Does Land Fragmentation Affect Household Livelihood Choice in Rural Vietnam?

Abstract

This paper examines how cropland fragmentation affects livelihood choice among households in Vietnam’s 12 provinces over the 2008–2016 period. Using cluster analysis techniques, we first classify households into various livelihood clusters. Then, employing multinomial logit regression analysis, we quantify how land fragmentation affects livelihood choice. The current research shows that land fragmentation has a positive impact on nonfarm diversification. Households with a higher intensity of fragmentation have a higher likelihood of pursuing a wide range of strategies based on nonfarm self-employment, wage-earning, or remittance sources rather than specialize in cultivation. Our findings suggest that households actively diversify away from agriculture in response to the disadvantages of land fragmentation. Notably, we discover that such coping strategies provide higher incomes than a cultivation-based livelihood.