 |
 Welcome to MDE |
| Overview |
| Curriculum |
| Facilities |
| Organization |
| Students |
| Applications |
| Fees, Loans, Scholarships |
| Theses |
| Seminars |
| Services |
| International Cooperation |
| MDE News |
| Alumni |
 |
|
| Tiếng Việt | English |
|
Goto: |
|
|
CHAPTER I I. BACKGROUND AND RELEVANCE OF THE THESIS Nowadays,
in developing countries, the weight of poverty falls most heavily on certain
disadvantaged occupation groups such as marginal and landless farmers,
traditional fishing populations, traditional handicraft, construction-workers,
tenants, etc. Especially, in Asian countries, traditional, or small-scale
fishers are regarded as an extreme poor group. Even in Malaysia where per
capita income is among the highest in Southeast Asia, more than 50 percent of
the traditional fishermen lives below the official poverty. In Philippine, this
number is 75 percent. The similar situations also happen in Bangladesh,
Indonesia and India where there have a very large number of the fishers regarded
as poor. Not only traditional but also the commercial fishermen are reflected
to be seriously threatened in these countries. What are about the fishermen in
Vietnam? How do they live now? Are they as poor as the fishers in some Asian
countries? How poor are the fisher folks as compared to other occupational
groups, such as to farmers? Up to now, these questions have been still unclear
problems because of very few researches on the poverty assessment of the fisher
folks in Vietnam now. Except for some reports and articles, the poverty of the
Vietnam fisher folks has not been considered yet. Moreover, the World Bank’s report (1995) on poverty in
Vietnam discusses that, the highest poverty rate, 60%, is found among the
farmers, and the second poorest one is the construction-workers. Are the
fishermen poorer or richer than these groups? This is an interesting question. The reasons mentioned above make
me more motivated to assess the poverty of the Vietnam fisher folks. This
thesis will try to look the fisher folk’s poverty in Vietnam to find the
answers to questions raised above. II. scope of the thesis a. To assess the poverty situation of the
fisher folks in Vietnam: the incidence, the depth and the severity of poverty b. To find out the poverty status of the
fisher folks and compare it to others in different sectors of employment in
Vietnam c. To analyze some of the principal
characteristics of the poor fishers as compared to those of other poor d. To break down the factors affecting the
poverty situation of the fisher folks The study uses mostly data
obtained from the Vietnam Livings Standard Survey 1997-1998 and other
information sources from Ministry of Fishery (MOF) and from newspapers, reports
and articles. Due to different sources of the data, consequently the result of
this study may be affected. The results of the VLSS 98 survey can be
representative at the national, urban/rural level and for some indicators at
regional level. However, because of quite small sample size of the fishing
households obtained from the VLSS 98, so this limitation does not allow for
regional estimates. III. Research
questions This thesis focuses on the key research
question: "How poor are the fisher folks in Vietnam now? In order to make
clear about this problem, some following sub-questions will be mentioned 1. What is poverty? What is the World Bank 's
Approach to poverty? How is poverty measured? 2. How many the fisher folks are poor in
Vietnam now? How are they poor? Are they as poor as the fishermen in some Asian
countries? How are the fishers poor as compared to people in other occupations?
3. What are the main demographic, geographical,
physical, social characteristics of the poor fishermen? What are the
differences of these characteristics between the poor fishers and other poor? 4. Why are the fishers poor? What are the
factors affecting this poverty situation? 5. What should Vietnam government do to help
the poor fishers escape poverty? IV. Structure of the thesis
Except for bibliography and appendix, the
thesis includes 5 chapters: Chapter I: Introduction Chapter II:
Theoretical and empirical framework Chapter III: The Profile of the Vietnam
capture fisheries. Chapter IV:
Poverty situation of the fisher folks in Vietnam Chapter V:
Conclusions and Recommendations Chapter
II Theoretical and Empirical framework
This chapter researches debates
on the topic of poverty and address the World Bank’s approach to
poverty, which is applied to analyze the fishermen' poverty in this thesis. In
addition, this chapter also adds important information about the fishermen's
poverty in some Asian countries. This information will be lessons for Vietnam
in conducting solutions for assistance the poor fishers. I. DEFINITION OF POVERTY
- In a narrow sense, the poor are those whose income
or expenditure is insufficient to maintain minimum acceptable level.
