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. iv LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS.
vii LIST OF TABLES .viii LIST OF FIGURES. ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION. 1 CHAPTER 2: STUDY GOALS AND OBJECTIVES. 4 CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEWS.
Geographic location and topography. Socio-economic conditions. 9 CHAPTER 4: RESEARCH METHODS. Multidimensional poverty measurement indicators.
Regulations and methods of identifying multidimensional poor households in Vietnam. Framework of potential factors affecting multidimensional poverty of the households. Gender of household head. Age of household head.
Education of household head. Occupation of household head. Households borrowed money from the bank. Data Collection method.
Data analysis method. Binary Logistic Regression. Descriptive statistics on surveyed households. Ethnicity of household head.
Gender of household head. Occupation of household head. Participation in agriculture extension activities. Households borrowed money from the bank.
Ability to access information by households. Age of household head. Number of dependant in the household. Education of the household head.
Average land area of the household. Factors influencing multidimensional poverty in Luong Thuong commune. Land area of the households. Access to information for households.
Increasing the land area of the households. Improving access to information for households. Renovation of agricultural extension. Sustainable poverty reduction for ethnic minorities.
Reducing the number of dependants in the household. 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.
Levels of poor households, near-poor households and medium households applicable during 2016-2020. The difference between Kinh and ethnic minority poverty widens. Description of a vicious poverty circle. Source: Rao và Chopra (1991).
Characteristics of surveyed households by criteria of capital-loan scale. Sampling design in Na Ri district, Bac Kan province. Time for field surveys. Interpretation of variables in the Binary Logistic Regression.
Relationship between independent variables and household belongs to multidimentional group. Description of quantitative variables. Percentage of dependency between poor households and non-poor households. Education level of household heads in Luong Thuong commune.
Comparing the average area between poor households and non-poor households. Model summary for factors influencing multidimensional poverty. Determining importance of variables in Binary Logistic Regression model. 46 viii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 3.
Map of study location. The indicators of the Global MPI. Conceptual model for potential factors influence multidimensional poverty of households in Luong Thuong commune. Gender of household head.
Occupation of household head. Participation in agriculture extension activities. Households borrowed money from the bank. Percentage of ability to access information by households.
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 2 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.
1 In order to successfully implement the hunger eradication and poverty alleviation, the government has implemented a number of concrete policies and programs of action, as well as in-depth studies on the causes of poverty. Since then, solutions to poverty reduction have also been explored by experts and scientists. In Vietnam, multidimensional poverty studies are not well developed and multidimensional poverty approaches are beginning to be approached [18]. Bac Kan is a mountainous province located in the northeast of the north with a natural area of 4,859.41 km2, in which agricultural land is 3,721.868 km2 and another land is 958.
There are 7 districts, 1 city with 122 communes, wards, towns in which 50 communes belong to the area III, 27 communes belong to the area II and 45 communes belong to the area I [1]. There are 1,421 villages and residential area. There are 2 poor districts assisted by the Program 30a and 58 especially difficult communes inherit from the Program 135. The population is 308,310 people including 7 ethnicities (Tay, Dzao, Nung, H‟Mong, Hoa, San Chay, Kinh), in which ethnic minority accounts for over 86% (Tay: 52.
The rate of poor household is considered highest in Vietnam. In the past few years of conducting the program of poverty reduction, with a tireless effort of departments, authorities, stakeholders and provincial residents, the affairs of reducing poverty have acquired some certain achievements. The rate of poor household reduced from 32.13% in 2011 down to 11. The rate of near-poor households reduced from 16.93% in 2011 down to 7.
This is a considerable effort of authorities of the executive committee (of party hierarchy), The Vietnamese Fatherland Front, departments, organizations, incorporations in the conduction of poverty reduction. 2 However, the poverty-escaping households are not really sustainable, the risk of re- poverty is still high, the number of poor households is large, the conduction of poverty reduction meets increasingly more difficult. The reduction rate of poor household is low, the rate of trained laborers is small, there are still unemployed people. Scientific application into practice is still limited.
Investment and construction progress of infrastructure in difficult communes is still inadequate, the rate of disbursement is still low. The conduction of poverty reduction and hunger elimination (by the national target program of districts and cities) most concentrated on assisting directly plants and pets, fertilizer supplies, buying machines or equipment, building farming cages, improving ponds for the poor and near-poor households but lacking building marked model to expand the scale. The study aims to 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 study, therefore, provide implications for developing solutions in the strategy of sustainable poverty reduction in the study area.
In that context, I decided to conduct the project “Factors influencing multidimensional poverty of households in Luong Thuong commune, Na Ri district, Bac Kan province, Vietnam”. 3 CHAPTER 2: STUDY GOALS AND OBJECTIVES Goal The goal of this study is to analyze factors influencing multidimensional poverty of households in Luong Thuong commune and propose solutions to reduce multidimensional poverty of households in the study area. Specific objectives To review potential factors that affect multidimensional poverty of households. To identify the factors that significantly affect multidimensional poverty of households in the study area.
To propose soulutions to reduce multidimensional poverty of households in the study area. 4 CHAPTER 3: LITERATURE REVIEWS 3. Geographic location and topography Geographic location Luong Thuong commune is located in the north of Na Ri district, about 24 km from the district center and 63 km from the north of Bac Kan City, with geographical coordinates: 22o16'42'' North latitude; 106o4'26'' East longitude. This commune is divided into 5 villages: Khuoi Noc, Na Lang, Vang Khit, Pan Xa, and Ban Giang.
The total natural area is 3,794.23 ha with the population of 2,036 people. - The East borders on Lang San commune. - The South borders on Lang San, An Tinh and Kim Hy commune. - The West borders on Kim Hy commune.
- The North borders on Thuan Mang and Thuong Quan commune.