Poverty

Household income surveys conducted in 2001 for valley floor areas and 2003 for plateau areas showed striking differences in the strategies households adopted for earning income. Valley floor areas supported a much more diverse set of income sources than the plateau. For example, 20% of the families in the valley earned income from fish, 28% from poultry, 9% from selling grass, and 22% from brewing beer. These were largely sold locally and were not of relative importance for families in the plateau area.

Examination of income contribution from the various sources showed that crops supported by commercial outgrower schemes, particularly cotton, far exceeded the relative importance of other income sources for plateau communities and that these crops have literally overtaken all other types of employment as the primary source of income (93.01% of all income of plateau survey respondents was generated by outgrower agriculture; data not shown). This overwhelming reliance on outgrower agriculture introduces several risks that are relatively new for the region. First, dependence on any one market leaves an area economically vulnerable as it is subject to normal market variations. Second, the reduction in planting of food crops reduces a family?s ability to address their personal food security needs through consumption of their own produce. Third, the depletion of soil by the farming of any monoculture crop in the absence of soil amendments imparts a need to farm fresh soil?leading to increases in deforestation.

The table below provides a summary of average annual household income for households sampled in the valley floor areas and the plateau areas. While income was 30% higher for residents on the plateau areas, attributed to income contribution from cotton and tobacco, average total annual income was still only $99.1, as compared to $76.0 for valley residents.

Income sources were relatively more diverse in the valley, suggesting people generally sought income opportunities from as many sources as possible. Given that market access and linkages with fair trading partners were poorly developed for these valley floor communities, the strategy of having a broadly diverse set of income sources probably made sense. This was in contrast to a more focused strategy of growing cash crops by plateau area residents who prescribed to outgrower schemes supported by well-managed companies.

Income derived from illegal sale of game meat was probably understated in this survey, since names of respondents were recorded. With such low incomes reported, it is hard to imagine that the sell of illegal game meat was not an important source of income for at least some residents for both areas. BACK TO TOP