Consideration here is made not only of food as the main provider of physical
efficiency or minimum acceptable level but also shelter, clothing and certain
household sundries. - In a broad sense, poverty is
used to denote the entire spectrum of deprivation and ill being which include
not only the lack of income or expenditure but also other dimensions necessary
for well being (including physical, economical, psychological, spiritual and
political factors), and violation of human rights. -The World Bank approaches to poverty firstly
with the narrow sense. Poverty is defined as inability to attain a minimal
standard of living. It settles for standard that is “consumption-based”. This
standard comprises two elements: “the expenditure necessary to buy a minimum
standard of nutrition and other basic necessities and a further amount that
varies from country to country, reflecting the cost of participating in the
every day life of society”. The second part is far objective, in some countries,
it is a luxury but in other it is a "necessity". For operational
purpose, the second part is set a side. The first element depends on the
minimal caloric intake per capita. The cost of minimum adequate caloric intake
and other necessities can be calculated by looking at the price of foods that
make up the diets of the poor. The World Bank uses expenditure per capita as
the welfare indicator and dual poverty lines (poverty thresholds), one is food
poverty line and another is total poverty line. The individual whose
expenditure is insufficient to meet the daily minimum level of caloric intake
(2,100 calories per day per capita) is regarded as the food poor. And a person
lives in total poverty if his expenditure has not enough to meet the
minimal level of food and non-food expenditure (other consumption on basic
necessities such as clothing, heath, education, etc). In addition, the World Bank
supplements consumption-based poverty measure with several other indicators
such as nutrition, life expectancy, under five mortality and school enrolment
rate. II. POVERTY MEASURES Headcount, poverty gap and square poverty gap
indexes are statistical indicators that can be designed to describe the size,
gap and severity of poverty. Foster, Greer and Thorbecke (1984) devise that
three poverty indicators can be determined by the following formula
.
Pa is simply the mean over the whole population of an individual poverty
measure which takes the value (1-Yi/Z) a for the poor and zero for the
non-poor . Yi is the welfare indicator (here per capita
expenditure) for the individual i . Z is the poverty threshold that is the
poverty line . N is the total number of people in the
community or sample population
. M is the number of people identified as poor . a can be interpreted as a measure of
inequality aversion The higher the value of a the more sensitive the
measure is to the wellbeing of the poorest person. As a approaches infinity the measure collapses to
one which only reflects the poverty of the poorest person. + Poverty gap index is devised when a = 1. It shows the intensity or the depth of
poverty. It estimates the shortfall of the poor’s expenditure from the poverty
line. It can be used as an indicator of minimum cost of eliminating poverty
using perfectly targeted transfers
+Square poverty gap index
III. DIFFERENT POVERTY'S DEFINITIONS IN
VIETNAM Three main methods have been used
for estimating poverty in Vietnam by the World Bank, General Statistical Office
and Ministry of Labour and Invalid Social Affair. These three methods differ in
two ways: the definition of the welfare indicators and the approach to setting
the poverty lines 1. The
World Bank’s poverty lines The World Bank (1995) establishes
expenditure-based poverty lines. There are two reasons to prefer the
expenditure data to income in Vietnam. First, income only raise welfare when it
is used for consumption purposes, as opposed to being saved or used to pay
debt. Second, income data tend to be inaccurate especially in countries such as
Vietnam where the vast majority of workers are self-employed. The World Bank’s
poverty line is calculated on the basic of a minimum requirement of 2,100 calories
per day per capita on the assumption that a household devotes 70% of its total
expenditure to food. The remaining 30% of expenditure are assumed to go to
other necessary items such as clothing, health, education and transportation Basing
on VLSS 1992-1993, the World Bank found that a household would need to spend at
least VND 750,000 (about $54) and VND 1,160,363 (about $83) per person per year
to be out of food and total poverty, respectively. After that, the poverty
lines in 1998 is calculated by adjusting 1993’s poverty lines. These
adjustments depend on the changes of the prices of bundle of goods. Therefore,
food poverty threshold in 1998 increases to VND 1,287,000 ($92) per
capita per year and total poverty line, including food and non-food consumption,
is VND 1,788,000 ($128) per capita per year. 2. GSO’s
poverty line The
GSO also relied on the food energy intake method to compute poverty line. A
household is in poverty if its income is not sufficient to buy enough rice to
provide 2,100 calories per person per day. This measure makes no allowance for
non-food expenses 3.
