“Food aid is killing Himalayan farms”. Debunking the false dependency narrative in Karnali, Nepal

World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

World Development journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev

‘‘Food aid is killing Himalayan farms”. Debunking the false dependency narrative in Karnali, Nepal Yograj Gautam ⇑ Department of Geography, University of Bergen, Norway

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history: Accepted 2 December 2018 Available online 26 December 2018 Keywords: Food aid Dependency Land abandonment Rice Karnali Nepal

a b s t r a c t Food aid constitutes a heated debate in development discourse. In Nepal’s Himalayan region, it is blamed for aggravating food insecurity by inducing dependency and negatively affecting local agriculture and diet patterns. Transferring large amount of rice, a grain scantily produced locally, food aid is considered to have worsened human nutrition by directing the traditionally diverse diet to rice-based monotonous diet. The aid dependent farmers are alleged to have given up cultivating land for less preferred local grains, ultimately reducing local food production and reproducing the need for more aid. Therefore, the removal of food aid is considered indispensable to the achievement of self-sustained food security. This paper examines the dependency narrative in light of empirical data produced by a mixed-method study conducted in Humla, a highly food insecure district in western Nepal. The results show no indication of ‘dependency’ as alleged in the narrative. Despite the free/concessional food transfers, the local farms have not only maintained diverse traditional crops, recent agricultural innovation has actually increased on-farm crop diversity. On average, the local grains contribute about 65% of the total local consumption signifying a diet pattern well embedded with the local food system. Food aid transfers cover about 20% of the total food need and constitute an important resource for households suffering high food scarcity. Therefore, we argue that the idea of removing food aid in the guise of ‘‘dependency” will directly affect many poor farmers’ food access, and will also leave an increased number of Himalayan farmers vulnerable to food insecurity in the face of emerging environmental and socio-economic stresses. Ó 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

1. Introduction Over two thirds of the world’s poor and food insecure population currently lives in developing countries where subsistence or semisubsistence agriculture remains the major source of their livelihoods (World Bank Group, 2016). Parallel to the commonly prioritized agriculture and rural development programs, most developing-country governments have also integrated social support programs into their poverty reduction strategies (Herrero et al., 2010; IFAD, 2016; Maitrot, Barrientos, & Nino-Zarazua, 2010). For over the last five decades, international development agencies too have been conducting several assistance programs, such as food assistance, cash transfer and employment guarantee schemes under food aid (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005). Despite high priority given to them, these social support programs are considered to negatively affect the aid beneficiaries by inducing perverse incentive toward dependency, discouraging work and self-reliance and thereby reproducing poverty – the ⇑ Corresponding author at: Department of Geography, University of Bergen, Fosswinkelsgate 6, 5020 Bergen, Norway. E-mail addresses: [email protected], [email protected]

same problem they attempted to alleviate (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005; Edkins, 2000; Harvey & Lind, 2005; Somers & Block, 2005). This paper focuses on food aid, the major non-contributory social assistance program in low-income countries and examines how it contributes to farmers’ food security or else hurts them by inducing negative effects on agrarian livelihoods and thereby reproducing negative dependency. The concept of dependency is used in different contexts (see Harvey & Lind, 2005). In the case of food aid, Barrett and Maxwell (2005) frame ‘dependency’ together with its ‘disincentive’ effects on recipient populations. In the context of farming based livelihoods, the disincentive effects are related to food aid impacts such as induced change in local food consumption patterns, reduced labor supply on local farms, and market price distortion and depressed production of local grain, particularly the same grain that is being transferred. Dependency, on the other hand, is explained as a condition of the aid recipient population being unable to sustain on their own without external assistance. Existing research and discussion on dependency are associated mainly with emergency food transfers (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005; Lentz, Barrett, & Hoddinott, 2005; Little, 2008). However, as we shall pre-

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2018.12.001 0305-750X/Ó 2018 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

sent in the next section, dependency narratives are often used to encapsulate all types of food aid transfers that, through different mechanisms, induce various disincentive effects, degrade the fundamental components of food security and reproduce the need for more aid in the aid receiving populations. Subsistence or nearsubsistence farmers grow diverse food grains mostly for their own-consumption. In this context, the direct transfer of free/concessional food rations, mostly a specific grain, is considered to change the dietary preference toward that grain at the expense of the local dietary diversity (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005). Since dietary diversity is directly associated with nutrition, reduced dietary diversity risks poorer nutrition (Ruel, 2003). This is an undesirable outcome of food aid in itself, which may also become the basis for further food aid increasing farmers’ dependency. The negative effects of food aid on local food production and market are another dimension underlying the disincentive effect. The flow of concessional food commodity into local food systems has been blamed for distorting the local market by crowding out private investment, depressing prices and creating disincentives for local producers (Gelan, 2007; Tschirley, Donovan, & Weber, 1996). Moreover, employment guarantee schemes and asset building projects, the most common projects under food-aid-for-development, are also criticized for creating farm labor shortages and negatively affecting food production in traditional farms where labor is a critical capital (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005). Although it is claimed that the assets thus built or restored increase the communities’ resilience and enable them to become food-secure in the long-term; evidence supporting this claim is weak. For example, despite the engagement of a substantial amount of labor, most of the assets built under World Food Program (WFP) funded Food-for-Work Program (FFW) were incompatible to the needs, priorities and capacities of local farming communities in Nepal (Gautam & Andersen, 2017a). This could explain why many of the assets including those built under highly prioritized agro-forestry projects became non-functional within a short time of their implementation (WFP, 2013). The dependency narrative explains such failed asset development as intentional because their failure means their success in reproducing the need for continued food aid transfers in the form of such projects (Edkins, 2000). Irrespective of the prevalent narratives, empirical studies show heterogeneous impacts of food aid. Although some studies note negative nutritional impacts of changing food habits induced by food aid flows (see Maxwell, 1995; Barrett & Maxwell, 2005), other studies find food aid to have positive effects on food consumption and nutrition at national and international scales (Lentz & Barrett, 2013; Schubert, 1981). Even at a local scale, food aid has evidently assisted food-deficit poor households to meet the deficit (Bishokarma, 2012), to increase dietary diversity by enabling them to save money and buy additional food (Bukusuba, Kikafunda, & Whitehead, 2007), and to reduce child undernutrition, which is a significant challenge facing low-income countries (Quisumbing, 2003). There is also evidence for food aid working as an effective safety net, for example by enabling poor households to avoid distress destocking of low value assets in the face of livelihood shocks (Tusiime, Renard, & Smets, 2013). Food aid impacts on local production and market are also mixed. Although food aid led to a decrease in local production in Uganda indicating a negative impact (Ferrière & Suwa-Eisenmann, 2015), it neither depressed prices nor had a significant negative impact on local production in Swaziland and Ethiopia (Abdulai, Barrett, & Hoddinott, 2005; Mabuza, Hendriks, Ortmann, & Sithole, 2009). In the same line, a recent study that analyzed the impact of a large scale social protection program on local grain price in Ethiopia found that cash transfer has no effect on food price. Although food transfers led to a reduction in local grain price, the effect was trivially small (Hoddinott, Stifel, Hirvonen, & Minten, 2018). These results suggest place and context specific impacts of food aid.

