Impacts of rice intensification on rural households in the Mekong Delta: emerging relationships between agricultural production, wild food supply and food consumption.
19/11/18 04:01PM
Van Kien Nguyen, David Dumaresq and Jamie Pittock. Food Security, 2018.
Abstract: Rice
intensification programs target poverty reduction and improved food
availability in Asia. Vietnam adopted a rice intensification
policy aimed at a rice surplus for export by the 1990s. The
intensification policy replaced an annual wet season crop with two to
three High Yielding Variety (HYV) rice crops a year. These multiple
annual crops required changes in hydraulic systems in areas
such as the Mekong Delta (MD) with the introduction of low and high
dikes for wet season flood control and dry season irrigation. This study
examines the impacts of rice intensification and hydraulic changes in
the MD between the 1990s and 2000s on rural household
food sources, both wild and cultivated. Across study sites representing
three flood management regimes, 165 households were sampled for data on
household demographics, the collection and consumption of fish, other
aquatic animals, wild and cultivated vegetables
and fruit, and other food sources. The results indicate that rice
intensification programs and dike construction have significantly
increased rice production. However, farm household catch, collection and
consumption of wild foods has decreased. Household
use of wild fish, other aquatic animals, and wild vegetables was
reduced significantly over the period. Significant wet and dry season
variation in food availability emerged. Poor households experienced most
loss. Overall household food security was affected.
This study suggests that rice intensification policies aimed at global
food security need to balance wider population access to a food staple
with the need for rice farming communities to maintain access to high
quality wild foods obtained from the fields
and waterways of rice farming landscapes.