MOLISA’s poverty line MOLISA established the rice equivalent poverty line by classifying a
household as a hungry one if its monthly per capita rice equivalent income is
less than 13 kg of rice. Those with a monthly per capita income that allows for
less than 15 kg, 20 kg and 25 kg of rice equivalent in mountainous areas and
island; plain and midland rural areas and urban areas respectively are
considered to be poor. In this study, the author focuses
on the expenditure per capita for assessment the fisher folks’ poverty by
applying the World Bank’s definition
because this approach is more
comprehensive than GSO or MOLISA's approaches (it includes not only rice or
food but also non food components) IV. CAUSES OF POVERTY There are many causes and determinants of
poverty mentioned by almost economists. 1. Demographic characteristics A household with large family size and too many dependants and
children will be possibly poorer than another with smaller size will. Women are more likely to suffer
poverty than men are . So a household will be more likely to be poor if its
head is female. 2. Education and skilled The reason of lack of knowledge
of doing business-farming; off-farm activities and other activity-as a major
reason explains why the poor are poor 3. Isolation disadvantage People may be poor because of
where they live. A family living in a rural area without access to transport,
market, vehicle, etc would experience deprivations that would not exist in a
city supplied with these and other services 4. Lack of access to productive resources It includes lack of access to cultivated
land; lack of access to capital. Poor resource base leads to low productivity
and then low income. Many studies show that lack of credit is most often cited
as the greatest obstacle to poverty alleviation 5. Employment Employment is one of essential
factors affecting poverty. In almost all countries, insufficient and unequal
access to employment rank high among the major causes of poverty and inequality
6. Unforeseen shocks and expenses Unforeseen shocks are strong threats to a household. They include
a variety of sources of vulnerability such as wars, severe floods, drought,
typhoons, and pre harvest lean seasons. 7. Degradation of environment Overexploitation reduces the
natural fertility of land, forests are cut to meet energy needs, and lakes,
rivers and offshore areas are drained of fish. These lead to depletion or
irreversible degradation of resource base. Therefore the poor have not
sufficient resources to serve their standards of living. V. EMPIRICAL STUDIES: THE POVERTY SITUATION
OF THE FISHER FOLKS IN SOME ASIAN COUNTRIES 1. Asian fishermen
Nowadays, the fishers’ population
in Asian countries increases two times as large as that of last two decades.
The fishing labor force of each country comprises at least 100,000 persons.
Their fishing activities are traditional since the majority of fishing boats is
low power and un-motorized. So traditional fishermen still play an important
role: they provide 75 percent of the fish
products for domestic market and create
direct employment to millions of people in these countries. 2.
The poverty and the characteristics of the Asian fisher folks
a. Poverty Income per capita is often used
to classify the poor and the non-poor in Asian countries. Most of assessments
indicate that the fishermen (especially traditional ones) in Asia are regards
as extreme poverty. About 50 percent of the fishermen are living in poverty
such as in the cases of Malaysia; Philippine, Bangladesh; Indonesia, and India.
As for commercial fishermen, there is not a statistical data or survey relating
to the poverty situation of this group, but it could be affirmed that, like the
traditional fishermen, the living standards of the commercial fishermen have
been increasingly threatened by overexploitation; falling of captured quantity;
rising cost of fuel and high cost of maintaining large vessels and engines;
increasing of competition among fishing nations and the imposition of Exclusive
Economic Zone. b. Characteristics of the Asian fishermen Asian fishermen have some major
characteristics as follows: + Scattering along the coasts, estuaries,
rivers, and lakes. Most of them are disorganized. +Using backward types of capture technology +Suffering from absence of infrastructure and
community services; +Having poor nutritional, health, and low
ability of skill and hygienic standards +Earning low and irregular incomes; Applying
labor intensive rather than capital intensive methods of production; Exploiting
non-renewable and open-access fresh water and depleted marine natural
resources; Depending heavily on financiers or middlemen; Suffering from debt. 3. Factors affecting the Asian fisher folks’
poverty The
main factors affecting the Asian fishermen' poverty include: + Less access to market + Less access to resources + Less access to infrastructure and other
services +
Overexploitation and employment 4. Solutions to help the poor fishers in Asian countries There are many solutions Asian countries are
conducting to help the poor fishers. In recent years, these are active
assistance to help the Asian fishers escape poverty +Generation
of employment is one of efficient solutions for reducing the fishers’ poverty
in Asian countries. +
Providing credit and setting funds for activities to help poor fishermen + Provision of production and marketing
facilities and creation of infrastructure + Restrictions on fishing To limit
overexploitation of natural resources, licensing and quota restrictions and the
limitation entry into fisheries, etc are carried out by some countries. V. CHAPTER REMARK
First, of the different approaches,
consumption-based poverty (food poverty and total poverty) is the most popular
and simplest way to evaluate poverty. In this study, the author will focus on
consumption-based poverty to evaluate poverty situation of the fisher folks in
Vietnam. Second, the empirical studies
show that about 50 percent of the Asian fishermen (majority of them is traditional fishermen) are classified as
poor. The solutions for help the poor fishers in Asian countries are valuable
lessons for Vietnam Government in the progress of assisting the poor fishers
escape poverty.