55

Subsistence farmers in developing countries are increasingly being vulnerable to food insecurity due to emerging multiple environmental and socio-economic risks (Gautam & Andersen, 2017b; Lambin & Meyfroidt, 2011; McCubbin, Smit, & Pearce, 2015; Morton, 2007; Tschakert, 2007). In this context, ample evidence exists signifying the role of various support programs in serving as effective safety net and also enabling the poor populations to undertake activities to sustainably improve their livelihoods (Banerjee et al., 2015; Fisher et al., 2017; Hidrobo, Hoddinott, Kumar, & Olivier, 2018). Arguably, this evidence can be used as a policy lesson to utilize food aid as a resource to safeguard the basic needs of the vulnerable populations in the face of these emerging risks. Policies, however, do not always directly draw on evidence provided by research (Tanner & Allouche, 2011). Robust knowledge regarding the dynamics, uncertainties and complexities inherent with development issues is not always available for policymakers for decision making. In this context, they find policy guidance in development narratives, which simplify the complexity by depicting some realities (and neglecting others) and generalizing the (partial) picture to the whole (Roe, 1991). By brushing-off evidences that contrast them, such narratives maintain a particular way of addressing a problem (Adger, Benjaminsen, Brown, & Svarstad, 2001; Cornwall & Brock, 2005; Escobar, 2011). Arguably, characterizing food aid as detrimental to long term food security, dependency narratives can create political barriers to integrate such potentially promising programs into food security policies. In addition, highlighting a simplified framework to explain the problem of food insecurity, such narratives may also sideline the importance of examining the dynamic and multiple factors that affect farmers’ wellbeing and ignore their real needs and priorities. This paper contributes to this important issue in development studies by empirically examining the effects of food aid on food security and livelihoods of rural farming communities in Nepal. Drawing on a study conducted in the district of Humla in Karnali zone, it first assesses the role rice transfers under food aid has on decreasing food deficit of the recipient households. It analyzes the disincentive impacts and in particular the alleged ‘dependency’ in terms of food aid impacts on local crop diversity, crop production, and dietary pattern especially in terms of the role of aid transfers in replacing traditional crops/diets. Results show that food aid has had positive contribution to food consumption during periods of food shortage, more so in the context of emerging multiple challenges to local agriculture. Despite the free/concessional food transfers, the local farming system not only maintains traditional crops, recent agricultural innovation has actually increased crop diversity. The local diet pattern is highly diverse and well embedded with locally produced grains, which discredits the alleged changes in food habits. Following on from this, we present a critique to prevalent dependency narrative that conceptualizes food aid as detrimental to local food security. Such conceptualizations are currently occupying policy discussion that advocate for the elimination or reduction of food aid. We caution that such a policy move will not only directly affect many poor farmers’ food access, it will also leave an increased number of Himalayan farmers vulnerable to food insecurity and malnutrition in the face of emerging climatic and socioeconomic changes challenging local livelihoods. 2. Food aid, food insecurity and the framing of dependency narratives in Nepal ‘‘Don’t kill Karnali with your aid1”

1 Jiban Bahadur Shahi, a local political leader from Karnali elected to the former constituent essembly of Nepal and currently to the provincial assembly of Karnali province. See Shahi (2005).

56

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

The history of formal food aid programs in Nepal dates back to 1974. Due to bad weather and poor harvests between years 1970 and 1973, many hill and mountain districts of Nepal suffered severe food crises. As a response, the government of Nepal founded the ‘Nepal Food Corporation (NFC)’ in 1974 to increase food access of the remote communities by distributing subsidized food grains, mainly rice (NFC, 2017). During the same period, Nepal also became a regular recipient of World Food Program (WFP) based food aid (Khadka, 1989). WFP at present conducts various food and cash transfer programs as well as employment guarantee schemes (see WFP, 2017). These two food assistance programs, currently Nepal’s main non-contributory social assistance schemes, prioritize areas that have high food insecurity prevalence. Karnali (see fig 1) is geographically the most remote and underdeveloped region in terms of social development indicators. The five districts of Karnali score an average Human Development Index below 0.400, one of the lowest figures anywhere in the world (GON & UNDP, 2014) and have malnutrition levels which are among the world’s highest (NPC, 2010). Understandably, it is the country’s most prioritized region in terms of food aid programs. As local level evaluation studies are lacking, it is poorly known how the four decades of food aid has affected the local food security (but see: Bishokarma, 2012; Gautam & Andersen, 2017a). It has, however, provided the public with a new perspective to explain the high levels of food insecurity and malnutrition. As reflected in the statement above, ‘dependency’ of the local farmers on food aid is understood as the root cause of food insecurity in the region. The dependency narrative takes the form of a story to explain food insecurity. According to Roe (1991, p. 288), a development narrative follows a common definition of a story that has a beginning, middle, and end, in which the process of a phenomenon is presented in chronological order with different roles played by clearly cast actors. In Karnali, the story begins at a time when the local farmers produced plenty of diverse grains to meet their food needs and there was no need of external assistances (see Adhikari, 2008). The problem of food insecurity began, according to the narrative, after the government and later the WFP started to provide free or subsidized rice, which gradually changed the local food preference. The farmers started to neglect locally available diverse grains such as millet, buckwheat and barley, and tended to eat rice only, which resulted in reduced diet diversity and increased malnutrition. In addition, since rice, now the preferred grain, is scantily produced in this high mountain environment, the local farmers started to give up toiling in their fields to grow the less preferred traditional grains in anticipation of receiving food aid (Roy, 2015; Upreti, 2010). The farmers’ laziness has consequently led to the abandonment of previously cultivated land on a massive scale and many traditional crops are on the verge of disappearance from the faming system (Pangeni, 2015; Sejuwal, 2014). These changes have eventually led to a condition of persistent food insecurity and malnutrition ultimately reproducing the need for external assistance. Conceptualizing food insecurity as aid dependency, the narrative argues that there is no food scarcity at the real level, rather the alleged shortage is barely a shortage of rice (Shahi, 2006). The reported hunger and malnutrition in Karnali is therefore, a fake alarm (Upreti, 2010). The dependency narrative is very influential in shaping the public wisdom such that whenever food shortage in Karnali is reported in Kathmandu based media; it is translated into headlines that read: fake hunger,2 the black magic of white rice3, rice crisis4 etc.

The narrative has also been internalized by a section of the local community, mainly educated young people, who like others, understand the local poverty as the byproduct of external (food) aid. In September 2016, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ presented the government’s policies and programs at Nepal’s parliament that included several development projects including an assistance scheme targeted to Karnali. In addition to the already existing programs, his new scheme included a guaranteed 20 kg emergency rice donation to each household in Karnali zone, for example when a family has to perform birth or mortuary rites. The very next day, local high school students organized a protest rally in Jumla headquarters, who later sent 20 kg local rice to the Prime Minister’s Office with a message: ‘‘all we need is development, not rice”.5 Narratives are persuasive. By providing explanations to the causes and mechanisms of a problem, they call for actions (Roe, 1991). The call for development was clearly a call for replacing food aid with programs targeted to restore and commercialize the traditional farming which would open up opportunities for a food secure and prosperous Karnali. Since both NFC and WFP procure most of the rice from Nepalese farmers from the Tarai region, the potentials for the development of regular trade between Karnali and those areas is also widely discussed. In such trade pattern, Karnali would export locally produced grains such as organic buckwheat and finger millet and import rice among other commodities (Shahi, 2016, text in parenthesis added). Recent initiatives taken by the aid agencies are in line with this policy vision. In 2014, the NFC implemented a grain exchange program; started to buy the local grains for sale in Kathmandu as the first step toward making Karnali self-dependent by commercializing the local farms. The WFP projects are also targeting local agricultural development through irrigation projects or agricultural commercialization through the promotion of high value cash crops such as apples or local medicinal herbs. However, neither of these approaches have yet shown any encouraging results. The NFC could not market the local grains of Karnali in Kathmandu due mainly to the high price of the grains incurred by high transport cost (Chaudhari, 2017). Due to the lack of transport facilities and market access, the local farmers also perceived the agricultural commercialization strategy of WFP as infeasible and therefore the projects were not effectively accepted (Gautam & Andersen, 2017a). The failure of these programs adds puzzling questions regarding the underlying causes of local food security, the impacts of the external assistances on food security and livelihoods, and also on the validity of the dependency narrative. Despite being widespread and influential, evidence to substantiate the narrative is largely lacking. Here we draw on both qualitative and quantitative field data and therefrom analyze ‘dependency’ manifested in various dimensions of local food security and livelihoods.

