Landscape with farmland and settlements in northern Chin State, Myanmar. Photo: Malte Øhlers
Lic. defence: Rural Livelihood Options for “a better and more sustainable future” - Local perspectives from Myanmar and Morocco
The 10th of January Focali member Laura Kmoch will defend her licentiate thesis with the title above. It is a public defence that will be held 13.15 in room ED lecture hall at Chalmers University of Technology. The invited discussant for the defence is Ole Mertz, who is Professor of Human Geography and Head of Section for Geography at the University of Copenhagen.
| What | Licentiate defence |
|---|---|
| When |
Jan 10, 2019 01:15 PM
to Jan 10, 2019 03:00 PM |
| Where | ED lecture hall, Chalmers |
| Contact Name | Laura Kmoch |
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Thesis
abstract:
In 2015, state leaders adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, to address global inequalities and respond to heightened concern about challenges, arising from contemporary global change. This thesis contributes to addressing these challenges, by extending the knowledge base that rural development stakeholders can draw on to co-construct viable livelihood options for vulnerable rural people.
Paper I does so on the basis of cross-sectional household survey data and clustering techniques, applied to explore the differentiated livelihood strategies of rural people in Myanmar. Results of this study show that households engaged in six relatively distinct livelihood strategies, which differed in terms of their relative reliance on land-based vis-à-vis other income generation activities and their income poverty implications. These findings imply differentiated vulnerabilities of rural households, e.g. to climate change, shifting land-governance regimes and labour market forces.
Paper II is based on local knowledge research, exploring the opportunity space for a tree-based adaptation of livelihoods and farming systems in Morocco’s drylands. Results of this study show that respondents already maintain a diversity of trees on their farms, but water scarcity, the low profitability of production systems and social conflicts constitute critical barriers to an agroforestry-based climate adaptation. Paper II further demonstrates the utility of local knowledge in climate adaptation research, showing that local knowledge methods facilitate inquiry into the contextual variability of livelihood contexts, technology-adoption barriers and extension priorities that farmers perceive.
Brought together, both papers contribute to realising the vision of “a better and more sustainable future” for rural people.
Find your way: Map to venue of the defence at Chalmers
Read more about Laura Kmoch here
Read Focali Q&A with Laura Kmoch here
