Diversification and Differentiation: Livelihood Strategies of Land-Owning and Landless Households In Thoi Thuan B Hamlet

Abstract

Since the introduction of the 1993 Land Law and neo-liberal policies in Vietnam, land has effectively become a commodity distributed through market mechanisms. Therefore, land can now be bought and sold by and to anybody. Commoditization of land has increased the gap between the rich and the poor. In fact, the neoliberal ideology focusses on effectiveness and efficiency but not social security, since the Land Law reforms have introduced competitive power relations and an insecurity of land tenure. Some poor land-owning households do not have enough capital to invest effectively in agricultural production, leading to the sale of their land and to them be coming landless. Under the market competition of agricultural production and labor market pressures at the regional and global scales, concurrently, in order to survive and to reduce the risks, the Kinh and Khmer better-off, medium and poor land-owning households, as well as poor landless households, have had to diversify their livelihoods through a combination of on-farm, off-farm and non-farm activities using different strategies.