3. Study area and methods The district of Humla (Fig. 1) was chosen as the study site. Humla is one of five districts composing the Karnali zone and lies at the north west corner of Nepal sharing border with the Tibet autonomous region of China.6 Located in a high-altitude area, Humla is the country’s most inaccessible district as it is yet to be connected with the national highway network. Semi-subsistence agriculture remains the mainstay of local livelihoods, where locally 5

Kantipur Daily, September 9th, 2016. Administrative regionalization of Nepal into different zones as illustrated in Fig. 1 has changed following Nepal’s transition to federalism since 2015. At present Karnali province includes a few additional districts from the former Bheri and Rapti zones. We still include the old zones to illustrate the study area because Karnali connotes to the area under old zonation with regards to food aid operations and prevalent dependency narrative. 6

2

Kantipur Daily, April 23rd, 2010. Kantipur Daily, August 7th, 2012. 4 Nepali Times Weekly, (09 July 2010–15 July 2010).The Kathmandu Post Daily, June 8th, 2014 (Editorial). 3

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

57

Fig. 1. Map of Humla District, Nepal (Source: Gautam, 2017a).

produced food is primarily utilized in self-provisioning of producer households and very little is traded locally. An overwhelming majority of the households have some degree of food deficit, which means that they consume all food they produce on their farms. Only around 7% farming families are surplus producers who occasionally sell some of their food surplus or provide in-kind food loans to families having acute food crises.7 Despite the high importance of agriculture for local livelihoods; only around 1% of the total land is cultivable leaving on average less than one hectare of land per household (DDC, 2011). Furthermore, high altitude farming is largely rain fed, has a short growing season and is highly vulnerable to climatic variabilities. Therefore, there is a constant pressure to meet food needs from self-production and chronic food insecurity is common. Recent estimates show that poverty prevalence and undernourishment rates in the area are over 50% and 60% respectively (NPC, 2010; World Bank, 2016). The population of Humla is composed of three dominant caste/ ethnic groups. Brahman/Chhetri (including Thakuri) and Dalit comprise Nepali speaking Hindu caste groups where Lama, another dominant group is a Tibetan speaking Buddhist ethnic group. In addition to farming, all caste and ethnic groups involve in a number of off-farm income activities. Despite their efforts to enhancing food security through diversified livelihood activities, the vast majority of households face food insecurity and stresses of unfulfilled non-food livelihood needs. In this context, food aid transfers play significant role. Nevertheless, food aid is a highly controversial issue and therefore it is difficult to precisely trace its history in the region. Some studies note that food assistance programs were implemented in Karnali region in the early 1970s (Adhikari, 2008; Ghimire, 2015). According to local people interviewed for this study, it was the year 1977 when Humla recieved its first food assistance. At present both NFC and WFP are conducting separate programs. Despite the fact that there is a high caste/ethnic variation in food insecurity prevalence and differential need of external 7

Source: Household survey data.

assistance, these programs tend to target these communities universally meaning that households can access food aid irrespective of their food security needs. This paper is based on primary data collected in three villages: Bargaon, Sarkeedeu and Kalika (Fig. 1). These villages represent the geographical and social variation of Humla; they feature all three caste and ethnic groups, are located at varying distances from Simkot, the district headquarters from a few miles (Bargaon) to several days’ walk (Kalika), and are situated at varying altitudes, ranging from 1800 m asl (Kalika) to as high as 3200 m asl (Bargaon). The main fieldwork was conducted in two phases between 2013 and 2014 and in total lasted five months. Prior to the main fieldwork, a pilot study was conducted for five weeks between September and October 2012. In the pilot study the researcher(s) lived in Humla and observed daily farming and family activities. Innumerable informal interviews were conducted with local farmers and they were useful to enhance general understanding regarding various aspects of the local food security. An additional six expert interviews also were conducted with government and nongovernmental organization (NGO) personnel with a focus on the management of food aid and its impacts on local food security. 3.1. Data collection The study adopted a mixed-method approach to collect and analyze data (Johnson & Onwuegbuzie, 2004; Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998). Thee major data collection strategies were employed in the main field work: focus group discussions (FGDs), household surveys and dietary surveys. FGD comprises small group of informants in which the participants discuss the issues specified by the researcher. They interact within the group, debate with one another and elaborate the issues leading to synergistic information mining and gathering of different perspectives, which can seldom be achieved through individual interviews (Cameron, 2010; Kamberelis & Dimitriadis, 2005). To represent all the three caste/

58

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

ethnic groups in the FGDs, the groups were composed to maintain homogeneity within groups and heterogeneity between groups (Bedford & Burgess, 2001). This led to separate FGDs for the Dalit, Chhetri and Lama. The size of the groups ranged from five to ten participants, and we drew on the concept of ‘theoretical saturation’ to determine the total number of FGDs (Agar, 1996; Bryman, 2004) which resulted into 10 FGDs with 74 participants, including 33 female participants. The issues discussed in the FGDs related to local farming systems, dietary pattern, livelihood risks, coping strategies etc. In addition, the main historical changes in local economies, farming practices and dietary changes were also discussed in the FGDs as well as in the informal interviews. The second major data collection method was household surveys. A survey questionnaire was administered to a total of 313 households including all the three major caste/ethnic groups (Lama = 27%, Chhetri = 49% and Dalit = 24%). The survey collected quantitative information regarding various aspects of the households’ social and economic characteristics including farming and food production. To precisely measure the local dietary pattern, a dietary survey was also conducted with a subset of respondents participating in the household survey. Twenty-four hour dietary recall (24 h recall), a method of measuring diet consumption common to the field of community nutrition, was applied (see Gibson & Ferguson, 2008; Kennedy et al., 2017). Subsistence and semi-subsistence farmers produce most of their food themselves and therefore there is high seasonality in agricultural produces and food they consume (Campbell et al., 2014; Savy, Martin-Prével, Traissac, Eymard-Duvernay, & Delpeuch, 2006). To capture this seasonality, the dietary survey was conducted in the autumn (October–November 2013) and the spring (April–June 2014). The individuals participating in the survey were adults (16– 59 years of age), both men and women from all the three caste and ethnic groups. A total of 138 individuals participated in the first survey, whereas the second survey covered 123 individuals. These individuals were visited in person for two non-consecutive days for 24-h dietary recall (Gibson & Ferguson, 2008) and were asked to recall all the food and drinks consumed during the preceding 24 h, and probed to recall if anything was eaten outside home. A combination of ready-to-eat food (such as cooked rice and vegetable curry) and food models of local bread (rota) and pancakes (lagar) was used to estimate the consumption amount. A portable digital scale was used to weigh portion sizes. A mean value of the two recalls has been used for analysis. All the food models were validated twice to determine the conversion factor to actual raw food amounts; before and after the survey. Similarly, a cookedfood-to-raw-food conversion factor was derived by weighing raw and cooked items in both occasions. Overall, the use of locally calibrated models to estimate food amounts, the coverage of food consumption seasonality (diet survey in two seasons), and individual level food consumption assessments (i.e. the participants recalled and estimated the food items consumed by only him or herself) maintained a high standard of dietary data quality. We analyzed the multitude of qualitative and quantitative data to gain insights into how the food transfers from food aid affect various dimensions of local food security. The following sections present the results of the study classified into four main themes: first, household food insecurity in the context of multiple stresses; second the contribution of food aid in household food supply; third, continuity and change in the local farming systems; and fourth, local dietary pattern and its linkages with food aid transfers. 4. Results 4.1. Household food insecurity and emerging challenges Households in Humla rely primarily on self-production of food for food security. The local production, however, meets only 63% of