The capture fishery is one
important part of the fishery sector as well as of the Vietnam economy. This
chapter introduces the profile of the capture fisheries in Vietnam and analyzes
the advantages and the disadvantages of this sub-sector for the fishermen in
improving their living standards. I. The contribution of the capture fisheries to the vietnam economy
1. Growth indicator From 1980, after the Sixth Central
Resolution of the Vietnam Communist Party, the fishery sector has developed
strongly and attained significant achievements. Annually, the fishery sector
contributes about 14 percent of Vietnam Gross Domestic product and 9.5 percent
to the total export values. Of which the capture fishery sub sector accounts
for the biggest contribution, 70 % of fishery sector's quantity. 2. Employment During the 1993-1997 period, the fishery
sector provided directly full time employment for more than 450,000 people
(from 760,000 in 1993 to 1,210,000 people in 1997, accounted for 4.1 percent of
Vietnam's labor force). And the number of people who engaged in the capture
fisheries in this period increased by 23 percent. In 1997, the capture fisheries and
aquaculture sub-sectors provided employment for almost 3.9 percent of the labor
force with 550,000 people (1.9 percent) in the capture fisheries. II. Vietnam 's Natural conditions for the
development of the fishing sector Vietnam has a favorable circumstance of natural resources and
geographical condition which is convenient for development of fishing activity.
However, labor force in this sub sector has to face with many difficulties
caused by natural disasters, depletion of natural resources (consequence of
destructive actions of man) III.
Fishing
facilities and overexploitation 1. Fishing vessels +Although there is a great number of fishing
vessels (nearly 1,000,000 pieces) in Vietnam now, a majority of them is of low
capacity; traditional and small-scale. + Nowadays, most of the fishing vessels
operate in relatively shallow water (about 30-40m deep) 2. Fishing methods +In general, most of the fishing methods are
concentrated on the 50 meters depth line which are delimiting narrow shallow
water zone, especially along the Central coast. +Inappropriate, illegal and destructive
fishing methods; backward fishing
technology; illegal fishing activities (using of dynamite) have been exploited
are an alarmed problem for preserving natural resources. +Most fishing activities do operate at time
where biological production is much lower than Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY)
or they sometimes operate at breeding seasons of fish. These fishing activities
often destroy the capacity of natural resource to regenerate. 3. Overexploitation and long term
sustainability of the capture fisheries Although the data of overexploitation
has still not been declared officially it is generally believed and reported
that the marine resources in inshore water are overexploited. The evidence
suggests that as much as 98.7 percent of total marine fish production in the
period 1976-1988 might originate from within the 50 meter depth (see table 1) Table
1: Estimated fish production by Depth Zones in
Vietnam (1976-1988)
Source: Estimated by MOF,
1996, which is based on earlier work done by Mr. Le Dang Phan of
the Ministry of Fisheries *
Actual catches for each depth zone A vast majority of the recent
production, about 86%, still originates from within inshore areas and
indications are that this share of current fishery may face with severe
sustainable problems. +
For inland water bodies, gillnetting, setnetting and trawling methods are used
commonly. Therefore as in the case of inshore water, many inland resources have
been overexploited IV. Vietnam's fishermen
+ Most fishermen's activities in Vietnam are
traditional. The proportion of the fishers engaged in small-scale fisheries
constitutes 90 percent of the total number of fishermen in the country + The number of fishermen includes about
550,000 persons of which, 450,000 engaged in the marine and 100,000 in the
inland fisheries. Population which relies directly on marine fisheries is about
1,150,000 people, make up to 7 percent population of coastal districts, 2.6
percent population of coastal provinces and 1.39 percent population of the
whole country (Ha Xuan Thong, 1995). +The fishers often concentrate on
communities. The fishing communities in Vietnam can be divided into 4 types:
(i) the fresh water fishers' communities; (ii) the brackish water fishing
groups in estuaries, lagoons; (iii) the beach, bays, island fishing
communities; (iv) the concentrated off shore fishing communities. V. CHAPTER REMARK The
Vietnam capture fisheries is a significant part of the economy. Natural
conditions, including geographical condition and natural resources are very
convenient for developing the capture fisheries and improving the living
standards of the fishermen. However, in the future, the Vietnam fishermen have
to face with depleted natural sources, which will impact negatively on their
living standards. Further, natural disasters are also severe threats to the
life of the fishermen and they become more vulnerable by threats of storms and
typhoons.
