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Poverty Status and Factors Affecting Economic Mobility: A Study of a few Villages of the Suriyawewa Divisional Secretariat of the District of Hambantota.
Upali Vidanapathirana
Part I
The setting
Suriyawewa is one of the twelve divisional secretariats of the poverty stricken Hambantota district. This divisional secretariat borders the legendary ‘Village in the Jungle’ of Leonard Woolf (1913) wherein his vivid description summed up the conditions of drudgery in terms of ‘first fear, and then hunger and thirst’. Quite ironically these conditions manifest the livelihoods of most of the villages of Suriyawewa even today. This is in spite of the proliferation of development schemes, programmes and arrangements in the area during the past few decades. It was found that different types of fears, anxieties, and uncertainties afflict those who live in these villages; they arise from vagaries of climate including droughts and floods, famines, destructions caused to life and property by wild animals, epidemics and other natural and man-made hazards. The recent spells of drought particularly in the past few years provide proof of the harsh conditions governing livelihood in these villages. These conditions have undoubtedly had a devastating impact on the living conditions of the peasantry[(] as their crops and home gardens have been destroyed and the livestock of the peasant households annihilated during the period 1995-2001. Associated with this has been the emergence of a culture of lawlessness as some people resort to pilfering livestock and crops, killing wild animals, grabbing arable lands and cultivating illicit narcotic plants in the jungles which provides high risk yet wind fall incomes at minimum financial costs. It is within this context that Woolf’s description still valid and a study on the poverty status of peasant households in a few Villages of the Hambantota District of Sri Lanka is timely, particularly given the paucity of data on poverty, their vulnerability, and factors affecting poverty.
The main economic activity of the people in Suriyawewa is characterized by agriculture performed either under major irrigation or rain-fed conditions. Of course as discussed in this paper later the agricultural system is heavily dependent on Maha rains as the starving water streams and rivers flowing through this area rarely replenish the irrigation tanks to make Yala cultivation successful. The agricultural system therefore consists of a number of subsystems including Chena, home gardens and paddy holdings with little ‘synergy albeit high incidence of entropy’[(]. As agricultural operations in Chena and paddy lands are mutually exclusive, i.e., farming under one subsystem precludes operations of the other, the synergy between subsystems have often been limited. The intermittent droughts have made the major irrigation structure weak and ineffective as tanks dry up and water fails to reach most of the farm holdings even in the Maha season. Farm households in Suriyawewa, in spite of the availability of vast extents of Chena lands, find inadequate supply of water a serious problem causing a chronic condition of income poverty and inequity.
The continuous farm operations in the Chena lands and paddy plots have made them relatively less fertile. The deterioration of soil conditions has increased the dependency on chemical inputs, which has adversely affected the capacity of farmlands to generate sufficient producer margins. Therefore the welfare standards of the peasantry have fallen;their levels of self-esteem have crumbled to low ebbs; for many of them ‘resigning themselves to poverty without feeling disdain is nothing uncommon’ (Goulet, 1972). It is these conditions that have given rise to the ‘dependency syndrome’ in which some farmers still prefer conditions of drought that could bring an inflow of outside assistance in the form of handouts, free food, and other household goods to successful rains[(]. In the following sections a brief account of the conceptual framework is made to address issues of measurement of poverty, and also identifying the causes and consequences of poverty in the villages.
This paper is divided into four parts. Part I outlines the setting of the study area in relation to poverty. Part II briefly surveys a few major theoretical explanations of poverty analysis with a view to develop a suitable framework of analysis for the study. It spells out the objectives of the paper and the methodology used to achieve those objectives. Part III presents data pertaining to status, causes and impact of poverty on the rural poor. Part IV discusses the major findings in relation to the conceptual framework. It delineates major observations arising from the analysis of data, which may be useful for poverty analysts and policy planners.