the total need. Cereal crops, the dominant produces of the local farming system, are produced in two seasons; the winter crops which include wheat (Triticum aestivum), barley (Hordeum vulgare) and naked barley (Andorogen sorghum) are sown in November and harvested in June/July. Buckwheat (Fagopyrum eculentum), panicum millet (Panicum miliaceum), finger millet (Eleusine coracana) and paddy rice (Oryza sativa), the major summer crops are, on the other hand, sown in July and harvested by November. In many food deficit households, food scarcity starts as early as in January when the summer harvest has been consumed and continues with increasing severity until the winter crops are harvested in June. In 2013 only around 10% households (31 in a sample of 313) produced enough food to sustain themselves throughout the year. Self-production in nearly half of all households (47%) hardly fed the families for six months. By caste/ethnicity, the Lama households were found to have the highest food sufficiency of 75% followed by the Chhetri households (63%). The ‘low-caste’ Dalit households had the lowest level of food security; they could meet only around 47% of the need from self-production in 2013. The already persistent local food insecurity has also been aggravated by a number of emerging socio-economic and environmental stresses. In the household survey, 68% farmers reported labor shortage as the most critical challenge to farm production. It was attributed mainly to increased school attendance of the younger population over the last few decades. Labor is a critical capital in local farming system and therefore increased school attendance substantially reduced labor available for land cultivation as well as for livestock raising. In addition, the recent enforcement of community forestry program has also heavily taxed the farmers for their livestock to access forest (and in some cases they have been expelled altogether). These institutional changes have made it costly for the farmers to maintain their usual livestock size. Since the farming system is labor intensive, farm mechanization is very low and animal manure remains the sole source of soil fertility; changes in labor supply and livestock population have had negative aggregate effects on local farm production and ultimately on household food security. The socio-economic drivers of change have been synergized by climatic variability and change, most notably increased dry-spells, which the farmers describe in terms of changing pattern of snow and monsoon precipitation. The timing of peak snow accumulation on the ground is the main factor determining the duration of snow cover. The local farmers, through a phrase in vernacular,8 describe the snow attaining peak accumulation on the ground in Push (a Nepali month that spans December-January) to last longer than that attaining peak accumulation in Magh (January-February). The interviews and FGDs traced the farmers’ perception of past snowfall generally starting in early December and reaching peak accumulation in late January. In the recent years, however, it is perceived to start between late December and early January, and reach peak accumulation in late February or sometimes even early March. This means that soil moisture is gradually decreasing due to the decrease in total snow cover days. The farmers also perceive a clear shift in the premonsoon precipitation from late April/early May to late May/early June. This creates a precipitation gap leading to a dry-spell between April and May, a period when soil moisture should normally be high lest the early-growing winter crops dry. Moreover, it is also the time that seedling nurseries for summer crops have to be prepared, which too demand high soil moisture. Therefore, the frequent incidents of dry-spells during this critical period was described to take a large toll on the annual crop production even when total annual precipitation remains relatively stable. Consistently, 63% of farmers participating in household surveys chose increasing dry-spells, mainly during the spring, to be the major stress to their farm production.

8

Pushko hiu sheela, Maghko hiu bila.

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

4.2. Coping strategies and the role of food aid The local farmers employ different strategies to cope with food insecurity. Traditionally there exists a patron-client system called Balighare, in which the Dalit families provide farm labor and a number of caste-based services such as tailoring and smithing to their ‘high-caste’ clients. For this, they are entitled to a fixed amount of grain each year. Since most of the Dalits have too little land for cultivation and large food deficits, the grain under Balighare contract, although important, is not adequate for their yearround sustenance. Borrowing food or money to buy food from richer households remains a common coping strategy among poor households including the Dalits. However, such loans, irrespective of cash or kind, incur interest and therefore the borrower households get into debt which intensifies their vulnerability to future food security related shocks. In emergency cases (such as acute illness) poor households even sell livestock to secure cash. In 2013, nearly 18% households reported to have sold livestock at least once to meet various emergency expenses. This too is counterproductive because livestock is one of the major productive assets in the farming system both in view of its use as draught power and the sole source of manure supply for soil fertility. Livelihood diversification is an important economic strategy to enhance food security and to meet non-food needs. Trading activities, limited salaried jobs in local schools and NGO offices, seasonal wage migration to India, and collection of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) are common off-farm activities. The former two, trade and salaried jobs, reportedly offered the highest economic return such that households having members involved in them had much higher food security and household assets. However, only 33% households in 2013 were involved in these profitable activities and most of them were relatively well-off Lama and Chhetri farmers. A large majority of poor and Dalit farmers were excluded as they failed to meet the prerequisites or entry requirements associated with these activities. For example, education is a prerequisite for individuals aspiring for jobs, and poor farmers having no or modest levels of investment capacity cannot start trade activities. Therefore, they had to choose less capital demanding activities such as seasonal migration or NTFP collection. These easy-to-access activities, however, offered comparatively far less economic return. Households that had member(s) involved in salaried jobs/or trade had a significantly higher annual income (Rs. 264,000) than those having seasonal migration and/or NTFP collection their off-farm activities (but none of salaried job and trade) (Rs. 75,000). Arguably, the low return off-farm activities offered rather modest economic support, helpful to reduce the severity of food shortage but not to enhance sustained food security. In this context, food aid holds significant position in the food security of poor households. There are currently two separate food aid schemes under operation in Humla. The first, Food-for-Work Program (FFW) is a scheme of food transfer in exchange for labor to construct and maintain various rural and agricultural infrastructures, such as irrigation canals, local road and trails etc. FFW included 40 working days of food ration (160 kg) in 2013. All sampled households participated in FFW programs and the rice thus earned met around 15% of the total household food need on average. Nepal Food Corporation (NFC), on the other hand, sells rice at a subsidized price. However, this scheme has comparatively far lower coverage than the FFW scheme, covering only around 5% of the total household food need in 2013. Since the rice distribution under NFC covers only a small subsidy (only the transport cost), farmers still need to pay for it in cash. This means the exclusion of households from this scheme when they do not have disposable cash at the appropriate time of the distribution. Data from household surveys revealed that 42% households, mostly poorer ones did not access NFC rice that year.

59

Although the food ration provided by food aid programs was not distributed equitably, its aggregate contribution was still significant in the context of high household food deficit. In an informal interview a local farmer from Sarkeedeu said: ‘‘You know, many food-deficit families run out of their summer harvest by February or early March. Had we not received food aid transfers, hunger would have loomed large by now (April)”. Food aid transfer, both combined, met 20% of the total household food need and nearly halved the aggregate food deficit. It was particularly important for poor household as it contributed as a safety net by enabling them to some extent to avoid the customary counterproductive coping strategies, such as borrowing grain or taking loan to buy food, which could otherwise make them susceptible to more serious food insecurity. 4.3. Food aid dependency? The role of food aid transfers on short-term household food security is clear from their contribution to filling household food deficit. The central issue inherent in the dependency narrative relates to what such free/concessional food transfers hold for the long-term food security of the communities. More specifically, questions relevant to ‘dependency’ in the context of subsistence agriculture-based economy are: have there been any changes in labor allocation and land utilization to an extent that they induce negative implication on the production of local traditional grains? Have the farmers opted out of the local traditional diet? Can the observed change, if any, be attributed to food aid? In this section, we organize our empirical data to evaluate the interlinkages among labor allocation, land entitlement and land use change, continuity and change in local grain production, and change in local dietary pattern. 4.3.1. Continuity and change in farming practices 4.3.1.1. Labor allocation, land utilization and land abandonment. Land and labor are two critical resources in Humla. An average household owns only 0.7 ha of cultivated land which is distributed into small patches throughout the slopes in varying altitudes (1000–4000 m above sea level). Human labor is applied to all farming activities including land preparation for cultivation, seed sowing, weeding and harvesting. The manuring process of land demands the carrying of manure from the stables to the cultivation patches situated in varying distances from the stable. Livestock is used for draught power; however, it is not viable on patches that are too small or are in extreme slopes. Fragmentation of land under inter-generational inheritance transfers is common among the Hindu caste groups, both Chhetri and Dalit. A household owns land of varying qualities according to soil productivity, access to irrigation etc. To make inheritance transfers equitable, all types of land, even if it is already small in size, should be further divided to the splitting families (of male siblings). Our field observations and measurements found that plots smaller than 100 square meters were not uncommon. The local geographical features and land tenure managements therefore make farming a laborintensive activity and subsequently food production highly sensitive to labor supply. Land distribution and labor allocation strategies vary by caste/ ethnic groups. Unlike Chhetri and Dalit, the Lama ethnic group practices fraternal polyandry, which means that all male siblings have one shared spouse and therefore their family does not spilt. This prevents land fragmentation under inheritance transfers. Household survey data shows that the average landholding size of Lama (1.2 ha) is double that of the Chhetri and three times that of the Dalit households. In addition, the relative availability of

