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• We provide a typology of communities based on their access to common-pool resources. • The influence of capitals and climatic shocks on livelihoods is spatially variable. • The type of community modifies livelihood opportunities and coping strategies. • Climatic shocks drive precarious livelihoods, except in best-connected communities. Spatial factors, such as environmental conditions, distance to natural resources and access to services can influence the impacts of climate change on rural household livelihood activities. But neither the determinants of precarious livelihoods nor their spatial context has been well understood. This paper investigates the drivers of livelihood precariousness using a place-based approach. We identify five community types in rural regions of the Mahanadi Delta, India; exurban, agro-industrial, rainfed agriculture, irrigated agriculture and resource periphery by clustering three types of community capitals (natural, social and physical). Based on this typology, we characterise the associations between precarious livelihood activities (unemployment or engagement in agricultural labour) with agricultural shocks and household capitals. Results demonstrate that, the type of community influences the impact of agricultural shocks on livelihoods as four of the five community types had increased likelihoods of precarious livelihoods being pursued when agricultural shocks increased. Our research demonstrates that the bundle of locally available community capitals influences households' coping strategies and livelihood opportunities. For example, higher levels of physical capital were associated with a lower likelihood of precarious livelihoods in agro-industrial communities but had no significant impact in the other four. Results also indicate that agricultural shocks drive livelihood precariousness (odds ratios between 1.03 and 1.07) for all but the best-connected communities, while access to household capitals tends to reduce it. Our results suggest that poverty alleviation programmes should include community typologies in their approach to provide place-specific interventions that would strengthen context-specific household capitals, thus reducing livelihood precariousness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Despite the increasing interest of the Sustainable Livelihood Framework in the field of international development and in academia and the recent call for the use of mixed-methods approach, there has been little analysis that brings together qualitative and quantitative methods over a large geographical extent. Based on findings from participatory rural appraisals during which participants identified the key assets needed to achieve their livelihoods, this paper argues that common-pool resources (community capitals) should be differentiated from private goods (household capitals) as they operate under different dynamics of decision-making and management. We then create quantitative indicators that can be mapped across a large geographical extent by using data derived from national census and satellite sensors. Spatial patterns and differentials in access to livelihood capitals across the case study are examined and the associations that exist between household capitals, between community capitals, and between both are quantified. The results demonstrate that household physical capital is positively associated with household financial and social capitals but negatively associated with household natural capital, supporting the hypothesis that households trade their natural assets to cope with shocks. It is also shown that proximity to main axes of communication increases access to village amenities but decreases access to natural resources, while remoteness increases household human capital but decreases household physical and financial capitals. Such a cross-scale study adds to the understanding of the question of scale regarding rural livelihoods and community development, which could act as a bridge between the implementation of policy programmes (often targeted at the community level) and their expected outcomes (often targeted at the household level). Highlights • We advocate for the separation of community capitals from household livelihood capitals to characterise rural livelihoods. • We observed spatial variability in access to common-pool resources and private assets affecting livelihoods in rural India. • Workforce availability and access to community natural resources increase with remoteness. • Access to community natural capital is negatively associated with access to community infrastructures. • Households make trade-offs between natural and financial assets to meet their needs and mediate vulnerabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of a coherent and coordinated policy for the management of large socio-agricultural systems, such as the Mekong delta in southern Vietnam, is reliant on aligning the development, delivery, and implementation of policy on national to local scales. Effective decision making is linked to a coherent, broadly-shared vision of the strategic management of socio-agricultural systems. However, when policies are ambiguous, and at worst contradictory, long-term management and planning can consequently suffer. These potential adverse impacts may be compounded if stakeholders have divergent visions of the current and future states of socio-agricultural systems. Herein we used a transferable, scenario-based methodology which uses a standard quadrant matrix in order to explore both anticipated and idealized future states. Our case study was the Mekong delta. The scenario matrix was based upon two key strategic choices (axis) for the delta, derived from analysis of policy documents, literature, stakeholder engagement, and land use models. These are: (i) who will run agriculture in the future, agri-business or the established commune system; and (ii) to what degree sustainability will be incorporated into production. During a workshop meeting, stakeholders identified that agri-business will dominate future agricultural production in the delta but showed a clear concern that sustainability might consequently be undermined despite policy claims of the contrary. As such, our study highlights an important gap between national expectations and regional perspectives. Our results suggest that the new development plans for the Mekong delta (which comprise a new Master Plan and a new 5-year socio-economic development plan), which emphasize agro-business development, should adopt approaches that address concerns of sustainability as well as a more streamlined policy formulation and implementation that accounts for stakeholder concerns at both provincial and national levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary This article presents results from an investigation of the relationships between welfare and geographic metrics from over 14,000 villages in Assam, India. Geographic metrics accounted for 61% of the variation in the lowest welfare quintile and 57% in the highest welfare quintile. Travel time to market towns, percentage of a village covered with woodland, and percentage of a village covered with winter crop were significantly related to welfare. These results support findings in the literature across a range of different developing countries. Model accuracy is unprecedented considering that the majority of geographic metrics were derived from remotely sensed data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]