Your search found 7 records
1 Matchaya, Greenwell; Chilonda, Pius. 2012. Estimating effects of constraints on food security in Malawi: policy lessons from regressions quantiles. Applied Econometrics and International Development, 12(2):165-191.
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H045551)
(0.20 MB)
This paper examines food insecurity in Malawi. Conceiving food security as tridimensional, it is shown using Quantile, logistic, and OLS regressions that food security in Malawi is a function of both supply and demand factors. Specifically, food security as proxied by dietary diversity, reported food security, and food end time is a function of farm level production as proxied by farm level incomes. It is also a function of credit accessed, age and sex of a household head, while access to the markets, extension information, radio ownership, assets such as housing and adoption of a cash crop (tobacco). Education and consumer worker ratio are also important signifying the role that knowledge and labour play in deciding household level food security. The results also show that the impact of the regressors on food security depends on the level of food security in question such that in general factors with a positive effect on food security have a greater impact on food insecure households than on households that are better off. Given the preponderance of evidence in this paper it appears that policies that seek to enhance market access, improve market opportunities, enhance extension services, enhance informal education, encourage cash cropping, and support household level consolidation of assets would be useful for enhancing household level food security.
2 Kaiser, H. M.; Messer, K. D. 2011. Mathematical programming for agricultural, environmental, and resource economics. Hoboken, NJ, USA: John Wiley. 512p.
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy SF Record No: H046530)
(0.69 MB)
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H047640)
(1.40 MB)
A water supply system can be impacted by rainfall reduction due to climate change, thereby reducing its supply potential. This highlights the need to understand the system resilience, which refers to the ability to maintain service under various pressures (or disruptions). Currently, the concept of resilience has not yet been widely applied in managing water supply systems. This paper proposed three technical resilience indictors to assess the resilience of a water supply system. A case study analysis was undertaken of the Water Grid system of Queensland State, Australia, to showcase how the proposed indicators can be applied to assess resilience. The research outcomes confirmed that the use of resilience indicators is capable of identifying critical conditions in relation to the water supply system operation, such as the maximum allowable rainfall reduction for the system to maintain its operation without failure. Additionally, resilience indicators also provided useful insight regarding the sensitivity of the water supply system to a changing rainfall pattern in the context of climate change, which represents the system’s stability when experiencing pressure. The study outcomes will help in the quantitative assessment of resilience and provide improved guidance to system operators to enhance the efficiency and reliability of a water supply system.
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H048059)
(4.44 MB) (4.44 MB)
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H050632)
(3.23 MB)
The challenge of achieving food, energy and water (FEW) security is greatest in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) where millions of people lack access to electricity, reliable drinking water and one in four people are undernourished. To develop targeted policies, it is necessary to identify at-risk countries and the spatial patterns of FEW insecurity in the region. However, country and sub-regional level assessments of FEW security have received scant attention. In this study, we carried out quantitative and spatial assessments of FEW security in SSA using the Pardee Rand FEW Index. Results show that 41 countries in SSA are FEW insecure, with Burundi being the most affected country while the West African sub-region seems to have many FEW insecure countries. Spatial analysis of FEW security reveals the presence of spatial patterns in the distribution of FEW insecurity in SSA suggesting that a sub-regional approach may be used to tackle this challenge. However, literature review shows that this has to be approached with caution given that different contextual factors such as socio-economic and governance conditions may influence FEW security within countries. Our analyses imply that any policy response designed to enhance FEW security needs to address both socio-economic, governance and other contextual factors within countries.
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H050889)
(6.42 MB)
Previous studies have shown that enhancing adaptive capacity can reduce vulnerability of farmers to water scarcity and improve their resiliency against environmental changes in the Social-Ecological Systems (SES). The present study aims to evaluate, measure, and compare the dimensions of farmers’ adaptive capacity in rural areas in west of Iran facing escalating water scarcity in the recent years. Since that adaptive capacity is a key factor in community resilience, the relationship between considered adaptive capacity dimensions with increasing resilience of the study area was also investigated. Furthermore, the influence and dependency of each item of the dimensions of adaptive capacity has been measured by the Cross Impact Analysis (CIA) method. For this purpose, 175 farmers in 6 villages in Borujerd County, Lorestan province, Iran were selected for examining the content, structure, and important dimensions of their adaptive capacity. Adopting the survey methodology, this study used the whole network approach to identify the agricultural water users in the ecologic boundaries of the selected villages. The t-values for the most important dimensions with highest effects on the adaptive capacity of the rural communities in the study area including “water governance”, “innovation” and “information, and awareness” were 5.56, 5.49 and 4.15, respectively confirming the Structural Equations Modeling (SEM) and Friedman statistical test results. The t-values less than 1.96 for “Local networks”, “trust in government”, “financial sources and infrastructures”, as well as “adaptive management” showed insignificance of these dimensions in the adaptive capacity of farmers in the study area. Based on the results of the adaptive capacity analysis, suggestions for enhancing resilience of the farmer communities against water scarcity were provided.
(Location: IWMI HQ Call no: e-copy only Record No: H052087)
(2.03 MB) (2.03 MB)
Currently, in Sri Lanka, strategies to address FW prevention and reduction are being considered by different state and non-state stakeholders. However, in the current scenario, solutions for FW are mostly addressing (bio-)waste management.
Quantifying FW is of paramount importance in understanding the magnitude and socio-economic as well as environmental impacts of the problem. A good understanding of the availability and quality of FW data is a prerequisite for tracking progress on reduction targets, analyzing environmental impacts, and exploring mitigation strategies for FLW (Xue et al., 2019). FW quantification aims at creating a robust evidence base for developing strategies, action plans, and policies towards FW prevention, reduction, and management as well as guide prioritization of actions, evaluation of solutions, and monitoring progress (CEC, 2019).
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