This chapter assess the Vietnam fisher folks’
poverty and compare the poverty situation of the fishers with that of other
occupational groups. In addition, this chapter also addresses the factors
affecting the fishers’ poverty. I. The fisher folks'
poverty + The poverty assessment is based on the second Vietnam
Living Standards Survey, undertaken in 1997-1998.
+ A household is regarded as fishing one if
majority of its members is engaging in fishing activities. From VLSS 98, we
obtain a fishing sample of 100 households. -The similar way will be applied
to collect samples of farmer-households and constructor-households. Hence, of
5998 representative households in VLSS 98, 100 engage in fishing, 3367 engage
in farming, 128 work in construction-activities, and 2403 households belong to
other occupations. 1. The incidence of the fishers' poverty Regarding both of food and total poverty, the
numbers presented in the figure 4.1 indicate that like the farmers, the
fishermen are one of the poorest by sectors of employment.
Sources: Estimates based on
VLSS 98 2. The depth and the severity of the poverty Like the farmers, the fishers do suffer from
not only larger but also deeper and more severe poverty than others do. Table
2: Depth and severity of poverty by
occupations in Vietnam in 1998 (%)
Source:
Estimates based on VLSS 98 * This shows the
intensity or the depth of poverty ** This reflects the
severity of poverty II. Principal
Characteristics of the poor fishers In order to describe fully the living
standards of the poor in fishing activity, this part will focus on the analyses
of main characteristics of the poor fishers. 1. Rural and urban poverty The extent of poverty varies greatly
from urban to rural areas. The poverty incidence among the rural fishers is
about 4 times as high as that among the urban ones. Of the different occupation
groups, the poverty disparity of the fishers between rural and urban is most
severe.
Source:
estimates based on VLSS 98 2. Household composition Household composition of the poor
and the non-poor fishers is characterized by main striking features of their
households such as household size, the dependant and the child ratio, and other
characteristics of its members, e.g. age and sex of households’ head. They are
often quite different between the poor and the non-poor fishers. a.
Household size Although the difference is not
very large, the poorer households are somewhat larger. Among occupations, the
average household size of the poor in fishing is larger than that of the poor
in other occupations. b. Dependent ratio The poor fishers are
characterized by a high proportion of dependants. Dependant is defined as any
one outside the working age group (16 - 60 years old). In detail, the poorer
households in fishing tend to be younger with more children under 15; fewer
elderly over age 60, and less working age-adult members than the non-poor ones The characteristics found among
the fishers are also similar for other occupational groups. However, of different
occupations, the disadvantages of demographic characteristics dominate in
fishing. c. Gender and age of household’s
head The fishers living in the female-headed
households are less likely to be poor than those living in the male-headed
ones. The evidence shows the heads of the poor fishing households are, on
average, six years younger than those of the non-poor ones. And as compared to other poor, the heads of
the poor fishers are too young to manage their families 3.