60

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

adult members (due to polyandrous family structure) has historically enabled the Lama to involve in other off-farm activities, mainly trade. Emerging labor shortage is, however; making it more difficult for them to maintain their balanced participation in economically lucrative trade and traditional farming. Therefore, an increased number of the Lama farmers have entered into sharecropping contracts with other caste groups, mainly Dalit. The household survey found 13% of all households in a sharecropping contract. Under this contract, the sharecropper cultivates the land and the total production is shared equally between the two parties. By adding some food grain to the sharecropper’s annual food basket, this contract generally makes a positive food security contribution to poor farmers having low land endowment, although such share is inadequate for securing their year round need. Emerging farming challenges have, however; started to alter this common practice of sharecropping. In the FGDs, Lama farmers expressed their willingness to put more of their land into sharecropping contracts. However, the land poor farmers (mainly Dalits) were largely hesitant due mainly to increasing dry-spells, more frequent extreme events and reduced manure supply for cultivation, and consequent decrease in soil productivity. A Lama woman who participated in a FGD said: ‘‘Dalits are poor because they are lazy. They complain of having too little land but refuse to cultivate our land on sharecropping contract”. The Dalit FGD participants agreed that land scarcity is the primary reason they are poor and food insecure. They, however, clearly expressed their reluctance to enter the sharecropping contract because: ‘‘We have several problems in sharecropping. Rain is not certain, drought is more common now than before and the soil has become less productive. The grain share we earn from sharecropping sometimes cannot cover even the labor cost.” -A Dalit man in Simkot A decrease in sharecropping tendency has forced some Lama farmers to give up cultivating some of the small, marginal and degraded patches lying far from their settlements. Many Chhetri and Dalit farmers too perceive it more beneficial strategy not only to opt out of sharecropping in search of other options, but also to give up toiling in their own land if it is already severely degraded and has very low productivity. Therefore, despite land scarcity being a widespread problem, land abandonment is also increasingly taking place among farmers from the latter groups. Nevertheless, alternative livelihood options are very limited and therefore farmers are facing increased pressure to seek new options within farming. Interestingly, leaving some of the highly degraded land fallow, some households from Sarkeedeu (Chhetri and Dalit) have actually managed to clear forest into new cultivation. However, such land extension is not viable for all households in all areas because rugged topography and poorly developed soil is the common geographical feature of the land. Therefore, more land is left abandoned compared to new land acquired for cultivation. Household survey found about 12% of the previously cultivated land has been abandoned, of which only 20% has been compensated by land extension. 4.3.1.2. Crop diversity and production. Cereal crops are at the top priority in the local farming system. Due to limited physical and economic access to market goods, local production of vegetables, fruits, fat and even condiments is also crucial for meeting the needed diet diversity. In addition, inherent variability in crop niches due to high variation in altitude and microclimatic conditions leads to high on-farm crop diversity. Table 1 and 2 show crop

Table 1 Number of cereal crops produced by individual households (n = 313). Number of cereal crops

Number of producer households

% of households

2 or less 3–5 6 and more Total

8 149 156 313

2.6 47.6 49.8 100

diversity and production amounts. An overwhelming majority of farmers (97%) produced at least three cereal crops on their farms in 2013 (Table 1). Among them 50% (156 in a sample of 313) produced more than five crops. The main staple crops in Humla are finger millet, panicum millet, buckwheat, wheat, barley and rice whereas smaller amounts of naked barley, amaranths, foxtail millet, maize and sorghum are also produced. There are local variations with regards to the main crop produced in different areas. For example, finger millet is the main crop in Kalika, whereas buckwheat is the main crop in Bargaon. By frequency, panicum millet is produced by most farmers (74% farmers), followed by wheat (69%), buckwheat (64%) and finger millet (63%) (Table 2). In terms of total amount, buckwheat is the main crop sharing 21% to the total crop production, followed by wheat (20%), panicum millet (16%) and finger millet (15%). Other crops such as maize, paddy, barley and amaranths produced in smaller quantities too have significant aggregate contribution to the total food basket (Table 2). The survey data showed an average household crop diversification (total number of cereal crop produced per household) of 5.4 in 2013. Next to the cereal grains, legumes are the most important produce of the local farming system. They mainly include kidney bean, soy bean, rice bean and grass peas and are mostly intercropped with cereals. A substantial amount of edible oil is managed locally by producing mustard and soybean as well as extracting lesser amount of oil from walnut and apricot kernel. In addition, some households also extract fat from yak, buffalo, goat or sheep when they are slaughtered (mainly during the festival of Dasain), and consume it later as cooking oil. However, the bulk of cooking oil consumed in Humla now is bought in market. The local food system has always remained limited in its capacity to supply vegetable items for year round consumption. Potato, radish, local turnip and different varieties of pumpkin and eggplants are the main traditional vegetable produce. The cold and long winter is a slack season with local farms growing no vegetables during this period. Moreover, low production of seasonal vegetables and the lack of their storing facilities means that the local farmers have rather limited items for consumption during the winter and through the spring to the summer. In interviews and FGDs,

Table 2 Composition of households cereal crop production (n = 313). Cereal

Number of households

% of households

% of total production

Wheat Buckwheat Panicum millet Finger millet Nacked barley Paddy rice Barley Maize Foxtail millet Amaranths Total

217 199 231

69.3 63.6 73.8

21.5 21 15.7

196 179

62.6 57.2

15.3 9.3

101 123 176 134 128 313

32.3 39.3 56.2 42.8 40.9

6.7 4.7 3.6 1.4 0.8 100

61

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

the participants noted pulses (mainly kidney beans), potato and a few items collected in the wild to be the only items consumed during the winter. The collected items, such as stinging nettle, fern and different types of wild green leaves are most common to the local people during food shortage. We too were quite frequently served with them (mainly stinging nettle) as a vegetable item during our fieldwork. Vegetable consumption still remains low and highly seasonal. Table 3 illustrates that an average individual consumed only 269 g of raw vegetables in the autumn, which is actually the high season for vegetables. However, substantial changes in production patterns are being observed in recent years. Numerous NGOs have been implementing local agricultural development programs over the last two decades or so. In this connection, they are not only transmitting innovative ideas but also appropriate means to apply them in the farming systems. The most significant of such interventions is related to the introduction of new vegetable seeds and the technical and logistical support to build greenhouse. This has enabled farmers to produce vegetable items even in the winter and some of them such as broad leaf mustard, cauliflower, bitter gourd, capsicum etc. are completely new to the traditional farms. During the dietary survey, a Lama man in Bargaon said: ‘‘The introduction of new seeds and greenhouses have made it possible for us to consume diverse vegetables now. It is only after greenhouses were installed, that we have got broad-leaf mustard, cauliflower, tomato and garlic in our dish even in the winter. If you had come ten or fifteen years earlier, you would have found only daal (pulses), potato and sisnu (nettle) eaten as vegetables at this time of the year (early April).”

