Extracción de Objetos Difusos (FOE)

A number of policy implications can be drawn from the case study presented in this thesis. Many of these suggestions could be addressed to the government, as they relate to better access and quality of services currently provided by government. However, in the absence of government action, there is a role for the non-government sector in monitoring the delivery of essential government services and advocating for improvements. In other cases, it may be possible for non-government-organisations (NGOs) or churches to play an active role in sharing skills, increasing the range of coping measures and in helping households accumulate assets and address nutritional deficiencies.

The first set of implications relate to the geospatial aspect of the poverty experienced by the study area. Attempts to address disadvantage in remote rural locations, such as the study area, are unlikely to be successful unless they tackle specific elements of geospatial disadvantage as well as individual level characteristics of poverty. Some aspects of low geographic capital could be ameliorated through intervention. For example, some of the disadvantages related to isolation could be offset by increased efforts to ensure regular flights to and from the village to facilitate the movement of people, delivery of government services and transport of coffee to markets. However, this type of intervention is expensive, would require a large degree of coordination between different parts of the government to reduce costs, and would still depend on the

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weather being safe for flying and landing in the remote location. Although the link has been established between access to roads and poverty alleviation, the low population density and ruggedness of the topography mean that the villages are unlikely to be connected by roads in the foreseeable future.

Assistance could target the three very significant challenges in relation to human capital. The first is the inability to ensure a consistent level of education and health service due to the absence of qualified personnel. The second challenge is the excess reliance on consumption reducing strategies in response to a shock. The third relates to the high levels of protein deficiency amongst the villagers. On the first challenge, in the event that the government was able to send qualified health and education staff to the villages, regular visits by health and education inspectors would allow for equipment failures in the health centre to be identified and fixed, and the early identification of teacher absenteeism. Identification and training of teachers from the local area may assist in ensuring more continuity in education.

On the second challenge, the fact that even those with relatively higher asset levels adopt consumption-reducing strategies indicates that geospatial characteristics of the villages dominate household level characteristics in the choice of coping mechanisms. This provides support for the development of assistance programs that are geographically targeted. This is especially important in the context of village-wide shocks such as drought. Satellite imagery such as that used in Chapter 3, based on the Drought Severity Index, could be utilised to determine whether a particular area is suffering from lower than average rainfall over an extended period. It would then be relatively straightforward to determine whether the villages required assistance through conducting representative focus groups using a version of the coping strategies index used in Chapter 3 of this thesis. In the event that assistance was provided, this research suggests that particular efforts should be taken to monitor those with the lowest asset levels, and those living on steeper land.

The third challenge was identified through finding that even those with higher levels of asset ownership are still likely to be animal-based protein deficient. One way to address this is through village-based assistance for malnutrition. In the study area, the recent

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introduction of fish farms by CARE International may assist in targeting animal-based protein deficiencies, although as yet, the food frequency data show little evidence of fish consumption. The success of fish farming as a means of addressing animal-based protein deficiencies will depend on the balance between households seeing fish as a new source of cash income, or as part of their subsistence production. If the former view dominates, it is possible that the asset will be protected, rather than consumed by the families with the fish farms. This would result in families in the villages with the cash available to purchase fish improving their access to animal-based protein.

Although all the households in the study area are poor, those with the least assets are less likely to be reached by any programs of assistance because they are more likely to be illiterate and to have lower social capital. The high overall level of poverty in the study area suggests that assistance should be targeted at a village level, and not at particular households within the villages. However, for the purposes of monitoring, households with the lowest asset levels should be identified.

A second set of policy implications relate to the vulnerability that villagers experience as a result of the large number of shocks that they face. Appropriate assistance programs that would support the study area to address their vulnerability would be two pronged. First, they could introduce a greater range of ex-ante risk management approaches to the study area. Measures might include the introduction of a wider range of low risk crops to the villages. Agricultural extension could assist with garden design to reduce landslide risk, help retain soil moisture and manage pests. Given the association established between being asset poor and living on steeper slopes, it is possible that adjustments to land management practices or the introduction of new crops may assist poorer households living on more marginal steep land. Another way in which ex ante risk could be managed is through health interventions. Ensuring that immunization programs are not interrupted by equipment failures is one step that could immediately reduce health risks. Increasing access to tapped water and hand-washing may also help reduce health risks related to poor hygiene practices. Any actions to increase the proportion of women giving birth in the health centre would lower risks to mother and baby of birth related complications.

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Second, there could be interventions focused on increasing the range of coping measures available to people. In general terms, coping measures that increase the capacity of villagers to save would widen coping strategy options. This would require an increase in either cash or garden produce. Thus, moves to ensure more reliable transport of coffee crops over time may encourage villagers to put aside some income for savings. Similarly, agricultural extension that introduced crops that could be stored may also increase the range of coping measures. The introduction of new foods or crops would need to be accompanied by education on how to farm, prepare and store the crops. Programs targeting increasing or diversifying the asset base should consider that households may need to acquire assets above a threshold level before they are willing to utilise these assets when faced with a shock, instead of adopting consumption reducing strategies.

Informal insurance was a relatively under-utilised coping strategy. Informal insurance networks were underdeveloped and weak. This is unlikely to change until there is more development. The low level of informal insurance against health shocks may support the need for programs to be considered to assist areas such as these cope with covariate shocks. A starting point for targeting assistance within the study area could be those households with no inter-household insurance links, for whom idiosyncratic shocks could lead to catastrophic declines in food consumption at any time.

While the sample of the study area is small, the case study suggests several possibilities for identifying those most at risk of not having informal insurance networks. The data suggest that a lack of engagement in village based organisations could be a useful means of identifying a sub-group of a village population that is more likely to be vulnerable to not having well formed informal insurance networks. Other household attributes that it may be worth monitoring more closely for the impact of negative shocks are those that are headed by single females, have negligible consumption of animal-based protein, and own low levels of assets. In the context of a poor community, it would not be difficult to administer a survey of asset ownership. Similarly, it is relatively straightforward to survey people on the frequency with which they consume meat-based protein through specific food frequency surveys.

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