Literacy and schooling 3.1. Literacy
One of the most major differences
between the fishers in the poor and the rich groups is in literacy. While 23.4
percent of the adult-fishers is illiterate in the poor fishers, the figure
falls to just 6.6 percent for those living in the non-poor ones. Moreover, of
employment sectors, the poor fishers must suffer the highest literacy gap
between the poor and the non-poor. This is one of obstacles of the poor fishers
in looking for jobs or obtaining high earnings. 3.2. Schooling More significant differentials appear in the
distribution of school attainment. The poor fishermen are also identified as
the least school attainment people with lowest years of schooling of
adult-members by different occupations (see table 3). Table 3: Average schooling
of household’s adults by occupations and by poor and non-poor in Vietnam in
1998 (years)
Source:
Estimates based on VLSS 98 Further, the fishers in the households headed by someone whose
education level is below the upper secondary are more likely to be poor than
those in the households headed by someone who attained higher educational level. 4. Housing, conditions and assets These are main characteristics which
reflect physical conditions of the poor fishermen. a. Housing status Table 4 documents the differences of housing
status among different employment sectors. Most of the fishers, both the poor
and the non-poor, are living in the bad status of housing. (temporary or the
semi-permanent houses).The numbers also indicate that housing status of the
poor fishers are worse than those of the poor farmers or the poor
construction-workers. However, the VLSS does not capture the fishing households
who often live on rivers and regard fishing boats as their formal houses. Table 4:
Housing status by occupations, poor and non-poor groups in Vietnam in 1998 (%)
Source: Estimates based on VLSS 98 b. Water status The poor fishers are also extremely
disadvantaged in access to safe source of water. Instead, the vast majority of
them rely on unprotected and less safe water source-mainly wells without pumps
(74.2 percent) and rivers or lakes (14 percent). It is also clear that, the
water access of other occupational groups are much better than that of the
fishers c. Sanitation status Similar
differences are apparent for sanitation (see table 4.20). This condition of the
poor fishers is very bad. Most of the poor fishermen, 71.5 percent, have no
toilet of any kind. This figure falls to just 23.4 percent of the poor among
the farmers. d. Electricity Another
indicator of housing standards is access to electricity. Here again the access
of the poor fishers lags behind. Use of electricity - the most convenient
energy source for lighting is common among the non-poor fishers, but very
scarce among the poor ones. The poor fisher folks are also most disadvantaged
in access to electricity as compared to others. Most of the poor fishers rely
on gas, oil or kerosene lamps for lighting their homes, which accounts for just
one-third among the poor farmers.. e. Durable assets Most of the fishing households,
even the poor ones, 50 percent of them have bicycle. However, almost none of
the poor fishers have motorbike while nearly one-fifth of the non-poor does.
The shift from bicycle transport to motorbike indicates better-off families. It
also shows families with better access to a variety of services and amenities.
However, as compared to others, the poor fishers are the poorest one in
possessing this asset. Table 5 Possess of
durable assets by occupations and poor and non-poor groups (%)
*Radio item includes radio and cassette
player **Electric stove includes electric stove
rice cooker and pressure cooker ***Value is the value of a household's total
durable assets at current price Source: Estimates based on VLSS 98 Similar
differences are apparent for the possess of other durable assets such as
electric stove rice cooker, pressure cooker, color television or telephone.
Overall differences in possess of durable assets among different occupations
are presented by the item of asset value. Of different sectors of employment,
the lowest value of durable assets is found among the poor in fishing activity.
5. Employment Employment status of the poor fishers is presented in essential
indicators such as unemployment rates, working hours, characteristics of
fishing activity and opportunities to access to non-farm employment. a. Unemployment rate The person who is in working age, but
has no job and is looking for a job during seven days is regarded as
unemployed. The prevalence of unemployment among the poor fishers is extremely
serious, about three times as high as that found among the non-poor. Moreover,
when looking at sectors of employment, the poor fishers are discovered as those
with the highest unemployment rate. Table 6:
Unemployment rates by occupations and poor and non-poor groups in
Vietnam in 1998 (%)
Source:
Estimates based on VLSS 98 b. Working hours This indicator includes working
hours in both main and secondary jobs of each adult-member in a household. Large
differentials appear in the distribution of working hours per week. This
indicator among the poor fishers averages only 36 hours per week, increasing to
43 hours among the rich fishers. Here
too there remains a sizable occupational gap. Mean working hours per week among
the poor fishers is lower than that among the poor farmers or the poor
construction-workers. c. Working for wage or self-employment. In fishing activity, the fishers
who are self-employed are less likely to be poor than those who work for wage
are. About 80 percent of the fishers
are self-employed, of which just 40 percent of them are identified as poor. But
the poverty rate of the fishers who are employees is very high, more than 70
percent. d.
