livelihoods, food security, equality, SW Ethiopia, Aisa, Jimma 2018

1. Food
?
Aisa O. Manlosa
Email: aisamanlosa@gmail.com / manlosa@leuphana.de
Linking livelihoods, food security, and social equality

2. Why are livelihoods important?
People have
goals and
they act on
those goals
People use
resources or capital
assets
People make
a living and
achieve well-
being

3. Outline of presentation
Livelihood strategies
• Why focus on livelihoods? What livelihoods were identified?
Coping strategies
• How do smallholder farming households cope with
livelihoods-related problems?
Gender and social relationships
• How does gender and differences in socioeconomic status
affect abilities to undertake livelihoods and be food
secure?

4. LIVELIHOOD STRATEGIES
IDENTIFYING TYPES OF LIVELIHOOD STRATEGIES AND LINKING THEM
WITH CAPITAL ASSETS AND FOOD SECURITY

5. Livelihood strategies – main findings
The majority of households depended on diversified smallholder
farming for their livelihoods.
These livelihoods typically combined food crops and cash crops.
Food crops such as maize, sorghum, and teff were mainly for
household consumption. Cash crops such as coffee and khat were
mainly for selling to earn income.
The capital assets households owned influenced the types of
livelihood strategies they were able to undertake. Size of farm field,
ownership of coffee plots, and engagement in sharecropping were
some of the most important capital asset determinants.
Livelihood strategies influenced household food security. The
higher the number of crops in a strategy, the better the food security
status.
Education and gender of household head also influenced food
security.

6. Table 1. Diverse crops in smallholder farming livelihoods.
Main crops Mean
harvest +
standard
deviation
Percentage
of harvest
used for
subsistence
Percentage
of harvest
sold
Maize 285 + 459 93 7
Teff 100 + 153 98 2
Sorghum 84 + 157 95 5
Barley 11 + 37 99 1
Wheat 10 + 39 100 0
Coffee 170 + 320 23 77
Khat 131 households
had khat
Some khat was
used by the
households
Most khat was
produced for the
local market
Livelihood strategies: crops and types

7. Livelihood
strategies: crops
and types
Fig 1. Composition of
livelihood strategies.

8. Livelihood strategies: crops and types
Fig 2. Groupings of households according to their livelihood
strategies.

9. Livelihood
strategies and
capital assets
Fig 3. Capital asset
variables with strong
correlations with PCA
axes at p<0.01.

10. Livelihood
strategies and
food security
Fig 4. Gradient of
food security
(measured by HFIAS
scores) corresponding
with livelihood
strategies.

11. Implications
To strengthen food security
Support for crop diversification needed
Better access and control of key capital
assets (e.g. land) required

12. COPING STRATEGIES
UNDERSTANDING HOW HOUSEHOLDS COPE WITH
LIVELIHOODS-RELATED PROBLEMS AND HOW COPING
STRATEGIES AFFECT THEIR RESILIENCE

13. Two types of situations when households need to
cope
When capital assets are
lacking. How can people
undertake livelihoods?
When food is lacking. How can
people eat?

14. PEOPLE IMPLEMENT
COPING STRATEGIES
To cope is to deal with something difficult
Coping strategies are actions undertaken by households or individuals to reduce
the negative effect of a problem
This often involves drawing on the capital assets one has to mitigate a type of lack
in a process called capital asset substitution.
In some cases, a household needs to make different types of substitutions.
This has an effect on a houehold‘s capital asset base and their resilience.

15. Fig 6. Process for coping and feedbacks.

16. Coping strategies – main findings
Challenges associated with
the natural capital are the
most frequently mentioned
reasons for needing to
cope.
Coping strategies that
erode capital assets in the
process of substitution,
undermine resilience and
food security. The poor are
particularly vulnerable to
this viscious cycle, but
even the better off are not
exempted.

17. Table 2 Most frequently mentioned livelihood problems, coping strategies, and
feedbacks.
Problem related
to capital assets
Coping strategies Capital asset
substitution
Feedback
Wild animal pests* Increasing farm labor
input (i.e. didaro) /
sharecropping
Social for human 0, + / 0, -
Lack of cash Farm wage labor / selling
coffee
Human for economic 0
Lack of oxen due to
diseases
Oxen sharing / buying
new oxen
Social for physical 0, + / -
Lack of farmland* Sharecropping Social for natural 0, +, -
Low soil fertility* Fertilizer application Economic and physical for
natural
-
Lack of farm labor Sharecropping Social for human 0, +, -
Capital
asset
substitution
(Notes:
* to indicate livelihood problem related to natural capital
In the feedback column, 0 means capital asset is maintained, + means capital asset is grown, and – means capital asset is
eroded.

18. Table 3 Some livelihood problems and demonstrative quotations.
Livelihood
problems
Quotations
Wild animal pests* “It’s like lending my other hand to another.”
Lack of oxen due to
diseases
“We spend money to buy cows and oxen and then they die. Our
assets decrease. Once the livestock are dead, we cannot buy [oxen]
again because we do not have the money. This reduces our
livelihood.”
Lack of farmland* “My father farmed this land, and his father before him. Over the years,
as land is handed down by inheritance, the sons receive smaller and
smaller areas of land, with more and more people in the family
depending on it. And because our land is small, we need to produce
from it in order to feed our family. We cannot leave it to fallow like our
ancestors did. In the past they would be able to fallow the land by
going to farther areas and farming there. But now, there are already
people farming in those areas.”
Low soil fertility* “The land I have is enough for my family but soil fertility is a problem.
The production I generate from my farmland is not enough to buy
fertilizers. We had to sell a sheep to be able to buy fertilizer.”

