-economic conditions 3.2.1 Population 3.2.2 Economy CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODS 10 4.1 Research framework 10 4.2 Theoretical basis 11 4.2.1 Relevant concepts 11 4.2.2 Multidimensional poverty measurement indicators 14 4.2.3 Regulations and methods of identifying multidimensional poor households in Vietnam 15 iv 4.3 Framework of potential factors affecting multidimensional poverty of the households 18 4.3.1 Ethnicity 19 4.3.2 Gender of household head 20 4.3.3 Age of household head 21 4.3.4 Household size 21 4.3.5 Dependent 22 4.3.6 Education of household head 22 4.3.7 Land area 23 4.3.8 Occupation of household head 24 4.3.9 Agricultural extension 24 4.3.10 Households borrowed money from the bank 25 4.3.11 Access information 26 4.4 Data Collection method 26 4.5 Data analysis method 29 4.5.1 Descriptive Statistics 29 4.5.2 Comparative analysis 30 4.5.3 Binary Logistic Regression 30 CHAPTER 5: RESULT 35 5.1 Descriptive statistics on surveyed households 35 5.1.1 Ethnicity of household head 35 5.1.2 Gender of household head 36 5.1.3 Occupation of household head 37 5.1.4 Participation in agriculture extension activities 37 5.1.5 Households borrowed money from the bank 39 5.1.6 Ability to access information by households 39 5.1.7 Age of household head 41 5.1.8 Household size 42 v 5.1.9 Number of dependant in the household 42 5.1.10 Education of the household head 43 5.1.11 Average land area of the household 43 5.2 Factors influencing multidimensional poverty in Luong Thuong commune 44 CHAPTER 6: DISCUSSION 47 6.1 Discussion 47 6.1.1 Land area of the households 47 6.2.2 Access to information for households 48 6.2.3 Agricultural extension 49 6.2.4 Ethnicity 49 6.2.5 Dependant 50 6.2 Proposed solutions 50 6.2.1 Increasing the land area of the households 50 6.2.2 Improving access to information for households 51 6.2.3 Renovation of agricultural extension 51 6.2.4 Sustainable poverty reduction for ethnic minorities 52 6.2.5 Reducing the number of dependants in the household 54 CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSION 55 REFERENCES 56 APPENDIXES: PICTURES OF THE FIELD TRIP 59 vi LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS DFID Department for International Development ESCAP Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific FAO Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations HDI Human Development Index MPI Multidimensional Poverty Index OPHI Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative SPSS Statistical Package for the Social Sciences UN United Nation UNDP United Nations Development Programme VND The ISO 4217 currency code for the Vietnamese Dong WTO World Trade Organization vii LIST OF TABLES Table 4.1 Levels of poor households, near-poor households and medium households applicable during 2016-2020 17 Figure 4.4 The difference between Kinh and ethnic minority poverty widens 19 Figure 4.5 Description of a vicious poverty circle Source: Rao Chopra (1991) 22 Table 4.2 Characteristics of surveyed households by criteria of capital-loan scale 25 Table 4.3 Sampling design in Na Ri district, Bac Kan province 27 Table 4.4 Time for field surveys 28 Table 4.5 Interpretation of variables in the Binary Logistic Regression 32 Table 5.1 Relationship between independent variables and household belongs to multidimentional group 35 Table 5.2 Description of quantitative variables 41 Figure 5.7 Percentage of dependency between poor households and non-poor households 42 Figure 5.8 Education level of household heads in Luong Thuong commune 43 Figure 5.9 Comparing the average area between poor households and non-poor households 44 Table 5.3 Model summary for factors influencing multidimensional poverty 45 Table 5.4 Determining importance of variables in Binary Logistic Regression model 46 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 3.1 Map of study location Figure 4.1 Research framework 10 Figure 4.2 The indicators of the Global MPI 15 Figure 4.3 Conceptual model for potential factors influence multidimensional poverty of households in Luong Thuong commune 18 Figure 5.1 Gender of household head 36 Figure 5.2 Occupation of household head 37 Figure 5.3 Participation in agriculture extension activities 38 Figure 5.4 Households borrowed money from the bank 39 Figure 5.5 Percentage of ability to access information by households 40 Figure 5.6 Percentage of ability to access information by households between poor households and non-poor households 41 ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Poverty is a paradoxical state Recognizable in the field for any sensitive observer who travels in remote rural areas and urban slums and meets marginalized people in a given society, poverty still remains a challenge to conceptual formalization and to measurement that is consistent with such formalization The analysis of poverty is multidisciplinary It goes from ethics to economics, from political science to human biology, and any type of measurement rests on mathematics (Louis-Marie Asselin, 2009) [17] In order to comprehensively assess household poverty, household poverty studies should be considered and analyzed according to different criteria Thus, in addition to traditional research methods, the assessment of household poverty is based not only on the common criteria of income and expenditure, but also on the level of "multidimensional poverty" through