Opportunities
to access to non-farm employment There are various types of
non-farm employment. In this study, the author considers the availability of
recruiting factories in the villages where fishers are living. The poor fishers are more disadvantaged with
less opportunity to access to factories than the non-poor are. Just one-fifth
of the poor fishers live in villages which have recruiting factories, whereas
majority of the non-poor ones has this beneficial features. This disparity also
happens among different occupations, but the poor fishers are the most
disadvantaged. 6. Isolation characteristics of the poor
fishermen Isolation from markets, physical
infrastructure, transportation, etc have close relations to the probability of
a household being poor. Isolation characteristics are reflected most clearly in
urban and rural disparity. Except for water and electricity characteristics
named in the part of housing characteristics, the author presents some more
isolation characteristics of the poor fishers such as market and road access. a. Access to road Table 7 verifies the average
distance from a household’s village to the nearest transportation road. Access to road is typically a major problem
of the poor fishers in the rural areas. In addition, a striking feature found
among occupational groups is too large disparity among occupations in access to
transportation. Table 7: The average
distance from a household’s village to a nearest road (km)
Note:
The distance from a household’s village to a nearest road is zero if a road lie within this village or household is living in large and medium
urban areas Source: Estimates
based on VLSS 98 a. Access to market Access to market is also
considered as one of the most significant factors affecting economic well being
of the poor. People with easy access to
market are less likely to fall in poverty as compared to those lacking of
access to market. Market is very important for the fishers. Since captured
products are too difficult to preserve and transport for sale if fishers live
far from markets. Isolation from access to market is also an obstacle to the
poor to attend commercial activities for improving their income. As expected,
the poor in the fishing are worse-off as compared to their counterparts in
other occupationsin access to this physical infrastructure. However, the
ranking of the poor in terms of access to market still verifies that the most
disadvantaged ones are the poor fishers with the largest average distance of
7.8 kilometers from their home to the nearest market. 7. Access to resources 7.1 Access to credit The poor typically lack of either saving
or credit (not only for initial investment in starting business but also for
sustaining business, disease control when there is epidemic, training of some
basic methods and skills). Surprisingly, the fishers strongly have access to
credit market. Of occupation groups, the average amount of borrows among the
fishing households both the poor and the non-poor is largest. Therefore, it is
very unclear for the conclusion that the poor fishers are disadvantaged in
access to credit as compared to other poor. However, the disparity happens
within the fishing groups itself, the poor is
less advantaged than the non-poor in access to credit 7.2 Access to cultivated land Cultivated land includes annual crop
land, perennial crop land, water surface, forest land, wild or barren, newly
cleared, road side/riverside, swidden land and others, excludes land rented or
borrowed in and residential/garden land. As mentioned in chapter III, the
fisher communities in Vietnam have been the agricultural communities, the
fishers have changed their occupation to fisheries in not very long time,
thereby, the secondary job of them are mainly farming activities. There is more
than 55 percent of the fishing households attended agricultural activities, but
nearly 16 percent of them has no access to cultivated land. In Vietnam now,
except for the farmers whose main occupation is cultivation, others do take
advantage over the fishers in access to cultivated land. On average, just
1,290m2 of annual cultivated land are accessed by a poor fishing
household while more than 2,500m2 are belonged to a poor
constructor-one. The similar situation also happens in the distribution of
perennial cropland. III.
Effects of some factors on the poverty situation of the fisher folks In
order to determine factors those contribute to the poor probability of a
fishing household, a probit regression is performed. After that, in order to
deal with some other external impacts, those belong to own characteristics of
the capture fisheries, more qualitative analysis will be exploited to
supplement this information. 1. Probit models and results 1.1 Probit Model A probit regression measures the
association between poverty and a wide range of household’ characteristics
simultaneously and thereby allows one to assess the strength of the association
between poverty and a given household characteristic holding constant the
separate influence of other characteristics. At the significant level of at least
0.1, all the variables in this regression are statistically associated with the
fishers’ poverty (see table 8) Table 8 The probit
model for the poverty of the fishing households (Marginal effects)
Probit estimates Number
of Obs =100 Pob>chi2=0.0000 Pseudo
R2 = 0.6068
(*)
dF/dx is for discrete change of dummy variable from 0 to 1 Z and
P>/Z/ are the test of the underlying coefficient being 0 Source: estimates based on
VLSS 98 In sum, from the probit model,
two conclusions can be drawn. First, of the factors affecting the
fishermen' poverty, employment situation, education, access to credit, access
to physical infrastructure and isolation characteristics (rural or urban) are
proved as important ones which impacts strongly on the probability of a fishing
households being poor. Second, it is worth noting that the factors
significantly affecting the fishers’ poverty in the probit model are also the
principal characteristics in which the poor fishers are most disadvantaged as
compared to others, even to the poor farmers. Furthermore, the fishermen,
especially ones engaged in the marine capture fisheries have suffered from the
impacts of other external factors, those are serious problems of this sub
sector, especially overexploitation and typhoons. 2. Overexploitation Overexploitation as analyzed in
chapter III is an alarmed problem in Vietnam, especially in inshore water
within the 50 meter depth. In these water areas, overexploitation consequently
has leaded to a reduction of captured quantity and a decline of abundance of
fish and other aquatic animal. According to MOF, marine catches per unit effort
expended are rapidly declining. As mentioned in chapter III, although in the
period of 1994-1998 the number of fishers as well as the number of fishing
vessels increase rapidly (it means that fishing effort has been strongly
expanded), the growth rates of the capture fisheries output in this period
still declined remarkably. It is clear that the reduction of the captured
capacity has threatened the living standards of the poor fishers who depend on
fish resources day after day. Higher working efforts but lower captured
capacity are essential reasons that bring about the unemployment problem or the
tendency of labor movement from the capture fisheries to other sectors. 3. Storms and typhoons Unlike other occupations, storms
and typhoons pose major threats to fishermen and to fishing communities.