19. Implications
Consideration of
the natural
environment as
a fundamental
requirement for
food security.
Broadening
options for
coping which do
not lead to
erosion of
assets.
Supporting local
farmers to build
up capital
assets,
including non-
material assets.
Especially liquidating assets to buy fertilizer erodes people‘s assets,
thereby reducing the ability to cope in the future

20. GENDER AND SOCIAL RELATIONS
UNDERSTANDING HOW GENDER AND SOCIAL RELATIONS
INFLUENCE THE ABILITY OF INDIVIDUALS TO UNDERTAKE
LIVELIHOODS AND BE FOOD SECURE

21. Why is it important to consider gender and social
relations in discussing food security?
Livelihoods are not only about
production inputs (e. g. seeds,
labor, land) but are also
influenced by social relations.
Social relations are
characterized by norms which
are people‘s shared
understanding of acceptable
attitudes and behaviors.
For example, gender norms
determine what women are
allowed and not allowed to do.
Source: Oxfam International (upper photo),
Jan Hanspach (lower photo)

22. Main findings
There have been positive
changes in relation to gender
equality.
However, women still face
systemic disadvantages, as do
poor men.
These disadvantages include
access and control of capital
assets, decision-making, and
delineated activities.
Reversing these systemic
disadvantages will be
important to expand
individuals‘ capacities to
achieve well-being.

23. Various gender related changes were reported in
southwest Ethiopia in the last ten years. These can be
classified as:
Fig 7. Leverage points for improving gender equality.

24. Increased involvement in
livelihood activities similar
to men‘s
Women participating in
public meetings and
trainings
Women getting involved
in conservation activities
Improved mobility
Decreased incidence of
husbands hitting wives
Women participating in
adult education
Fig 8. Gender-related changes in visible gaps.

25. Policy reforms (e. g. joint land
registration, family code)
Shared decision-making
Awareness about gender
equality and women‘s rights
Change in rules around access
and control of capital assets
Change in what women are allowed
to do in relation to their roles
Women are more knowledgeable
about trading and livelihoods
Women can clean themselves without
being perceived as doing bad
Women can save money
Women can take out loans
Women are more proactive
Women have more knowledge
Fig 9. Gender-related changes in
formal and informal structures.

26. Emergence of trust
The perception that women‘s
initiative and involvement
should be encouraged
The perception that men
should accept women‘s ideas
The perception that men
and women are equal
Shift in perception of women as
weak and incapable to women
as capable of making farm-
related decisions and leading
The perception that
women should also be
involved in providing
advice to the government
as men do
Fig 10. Gender-related changes in
attitudes.

27. Interactions between leverage points are also important and
need to be engaged with carefully:
Fig 11. Interactions between leverage points.

28. Fig 12. Women‘s and men‘s perceived change in sense of agency
in the last ten years assessed using the Ladder of Power.

29. Despite the changes, several features of the normative climate continue
to limit individuals‘ abilities to participate in and benefit from smallholder
farming livelihoods.
Gender
Patrilineal inheritance practices
Nika enables women to
negotiate their disadvantaged
position but to a limited extent
Decision-making is now shared
but in most cases, in nominal
terms
Allocation of tasks make
women dependent on male
labor
Socioeconomic status
Uneven sharing of risk,
difficulties of sharecroppers
exacerbated by increase in
crop raids
Unequal abilities to decide on
crops to plant
In some cases, information not
shared on actual costs of
inputs
Insecurity of access to land
All these impact on
F O O D S E C U R I T Y.

30. Implications
Leveraging livelihoods as a sphere to expand
individuals‘ agencies to improve their well-being.
Capitalizing on the interactions betwen formal
and informal structures/institutions
Fostering reflections on the role of social norms

31. Key points for policy and practice
1. Diverse food crops in combination with cash crops
resulted in better food security.
2. Working together (e. g. didaro, help networks,
sharecropping) helped people cope with livelihoods-
related problems with less erosion on their capital assets.
3. Expanding individuals‘ agency is intrinsically important, but
also beneficial for supporting smallholder farming
livelihoods and food security.

32. QUESTIONS?
References
1. Livelihood strategies, capital assets, and food security in rural southwest Ethiopia (in review, Food
Security)
2. Capital asset substitution as a coping strategy: practices and implications for food security and resilience in
southwest Ethiopia (in review, Geoforum)
3. Leverage points for improving gender equality and human well-being in a smallholder farming context
(published, Sustainability Science)
4. The social embeddedness of smallholder farming livelihoods and food security: unpacking local norms
around gender and socioeconomic difference in southwest Ethiopia (in preparation)

33. Grateful to
All the local residents of the six kebeles who kindly welcomed us and
gave so generously of their time and knowledge
Oliyad Amente, Shiferaw Diriba, Dadi Feyisa, and Tolani Asirat for
making the work possible through their translations and building of
bridges
ERC for its Consolidator Grant to Joern Fischer

34. Contact
Faculty of Sustainability
Aisa O. Manlosa
Universitätsallee 1
21335 Lueneburg, Germany
Phone +49.4131.677-4028
aisamanlosa@gmail.com / manlosa@leuphana.de
» www.leuphana.de