the social aspects of residential life with the gaps that they may face such as social security, education, health, housing, social security, and security Because of that, in recent years, the Multidimensional Poverty Index has been used by scientists around the world as a tool to identify poor households and, on that basis, proposes solutions to reduce poverty At present, nearly billion people in Vietnam still live in poverty, lacking basic education, nutrition, and health Poverty is one of the major barriers to the equalization of human, community and national development Poor people often have no access to social services such as employment, education, healthcare, information and so on That makes them less likely to escape poverty with better access to information, the chances of escaping poverty will be higher than those with no access to information 6.2.3 Agricultural extension The local authorities are fully equipped with guidance sessions to improve the knowledge of farmers on how to produce effective agriculture However, the extension of agricultural extension depends on many reasons If people implement and implement extension, their agricultural land will be provided with all necessary elements such as water, pesticides, disease prevention and correct harvesting Harvesting has a huge impact on local agriculture For example, if the villagers participate in the extension, the whole village will plant the tree at the same time, then the whole village will harvest the same crop If people not participate in extension, people often use old seedlings and the time of planting of different households Firstly, the old tree species of local people will take quite a long time to develop (about or 10 months / crop) However, nowadays new crop varieties can be harvested in a short time, people can produce crops per year (for upland rice) and crops per year (for paddy rice) Secondly, the different planting times will lead to the different harvest times of the households Partially affected by livestock and poultry from other households These will affect productivity and quality in agricultural production 6.2.4 Ethnicity The Tay ethnic group accounts for the largest number of ethnic groups In addition, there are more ethnic groups from the Nung, Dzao, H‟Mong and Kinh ethnic groups Few families reside in one area, and in one village there are at least two or three families residing together They live together, united together Different habitats, including high mountainous areas, mountainous areas, and other areas, will have different ethnic groups Ethnic groups will have different cultures, habits 49 of living, ways of farming, etc For instance, for the H'Mong, older households live on upland fields In the household, men work on average, women often work more, including shifting cultivation Another example, for the Nung, they grow mainly ordinary rice, glutinous rice, corn, potato and cassava are grown less 6.2.5 Dependant The greater the number of dependents, the more negatively they will affect the lives of ethnic minorities Dependents include children, the elderly, and vulnerable groups In particular, the elderly and children are unable to work because of inadequate health in order to participate in production The vulnerable groups include people with disabilities, mental retardation for many reasons such as inbreeding In general, there are many variables related to factors (land area, access to information, extension, ethnicity and dependents) affecting the general situation in the locality In fact, the land area is the most affected because more than 90% of people are dependent on agriculture 6.2 Proposed solutions 6.2.1 Increasing the land area of the households To solve the difficulty in increasing land scale of the ethnic minority household, it is essential to concentrate on: - Helping the poor household of ethnic minority increase land productivity, develop agricultural production in depth in aspects: (i) Increase planting index; (ii) Increase tree and castles per an area unit; (iii) Focus on acquiring optimal investment scale in agriculture effectively, reducing cost per area unit, help the poor get more profits from investment - Continuously conducting and completing the policy of land assistance and production, water for daily activities for the poor ethnic minority and the poor household in commune, village especially difficult according to the Decision of Prime Minister (2013) 50 - Giving mechanism, policy warranting the production land for the poor During planning and conducting project of economic-social development with withdrawal of farmer production land, solutions to planning and distribution residents appropriately to those whose land was withdrawn and those households who are affected by projects as long as the resident inherit profit from those projects This not only warrant the resident to have production land or to be solved with unemployment, to have stable income, escape from poverty sustainably - Conducting assistance policies for the poor effectively, especially juridical services related to land through ambulatory helping times of juridical assistance; monitoring the helping results based on Decision of Prime Minister (2012) about juridical assistance policy for the poor and ethnic minority in the period of 2013-2020 6.2.2 Improving access to information for households Investing, enhancing radio