Having installed their own greenhouses, some households in Bargaon have been able to commercialize vegetable production by selling some surplus to restaurants and hotels in Simkot. However, access to the benefits (seeds, greenhouse building materials and technical assistance) is still limited and most of the existing greenhouses are shared within groups rather than owned by individual households. In addition, the available market is also very small at the local level. Therefore, commercialization of vegetable production is rather limited. Undeniably, however; NGOs have brought about significant changes in the farming system. In the household survey, negative perceptions of observed changes in agriculture, such as land degradation, drought and decreasing productivity was common. However, none of the farmers perceived to have had on-farm crop diversity decrease over the years. Rather, 27% of farmers reported that crop diversity is unprecedentedly

high on the local farms, which is expected to rise, given several NGOs increasingly targeting local agricultural development with varying projects. 4.3.2. Dietary pattern: is it predominantly rice based? Our quantitative estimates from the dietary survey shows rice, finger millet, buckwheat and wheat as the main grains consumed in Humla. Rice was the most common grain in terms of consumer frequency both in the spring and the autumn (74% and 77% respectively) (Table 3). However, from the point of view of average amount of grain consumption, rice was the second most common grain after finger millet. The average of the two seasons shows that rice is the second major crop consumed after finger millet. In fact, average rice consumption is not considerably higher than other local grains such as maize, wheat and panicum millet (Table 3) signifying that the diet pattern is well embedded with local production. Data on average daily grain consumption presented in Table 3 are adjusted to the number of individuals consuming that grain. For example, the average amount of finger millet consumption in the spring (284 g, Table 3) was calculated by diving the total finger millet consumption in the whole dataset (i.e. 23,837 g) by total number of individuals consuming finger millet (=84). Therefore the consumption amount of some grain (such as maize in both seasons) is relatively high although only a few individuals consumed them. In Fig. 2, we present average diet consumption pattern at the aggregate, which means total amount of grain consumed is divided by total sample size irrespective of whether or not an individual ate all grains. Data thus derived show that finger millet and rice are the two main staples in both seasons. These two grains cover 56% of the total grains consumed in the spring and nearly 80% during the autumn. However, in both seasons rice is not the main staple. It covers only 27% of the total cereal consumed in the spring and 33% that in the autumn. This implies that 73% of the cereal consumed in the spring and 67% that in the autumn (i.e. roughly 70% at aggregate) is a cereal other than rice. Assuming that the locally produced rice (i.e. 7% of total cereal production, Table 2) too contributes to consumption, rice transfer under food aid makes even smaller contribution to local consumption. This is in sharp contrast to the dependency narrative that explains food aid to have induced a predominantly rice based diet in Humla. The snapshot dietary data has limitations in featuring historical change in food consumption patterns. Interviews with the local farmers helped us enhance important information regarding the past consumption of rice vis-à-vis other local grains in absence of food aid. The local economy of Humla historically sustained from farming, pastoralism and salt-grain trade between Tibet and Nepal.

Table 3 Diet consumption pattern of adults (based on 24 h dietary recalls). Cereal

Finger millet Rice Maize Wheat Panicum millet Buckwheat Barley Nacked barley Legumes Vegetables Total** * **

Spring (n = 123)

Autumn (n = 138)

Consumers (%)

Average daily consumption (g)*

Consumers (%)

Average daily consumption (g)*

68 74 12 64 21 45 – 13 89 100

284 245 166 249 193 169 – 43 65 113 677

75 77 8 28 10 28 6 4 89 100

472 340 289 198 245 182 120 49 100 269 780

Raw, uncooked amount. Average amount of all cereal grains consumed per individual per day.

Average of the two seasons (daily consumption (g))

378 293 228 224 219 176 60 46 83 191 729

62

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

Fig. 2. Daily grain-diet composition in Humla.

The trade was characterized by the transport of massive amount of rice from the grain surplus Tarai region of Nepal for sale in Tibet where gain scarcity was common in the past. In turn, natural salt which is extensively available in Tibet was transported to Nepal where salt was scarce. In interviews, the local farmers described that substantial amount of rice was also sold within Humla on route to Tibet. Therefore, rice used to be the main staple to fill the local grain deficit in the past like food aid transfers fill some of the deficit at present. An old Lama man who, for several years, was involved in the cross-border salt-grain trade in the past, mentioned that the amount of rice they used to have at home for consumption was considerably higher than they now get in food aid. Showing the box-beds around in the kitchen, he said: ‘‘We filled these box-beds with rice as we travelled to Tibet via Humla. How can we compare that abundance with small pouches of today’s occasional food aid transfers?” The case of a few farmers involved in trade cannot be generalized, nor can the precise magnitude of historical changes in the role of rice in local diets be determined by the data collected in this study. Nevertheless, this qualitative information suggests that rice is not a new grain consumed in Humla as claimed in the narrative, nor can any dietary changes be firmly attributed to food aid only. 5. Discussion and conclusion Dependency narratives conceptualize food aid schemes as detrimental to food security and therefore people’s reliance on them a tendency to be avoided (Harvey & Lind, 2005). However, reliance on external assistance to fulfill food and livelihood needs is imperative for millions of rural farming populations in developing countries who have a number of limitations in their resource endowments, livelihood activities and food security outcomes (FAO, 2006). While some farming families can generally meet their livelihood needs themselves, some families are too poor to secure livelihoods without external assistances. Similarly, there are also households with composite food insecurity, that have generally low or moderate level of food insecurity, but which occasionally fall far below the subsistence threshold when they are exposed to unexpected shocks (Devereux, 2006). For them too, external assistances become imperative in order to avoid the risks of getting into chronic food insecurity (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005). Arguably, relying on external assistances is positive in such circumstances and therefore a distinction should be made between positive dependency and negative dependency (Barrett, Clark, Clay, & Reardon, 2005; Harvey & Lind, 2005). Food aid dependency, a form of negative dependency, can be described as a condition when continued provision of food aid makes no significant contribution to

the achievement of self-sustenance, but rather reproduces the recipients’ dependence on it (Riddell, 1996). Despite being widely discussed, existing studies largely lack systematic evidence for dependency and are commonly based only on ‘‘assumptions and theoretical explanations supported by barely an anecdote or two” (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005, p. 277). The empirical evidence provided by this study is therefore crucial in view of this gap in literature. Central to the dependency narrative are two major assumptions regarding food aid and its role in household food security. First, it is assumed that food aid is reliable and covers a core part of an individual/household’s livelihood strategies (Barrett et al., 2005; Harvey & Lind, 2005). Second, that food is farming families’ sole need and therefore having adequate amount of food supply guarantees their livelihood security. At this backdrop, it is considered that by ‘reliably’ providing ‘adequate’ amounts of food to the beneficiaries, food aid schemes induce specific behavioral change among them such that they disregard economic initiatives toward becoming self-reliant. In Humla’s case, this could mean neglecting local agriculture, and giving up the consumption of local grains because: ‘‘why would the farmers bother to cultivate their land if they got free rice, their preferred grain, in adequate amount (Upreti, 2010)?” Evidence, however; sharply contrasts with these assumptions. The empirical results of this study, as well as others, including those from the world’s major food aid recipient countries all highlight that food aid is neither the major source of food security of the aid recipient communities/households, nor is it reliable in terms of amount, timing and targeting for people to fully depend on it (Bishokarma, 2012; Del Ninno, 2001; Little, 2008; Pyakuryal, Roy, & Thapa, 2010). Nagoda (2015) found the amount of food rations annually allocated to Humla by WFP to fluctuate between 400 MT and 2500 MT in the 2000s which indicates subsequent fluctuation in the amount of food received by a single household. In interviews conducted for this study, the WFP officials described that their targeting scheme is based on routine Food Security Monitoring System in that the most vulnerable spatial units (villages) are prioritized for food aid. Therefore, it is no guarantee that communities having received food aid in the past will necessarily receive it again,9 indicating that not all farmers can rely on it. The distribution of subsidized rice from the NFC, the other food aid scheme too is not reliable. The distribution takes place only a few times a year, with an amount very small (5% of total household food need in 2013). In fact, the NFC is mandated to prioritize the public employees including the police and army over the local farmers. Therefore the bulk of NFC rice is sold actually to the job holders, most of whom are non-locals (Pyakuryal et al., 2010). Moreover, even among the local farmers, those living in the proximity to the distribution depot, receiving prompt information regarding the distribution and having adequate disposable cash at the right time are likely to access more of it than others (Gautam & Andersen, 2017a). All these uncertainties have taught the farmers not to depend on food aid and not to take any risks that could deteriorate their food security (Barrett & Maxwell, 2005; Nagoda, 2015). This was supported by our data reflecting the continuation of the production and consumption of traditional food grains in the local communities. Inherent with the dependency narrative is also a critical conceptual fallacy associated with its emphasis on food need only, and the neglect of all other (non-food) livelihood needs. Food is only one of several needs of a farming family and therefore their economic decisions are guided by the consideration of how balance can be maintained between competing needs. This sometimes 9 Our observation was apparently illustrative of this. While farmers from Kalika, the most food insecure of the selected villages were engaged in an FFW project in April–May 2014, there was no any scheme endorsed yet then for Bargaun – the village inhabited by relatively food secure Lama community.