Hundreds of fishermen are lost annually due to storms and typhoons, for
instance, 165 fishing boats were sunk and damaged and 1,162 tons of fish and
shrimp were lost by the impact of the tropical storm at the end of 1999.
Similar or even greater damages were happened due to other storms such as ones
in 1986, 1989, 1992, especially by Andy and Cecil in 1986 and Linda typhoon in
1999 (WB 1999, p.109). Accident of fishermen happens annually due to the absence
of an early warning system that could beam meteorological forecasts to
fishermen at sea and/or to coastal fishing communities (MOF 1993, p.25). Storms have threatened not only
the fishers at sea but also their family in coastal areas. For instance, in
1995, twelve major storms and four tropical low-pressure areas appeared over
the Eastern Sea. Of these storms, four moved into Northern and Central Vietnam
causing considerable damages in a number of coastal provinces such as Quang
Ninh, Thanh Hoa, Nghe An, Quang Nam-Da Nang, Binh Dinh and Phu Yen. For inland fishers, they are also
affected by major floods, resulting from storms. In 1995 large areas along the
Red River and Thai Binh Rivers, the provinces of Ninh Thuan and Binh Thuan, and
especially the Mekong Delta, were severely affected by major floods that caused
extensive damage of properties and loss of life. Therefore, natural disasters are
serious threats to the poor fishers and have made them, especially marine
fisher folks more vulnerable than others. V. CHAPTER REMARK
In sum, as analyzed above, the
author points to the fishers in Vietnam as one of the poorest by employment.
The poor in fishing activity also live in the most unfavorable circumstances,
and suffer a loss from many physical and social disadvantages as compared to
the poor in other occupations. Of the principal characteristics, household
composition; education; employment; access to credit; access to physical
infrastructure; isolation characteristics (urban or rural) are statistically
correlated with the fisher folks' poverty. Moreover, the poor fishers also suffer a loss from the scarcity of
natural resources resulted from overexploitation and threats of natural
disasters which make them become easily vulnerable.
Basing on analyses of the
fishermen, the thesis draw conclusions and recommendation as follows I.
Conclusions
The fishermen in are one of the
poorest groups in Vietnam by employment. In comparison with other occupational
groups, they are also disadvantaged in most of the principal characteristics
mentioned in the study. The fishermen,
like those in some other Asian countries such as in Bangladesh, in Philippines
or in Malaysia, have suffered from extreme incidence of poverty with nearly
half of them classified as the poor. Of the characteristics of the
fishermen, the factors which belong to household composition, education,
employment situation, infrastructure access, geographical characteristics
(rural or urban) and credit access impacts significantly on the fisher's
poverty. Besides, overexploitation and storms, the own characteristics of the
capture fisheries, have threatened the living standards of the poor fishers.
These findings found among the Asian fisher folks are also discovered among the
Vietnam fishers. Therefore, the solutions to dismantle these obstacles for the
poor in Asian countries are lessons for us in making policies to help the poor
fishers in Vietnam overcome poverty. Finally, it is clear that the living standards of
the fishermen in Vietnam currently are less extreme than that of the farmers.
Yet in coming years, if the disadvantages mentioned above are not dismantled,
the living standards of the poor fishers will tend to fall down and
unsurprisingly, they will be even poorer than the farmers in respect of not
only total poverty but also food poverty. II. Recommendations
After studying the solutions some
Asian countries is conducting to help the poor fishers, the author recommends
some important suggestions to assist the poor fishermen as follows 1. Employment Generation 2. Education priority 3. Giving priority to development of rural
areas: providing infrastructure for instance, construction of roads, markets,
provision of cleaning water and electricity in remote and coastal areas 4. Natural resource preservation, fishing
restriction and off shore fishing development: Imposition a system of licensing
and quota restrictions; Prohibition of
exploitation at breeding seasons 5. Reducing vulnerability from storms and
typhoons
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| << BACK | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