Part II
Conceptual Framework of the paper
Conventionally poverty is seen as a phenomenon associated with low income, or restrictions on the capacity to spend (expenditure), which debilitates ones capacity to meet basic consumption needs. Therefore the ability of a household to meet basic food consumption needs has often been used as a proxy to indicate the poverty level of a household. These expenses must initially cover basic energy (calorie) requirements necessary to meet life-sustaining needs. Of course basic calorie requirements form only a part of the total formula of nutritional needs of people as in many instances, poor households suffer on account of the non-availability of other nutrients that lead to stunting, wasting, ‘underweight’, and low birth weight among children under five years (Family Health Bureau, 2001). These are complications arising from malnutrition and it was found that wasting is particularly pronounced in the Hambantota district ( Abeyrathne, 2001).
The biologically determined poverty is linked to the minimum calorie requirement, which is estimated to be around 2030 kilo-calories per adult (Rathnayake, 1990; DCS, 2003). The Household Consumption Survey of 1995/96 has revised the poverty threshold based on calorie requirements to reach a higher value of Rs. 791 (DCS, 2000).[(] To accommodate the other consumption needs the above poverty threshold has been further increased by 20 per cent to reach Rs 946(DCS, 2003).
In spite of the statistical refinements introduced in recent years, the income and / or expenditure based poverty definition and the measurements of poverty therein capture a part of the total concept. Yet, the concept of consumption poverty has an advantage as it depicts the extent to which a household can generate specified levels of capabilities. The failure to do this is identified as capability deprivation which gives rise to the possible reproduction of poverty in the long run (Sen, 1992). Nonetheless, poverty measurement has become a much-debated issue in the development literature in the recent years.[(]
Some of these debates have resulted in the concept of human poverty, which combines a number of related concepts in the measurement of poverty. The concept of human poverty developed by the UNDP therefore focuses on a host of parameters including literacy, life expectancy, maternal and infant mortality rates, access to drinking water, health facilities, education, and electricity (UNDP, 2000). For those who live below the poverty line and those who spend most of their income on food suffer from income restrictions limiting their capacity to invest on non food expenditure including health, education and also spends on ‘physical assets’. To this extent poverty is viewed, as a failure of entitlements and the poor happened to be the most vulnerable to stress arising from such failures (Sen, 1992).
The low and unpredictable incomes compel the poor to forego basic food consumption requirements and to postpone expenses on health, education and attending to essential repairs to their substandard shelter. Related to this is the relative failure of entitlements. In countries where the lowest 20 per cent of the populations’ income share is around 5 per cent, which compares with the income share of around 60 per cent of the highest quintile, this aspect of entitlement failure is quite evident.(Fortman, 2003). One of the outcomes of this low income and its inequitable distribution has been the very high calorie deficiency among the poor that has resulted in chronic and acute under nutrition (Wickrama, 1998).
This paper is based on the fundamental premise that poverty is always a dynamic process of persistent involvement of situations and forces. Poverty therefore is not a static condition. At any given point in time the poor consists of those who are always poor and those who move in and out of poverty. This is known as poverty dynamics (Baulch and Hoddinott, 2000). Therefore poverty invariably is a complex phenomenon in which a number of interlocking forces contribute to its existence, persistence, deterioration or economic mobility. Chambers identified a set of forces that contribute to a poverty trap in which vulnerability, deprivation, indebtedness, powerlessness, and helplessness, which together unleash a cycle of poverty process (Chamber, 1983). This explanation underscores, among others, the significance of forces other than income in the manifestation of poverty.
Another landmark contribution to poverty analysis has been the concepts of capability in which poverty was denoted as a capability failure (Sen, 1988, 1992, 1993). As an abstract concept, definitions of poverty have been expanding to encapsulate a complex mix of features, causes and impact of poverty; these definitions deal with the deprivation of people from functionings and capabilities. Functionings as described by Sen can vary from such elementary matters as being well nourished, disease free, safely sheltered, and literate. They could also include self-respect, preserving human dignity, being free from stress, taking part in community life, and participation in political and social movements. A narrow definition of capability signifies freedom from diseases, malnutrition, and illiteracy while the broader definition encapsulates freedom of choice, which includes a complex state of affairs such as having self-respect, preservation of human dignity, and freedom from stress (Shanmugaratnam, 2002).