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

leads non-food goods and services to be prioritized over food (De Waal, 2005; Maxwell & Smith, 1992; Maxwell, 1996; PinstrupAndersen, 2009) leaving food resources (such as food aid) a secondary role to play in their decisions. Arguably, the condition and process through which food aid is considered to induce laziness among farmers mirrors grave misunderstanding of their livelihood needs and priorities. This is particularly important in Humla’s case where 56% households rely directly on natural springs and rivers for drinking water, 46% lack access to an improved cooking stove, 53% to latrine and 47% to electricity.10 In the entire fieldwork, we observed that a family rarely has separate beds for all; rather the whole family lays thin mats or handmade carpets on the floor to use as beds. Households lacking access to electricity collect small woods of Chir Pine (Pinus roxburghii) which they burn one after the other to provide indoor light in the evening (see also McKay, Zahnd, Sanders, & Nepali, 2007). In such a situation where the local people lack even very basic livelihood needs and facilities, it is implausible to argue that a support scheme that provides limited food ration, just 20% of the total need, can induce moral hazard to such an extent that they give up farming, the mainstay of their livelihoods. An aspect of the local farming that the dependency narrative most frequently cites to substantiate its claim of food aid dependency is the increasing trend of land abandonment. Undeniably, land abandonment is a widespread problem in Nepal’s mid-hill and mountain areas where up to 60% of previously cultivated land has been abandoned over the last few decades (Jaquet et al., 2015; Khanal & Watanabe, 2006; Ojha et al., 2017; Paudel, Tamang, & Shrestha, 2014). These, however; are areas outside of food aid intervention, where rapid outmigration of rural population to cities and international job markets remains the main causal driver of the change. Comparatively, Humla has far less land abandonment (net abandonment of around 10%). Moreover, its underlying factor is not a high rate of outmigration nor the farmers’ laziness induced by their dependency on food aid. Rather, it is the result of their strategic decision to opt out of less profitable activity (i.e. cultivating degraded land) to allow more time and labor to pursue other more advantageous opportunities. Interestingly, time and labor optimized by giving up cultivation of some land has also been invested back to the appropriation of forest land into new cultivation. Land extension practice is neither feasible for all farmers, nor sustainable to cope with increasing soil degradation. Nevertheless, it delivers an important message that by missing the local cases of land extension completely, exaggerating the scale of land abandonment and falsely attributing it to food aid induced laziness, the dependency narrative is ‘‘misreading” the local environmental context (Fairhead & Leach, 1996). Stephenson and Stephenson (2016) describe the misreading as a ‘victim blaming trope’ used to impose the local farmers themselves the responsibility for their poverty and food insecurity. As the narrative ascribes the local people the responsibility for their social and economic deprivation, it masks the external social, political and environmental drivers of local poverty and food insecurity. Several studies underscore that farming and pastoralism-based livelihoods of Humla have been worst hit by political changes in Tibet following its annexation to China and subsequent cross-border regulation of the salt-grain trade that sustained the local livelihoods for centuries (Bishop, 1990; Saxer, 2013). In addition, the enforcement of community forestry has also had a large toll on local pastoralism as well as on historical trade because it forced the farmers to reduce the size of their livestock (Adhikari, 2008; Gautam & Andersen, 2017b; Saxer, 2013). The internal social and political inequality rooted into caste, ethnicity and gender has also been instrumental in shaping and reinforcing the marginalization of some groups like women and low caste Dalits, and which also determines socially dis-

10

Calculated from survey data.

63

aggregated impacts of emerging environmental change (Gautam, 2017b; Jones & Boyd, 2011; Nagoda & Eriksen, 2014; Onta & Resurreccion, 2011). These aspects of local livelihood vulnerability have not been completely ignored in current development programs. For example, considering the negative livelihood impacts of community forestry, a number of development institutions in Humla have started to emphasize agroforestry projects including the promotion of non-timber forest products that offer a better balance between the local farmers’ livelihoods and forest conservation while also increasing their income and improving household food security (Roy, Schmidt-Vogt, & Myrholt, 2009).11 Similarly, local NGOs as well as international donor agencies have also been focusing on transformative approaches in agricultural sector in the face of climate change (see for e.g., Pant et al., 2014). However, the dependency narrative still continues to have stronger hold in presenting a distorted picture of reality and (mis)guiding how policies envision development. This misguide was more clearly illustrated, when Mahendra Bahadur Shahi, the Chief Minister of Karnali recently proposed to expel all the NGOs from the province because they are ‘‘the main culprit inducing dependency and driving underdevelopment”.12 This paper cautions against such antagonism to external institutions and support programs. Here, we subscribe to Roe’s (1991) concept of counter-narrative which refutes the established narratives on the basis of empirical evidences and tells a better story regarding the issue in question. With ample evidences from Humla to contradict the popular narrative, we conclude with the counternarrative suggesting that food aid has not created dependency nor induced any type of negative impacts on local agriculture and diet pattern. Rather, covering about 20% of the total household food needs, it has contributed significantly to the poor and highly food deficit households by reducing their reliance on debt as a means of securing food. Therefore, any justification like dependency for their cutback may create a void in farmers’ livelihoods by removing an effective safety net which has been assisting them to avoid the loss of livelihoods in extreme conditions. Emerging environmental and socio-economic stresses are directly affecting the agrarian livelihoods of the local farmers who already have high poverty and food insecurity levels. In this context, external assistance programs like food aid become even more crucial lest they fall into extreme poverty. This conclusion does not mean to sideline the limitations of assistance programs such as their failure to equitably target the most vulnerable population, or their large investment on local asset building turning abysmal (see for e.g., Clay, Molla, & Habtewold, 1999; Barrett, 2002; WFP, 2013; Gautam & Andersen, 2017a). However, the main argument is that by eclipsing the seriousness of livelihood deprivation in the guise of food aid dependency, the narrative not only justifies the termination of food aid, it also dismisses the need to implementing alternative safety net programs. This, we argue, risks increasing the vulnerability of the poor Himalayan farmers to food insecurity, more so in the face of emerging socio-economic and environmental stresses. Conflict of interest The author declares no conflict of interest associated with the study. Acknowledgements I heartily acknowledge Peter Andersen for his suggestions on the research design and guidance on data collection, Dipak Phadera 11 Example also includes Government of Nepal’s ‘‘NTFP Development Program” launched in 52 districts including Humla. 12 Deshsanchar, Online Digital Newspaper, March 22, 2018: https://deshsanchar.com/2018/03/22/36432/.