broadcasting base station; developing telecommunication internet in remote areas, mountainous areas, to enable the poor, the ethnic minority and those living in difficult conditions of economy-society to get access to information services, use telecommunication equipments and broadcasting; helping them understand and know about their rights and obligations, actively getting access to assistance policy of the state and head forward to escaping from poverty 6.2.3 Renovation of agricultural extension Enhancing ability of officers in agricultural extension hierarchies: training, enhancing profession of officers in agricultural extension hierarchies; focusing on raising knowledge of the market and the skill of service provision and technique consultancy; investing in infrastructure, equipment to serve agricultural extension activities The main equipments are mainly computers, projectors for training transference and tools for artificial insemination and to serve program of developing crossbred cow and lean pigs 51 Innovating methods and content of agricultural extension based on demand: it must be stated that success of agriculture in the progress of innovation resulted from positive and important contribitions of Vietnam Agricultural Extension System which plays a role as a connection between the state and scientific research office with farming household and market This is the consultance system, introducing knowledge and allege of the Party, State, providing information and tranferring scientific techniques progress and tradingproduction experiences to the farmers in socialist-oriented market economy Agricultural extension contributed to developing household economy, eliminating hunger and reducing poverty, enhancing living standard of farmers in mountainous area in particular and other areas in general Carrying out implementation effectively specific policy of province on building new countryside and developing goods production toward the direction of technical and technological progress application, making products with trademarks and competitiveness to increase income for residents in the countryside Making policy to stimulate officers in the basic agricultural extension: giving policies to attract engineers expected on agricultural and agricultural extension, especially the local people working there Standards and regimes to the agricultural extension base officers are necessarily clear and stimulative Besides, because the farmers are willing to pay partly the service cost, it is essential to determine the number and the way of expenditure and distribution rate appropriate for benefits of direct participants and agricultural extension office 6.2.4 Sustainable poverty reduction for ethnic minorities The life of the ethnic minority in Luong Thuong commune is full of difficulty Three factors essential to developing an economy and enhancing living condition are in difficulty, they are small production area, no traffic road, and limited knowledge of 52 intensive cultivation The production land is small, mainly for growing cassava and corn Many places in the high mountainous area have no area for rice The traffic in villages is mostly pathway Due to living in the high mountain and remote forest, the residents get lack of information and assess to scientific technique, leading to low productivity in production The state has made various assistance policies but mostly prevent the resident self-enjoy only Conducting project of growing forest and product development is still difficult for local households due to scarcity of production land To help ethnic minority reduce poverty sustainably, it is necessary to follow certain directions: First, sustainable poverty reduction for an ethnic minority is attached to effective use of assisting capitals from the Government At the moment, the Government is carrying out many poverty reduction programs from governmental capitals, in which there are many specific programs for ethnic minority Poverty reduction programs have acquired some considerable achievements However, the connection amongst programs is not highly effective This is the basic capital source for the poor so enforceable solutions to using the capitals effectively are necessary Second, sustainable poverty reduction of ethnic minority must be attached to the conservation and development of traditional culture features and ecotourism development The ethnic minority has various cultural traditions being protected and developed, necessarily concerned to keep investment, improve and exploit the serve ecotourism and local culture This is strategic direction to reduce poverty in sustainability Building up program of investment, development and poverty reduction in the local area with large source, regarding the village as the center Concentrating on investing in the most difficult ethnic minority; thoroughly investigating characteristics of each village, each of peoples, leading factors, spreading channels, connection ways amongst community, local advantages, improving directions, 53 diversification strategy, risk reduction, conditions of absorbing new practices in the local people (the poor and small producers) before setting up any projects for the poor in the areas of ethnic minority 6.2.5 Reducing the number of dependants in the household The high rate of dependent people means high scale of household, in which the