Among the recent developments in poverty analysis has is the sustainable livelihood approach where an attempt has been made to integrate different perspectives of poverty in a holistic manner (Chambers, 1987; Scoones, 1998). Accordingly, a sustainable livelihood comprises the capabilities, assets and activities so as to develop coping strategies to meet stresses and shocks without undermining the natural resource base (Farrington, 1999). This approach has been experimented by the DFID in a number of countries including India, Pakistan, Zambia, Kenya and Sri Lanka with view to assess and manage projects on poverty[(]. These initiatives have so far produced mixed results. Some of the major criticisms leveled against the sustainable livelihood approach are intrinsically abstract in nature, focus heavily focus on micro underpinnings of poverty and fails to generate sufficient value addition to make livelihood changes sustainable.
Although the three major contributions listed above depicted a lot of differences there are a few underlying similarities between them. Firstly, they underscore the importance of a variety of intertwined causes and relationships, which are fundamental to any discourse on poverty. Secondly, they have expanded the poverty debate beyond the simplistic income and expenditure domains. Thirdly, they have attempted to explain why poverty persists in the developing countries in a more profound manner than the contributions to previous debates on poverty
Related to the sustainable livelihood approach has been the poverty dynamics models developed to assess poverty status and processes on a longitudinal basis (Baulch and Hoddinocott, 2000;). This paper has attempted to adapt the poverty dynamics model to ascertain the status, courses and impact of poverty. The paper also explores the linkages between endowments, returns to endowments, shocks, coping mechanisms and the role of the macro environment in determining the welfare levels of the poor (See figures I & IV). This paper forms the first part of a long-term project initiated to explain the process of poverty dynamics and patterns of economic mobility for which the changing socio economic conditions in the rural hinterland of the district of Hambantota will be observed and documented for a continued period of few years.
Figure I-The conceptual model for the paper
Endogenous / ExogenousShort term / Perceptions on returns to assets / Shocks
Long term / Endowments
Copying strategies / Policy framework
Source: Adapted from Baulch.
The above four-quadrant model shows key groups of factors that affect poverty levels of the poor. It would be seen that the factors identified vary in terms scope (i.e., whether their origin and impacts are intrinsically local or outside) and in terms of time horizon, (i.e., whether they require longer or shorter time to effect changes). For example, perceptions of the peasant farmers are basically local in terms of origin and impact while it is presumed that effectively planned extension and educational programmes could change them within a relatively short span of time. In contrast peasantry has a very limited control over shocks and/or the policy framework of the state, which may require a long time to adjust or to introduce changes. Most shocks and stresses have a tremendous impact on the ‘vulnerability context’ of the peasant households. Vulnerability in this context refers 'to exposure to contingencies, stresses and difficulties in coping with them’. Vulnerability therefore has two sides: an external side of risks, shocks and stresses to which a household or individual is subjected to and an internal side which is defenselessness, meaning a lack of means to cope without incurring losses' (Chambers, 1989; Silva, 2002).
Shocks in the meantime are twofold. The first category is referred to as 'covariant' shocks, which affect almost everybody in a community, and hence make the entire community helpless (Baulch, 2000). This aspect of generalized (covariant) shocks may be severe as they damage the entire social fabric neutralizing the capacity of indigenous coping strategies, which are based on community help (Chambers, 1981). When all the members of the community are adversely affected by generalized shocks the ability to share the impact of shocks and stresses becomes limited. The second type of shocks is known as ‘idiosyncratic’, which refers to conditions, which may be peculiar to a single household. An example for this could be a chronic sickness or a death in the family (Dercon, 2000).
The factors and forces discussed above are interrelated in which each factor affects the other in a direct and circular fashion. For instance, the presence of an economic policy framework could support poverty reduction and enhance the overall social welfare: its absence can lead to exacerbation of poverty. Such a policy framework would focus on the variability of input costs and levels of food security on the one hand, and poverty reduction initiatives on the other. As far as the rural agricultural sector and its operations are concerned, one of the most controversial elements in the past has been the failure of the state to control the inflow of cheap imports of agricultural commodities at the time of harvest. Similarly, availability of endowments that cover different types of capital stocks, as presented above, can generate virtuous cycles of economic mobility for the poor.