number of people in the household is high whereas they not have enough production materials Therefore, distribution of labor appropriate for effective time of working is virtually impossible, as a consequence, labor productivity cannot increase, making household easily return to poverty Luong Thuong commune is typical of a mountainous commune where the ethnic minority lives with unequal intellectual, the residential awareness of population-family planning is still limited Quality enhancement of population-family planning affairs of the province needs to be concerned by the Party hierarchy and authorities to raise the residential awareness that having crowd of children is a burden on the society and family themselves Then, they volunteer to comply with family planning To this, consolidation of officers responsible for provincial population-family planning affairs is necessary, they should be enabled to be educated Partners in population-family planning should be ethnic minority of the local because they know exactly the local geography, understanding the local costume, language so they can easily share, make credit and agreement amongst Peoples 54 CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSION Multidimensional poverty of households will cause a lot of total material and spiritual life for the people In addition, this is also a macroeconomic issue of a country, including Vietnam Multidimensional poverty of households is a problem that hinders the development and growth of the national economy in the present and in the future The formulation of policies and solutions contributing to poverty reduction This is not just a personal matter, it is a big problem for the whole society, so this requires the cooperation of all people and authorities Hunger eradication and poverty reduction must be carried out thoroughly and in parallel with each stage of socio-economic development The investigative result of interviewing 150 households (including 75 poor households and 75 non-poor households) in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Bac Kan province shows that the main causes on multidimensional poverty of households in study area include: (1) Average land area of the household, (2) Ability to access information by households, (3) Participation in agriculture extension activities, (4) Ethnicity of household head, and (5) Number of dependant in the household Based on this study, five groups of solution were proposed to contributorily help households in study area escape from poverty, including (1) Increasing the land area of the household (2) Improved access to access information for households (3) Renovation of agricultural extension (4) Sustainable poverty reduction for ethnic minorities (5) Reducing the number of dependants in the household These solutions can be used as valuable reference materials for determining policies of sustainable poverty-reduction for ethnic minority in Luong Thuong commune in particular and in Bac Kan province in general 55 REFERENCES [1] Ngo Trung Kien (2016), “Multidimensional Poverty Reduction Solutions in Bac Kan Province”, Master Thesis; [2] Bac Kan People's Committee (2016), “Sustainable Poverty Reduction Program, 2016-2020”; [3] Bac Kan People's Committee (2017), “Plan for implementing the national target program on building new rural Bac Kan province in 2016-2020”; [4] People's Committee of Luong Thuong Commune (2018), “Report on socioeconomic development, national defense and security in the first half of 2018, direction of the months of 2018”; [5] Nguyen Thi Nhung (2012), “Poverty Alleviation for Socio-Economic Development in the Northwestern Provinces of Vietnam”, PhD thesis; [6] Hoang Trieu Hoa (2014), “Sustainable Poverty Reduction in Vietnam: Support from Education and Health Policy”, The Vietnamese Journal of Economic Forecasting, No 12; [7] Nguyen Van Pham (2013), “Poverty line and poverty measure in some countries”, General Statistics Office of Vietnam; [8] Dang Nguyen Anh (2018), “Multi-dimensional Poverty in Vietnam: Some Policy and Practical Issues”; [9] Le Đinh Hai (2017), “Solutions to overcome poverty for 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(Unit: VND) Yes No Transport (Number) Bicycle Motorcycle Other means of transport Access information Television Radio Phone or Telephone WIFI / Internet 10 11 62 Answer (x or number) Note III Institutional and policy factors Which kind of incentives did you receive? And amount? Does the Government have any policies for poor households/ non-poor households? How? (poverty-alleviation, etc) Are they important for your family? What you think of the local poor support policies? (Write reasons mentioned in an order of priority) Interviewee’s Signature ………………………… 63 ... identify the main factor influencing multidimensional poverty of households and propose solutions to overcome poverty in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Binh Phuoc province The findings of this... households in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Bac Kan province, Vietnam? ?? CHAPTER 2: STUDY GOALS AND OBJECTIVES Goal The goal of this study is to analyze factors influencing multidimensional poverty. .. The investigative result of interviewing 150 households (including 75 poor households and 75 non-poor households) in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Bac Kan province shows that the main