64

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65

and his team for excellent assistance during the fieldwork, Madan K. Suwal for preparing the figures used in this paper and Benjamin Aubrey Robson for sparing some time from his busy office hours to read the manuscript and fix language errors. The last three photographs used in the supplementary file were provided by Santosh Kumar Jirel, an agricultural scientist at Self-Help Initiative Promotion Centre, Humla, Nepal, who owns their original copyright. I acknowledge him for his kind permission to use them in the paper. Finally, my sincere acknowledgements go to two anonymous reviewers whose insightful comments on the manuscript significantly contributed to the scientific quality of the paper. Appendix A. Supplementary data Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.worlddev.2018.12.001. References Abdulai, A., Barrett, C. B., & Hoddinott, J. (2005). Does food aid really have disincentive effects? New evidence from sub-Saharan Africa. World Development, 33(10), 1689–1704. Adger, W. N., Benjaminsen, T. A., Brown, K., & Svarstad, H. (2001). Advancing a political ecology of global environmental discourses. Development and Change, 32(4), 681–715. Adhikari, J. (2008). Food crisis in Karnali: A historical and politico-economic perspective. Kathmandu: Martin Chautari. Agar, M. H. (1996). The professional stranger: An informal introduction to ethnography. New York: Academic Press. Banerjee, A., Duflo, E., Goldberg, N., Karlan, D., Osei, R., Parienté, W., ... Udry, C. (2015). A multifaceted program causes lasting progress for the very poor: Evidence from six countries. Science, 348(6236), 1260799. Barrett, C. B., Clark, M. B., Clay, D., & Reardon, T. (2005). Heterogeneous constraints, incentives and income diversification strategies in rural Africa. Quarterly Journal of International Agriculture, 44(1), 37–60. Barrett, C., & Maxwell, D. (2005). Food aid after fifty years: Recasting its role. London: Routledge. Barrett, C. (2002). Food aid effectiveness: It’s the targeting, stupid! Cornell University Applied Economics and Management Working Paper (2002–43). Available at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=431261. Bedford, T., & Burgess, J. (2001). The focus-group experience. In M. Limb & C. Dwyer (Eds.), Qualitative methodologies for geographers: Issues and debates. London: Edward Arnold. Bishokarma, M. (2012). Assessing dependency: Food securtity and the impacts of food aid on livelihoods in Mugu. Kathmandu: Vajra Publication. Bishop, B. C. (1990). Karnali under stress: Livelihood strategies and seasonal rhythms in a changing Nepal Himalaya. Chicago: University of Chicago Geography Research Papers. Bryman, A. (2004). Social research methods. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bukusuba, J., Kikafunda, J. K., & Whitehead, R. G. (2007). Food security status in households of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) in a Ugandan urban setting. British Journal of Nutrition, 98(1), 211–217. Cameron, J. (2010). Focusing on the focus group. In I. HAy (Ed.), Qualitative research methods in human geography (3rd ed.. Ontario: Oxford University Press. Campbell, R. K., Talegawkar, S. A., Christian, P., LeClerq, S. C., Khatry, S. K., Wu, L. S., & West, K. P. Jr, (2014). Seasonal dietary intakes and socioeconomic status among women in the Terai of Nepal. Journal of Health, Population, and Nutrition, 32(2), 198. Chaudhari, R. (2017). Ajhai Biken Karnaliko Gedagudi. Kantipur Daily, May 27, 2017. Clay, D. C., Molla, D., & Habtewold, D. (1999). Food aid targeting in Ethiopia: A study of who needs it and who gets it. Food Policy, 24(4), 391–409. Cornwall, A., & Brock, K. (2005). What do buzzwords do for development policy? A critical look at ‘participation’, ‘empowerment’and ‘poverty reduction’. Third World Quarterly, 26(7), 1043–1060. DDC (District Development Committee) (2011). District Profile of Humla. Simikot: DDC. De Waal, A. (2005). Famine that Kills: Darfur. Sudan: Oxford University Press. Del Ninno, C. (2001). The 1998 floods in Bangladesh: Disaster impacts, household coping strategies, and response, Vol. 122. Devereux, S. (2006). Identification of methods and tools for emergency assessments to distinguish between chronic and transitory food insecurity, and to evaluate the effects of the various types and combinations of shocks on these different livelihood groups. Rome: United Nations World Food Programme. Edkins, J. (2000). Whose hunger?: Concepts of famine, practices of aid. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Escobar, A. (2011). Encountering development: The making and unmaking of the Third World. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Fairhead, J., & Leach, M. (1996). Misreading the African landscape: Society and ecology in a forest-savanna mosaic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations) (2006). The state of food and agriculture 2006. Food aid for food security? Rome: FAO. Ferrière, N., & Suwa-Eisenmann, A. (2015). Does food aid disrupt local food market? Evidence from rural Ethiopia. World Development, 76, 114–131. Fisher, E., Attah, R., Barca, V., O’Brien, C., Brook, S., Holland, J., et al. (2017). The livelihood impacts of cash transfers in sub-Saharan Africa: Beneficiary perspectives from six countries. World Development., 99, 299–319. Gautam, Y. (2017a). Seasonal migration and livelihood resilience in the face of climate change in Nepal. Mountain Research and Development, 37(4), 436–445. Gautam, Y. (2017b). Food system dynamics and food insecurity in Humla, Nepal Himalaya PhD thesis. University fo Bergen. Gautam, Y., & Andersen, P. (2017a). Aid or abyss? Food assistance programs (FAPs), food security and livelihoods in Humla, Nepal. Food Security, 9(2), 227–238. Gautam, Y., & Andersen, P. (2017b). Multiple stressors, food system vulnerability and food insecurity in Humla, Nepal. Regional Environmental Change, 17(5), 1493–1504. Gelan, A. U. (2007). Does food aid have disincentive effects on local production? A general equilibrium perspective on food aid in Ethiopia. Food Policy, 32(4), 436–458. Ghimire, S. (2015). Anikaalle jeliyeko Karnali. In S. Ghimire & T. Bhattarai (Eds.), Sambridha Karnaliko dukha (pp. 35–83). Kathmandu: Sangrila Books. Gibson, R. S., & Ferguson, E. L. (2008). An interactive 24-hour recall for assessing the adequacy of iron and zinc intakes in developing countries. Washington, DC: HarvestPlus. GON, & UNDP (Government of Nepal and United Nations Development Programme) (2014). Nepal Human Development Report 2014. Kathmandu: National Planning Commission. Harvey, P., & Lind, J. (2005). Dependency and humanitarian relief: A critical analysis. London: Humanitarian Policy Group, Overseas Development Institute. Herrero, M., Thornton, P. K., Notenbaert, A. M., Wood, S., Freeman, S., Msangi, H. A., et al. (2010). Smart investments in sustainable food production: revisiting mixed crop-livestock systems. Science, 327(5967), 822–825. Hidrobo, M., Hoddinott, J., Kumar, N., & Olivier, M. (2018). Social protection, food security, and asset formation. World Development, 101, 88–103. Hoddinott, J. F., Stifel, D., Hirvonen, K., & Minten, B. (2018). The impact of large-scale social protection interventions on grain prices in poor countries: Evidence from Ethiopia. Internatuonal Food Policy Research Institute. IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development) (2016). Rural development report 2016, Fostering inclusive rural transformation. Rome: International Fund for Agricultural Development. Jaquet, S., Schwilch, G., Hartung-Hofmann, F., Adhikari, A., Sudmeier-Rieux, K., Shrestha, G., et al. (2015). Does outmigration lead to land degradation? Labour shortage and land management in a western Nepal watershed. Applied Geography, 62, 157–170. Johnson, R. B., & Onwuegbuzie, A. J. (2004). Mixed methods research: A research paradigm whose time has come. Educational Researcher, 33(7), 14–26. Jones, L., & Boyd, E. (2011). Exploring social barriers to adaptation: Insights from Western Nepal. Global Environmental Change, 21(4), 1262–1274. Kamberelis, G., & Dimitriadis, G. (2005). Focus groups: Startegic Articulation of pedagogy, politics and inquiry. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.). The SAGE handbook of qualitative research (Vol. III, pp. 887–907). Thousand Oaks, London, New Delhi: Sage Publications. Kennedy, G., Lee, W., Termote, C., Charrondiere, R., Yen, J., & Tung, A. (2017). Guidelines on assessing biodiverse foods in dietary intake surveys. Rome: FAO. Khadka, N. (1989). Food aid and Nepal: Some comments. Food Policy, 14(2), 155–166. Khanal, N. R., & Watanabe, T. (2006). Abandonment of agricultural land and its consequences. Mountain Research and Development, 26(1), 32–40. Lambin, E. F., & Meyfroidt, P. (2011). Global land use change, economic globalization, and the looming land scarcity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 108(9), 3465–3472. Lentz, E. C., & Barrett, C. B. (2013). The economics and nutritional impacts of food assistance policies and programs. Food Policy, 42, 151–163. Lentz, E., Barrett, C. B., & Hoddinott, J. (2005). Food aid and dependency: implications for emergency food security assessments IFPRI Discussion Paper No. 12-2. IFPRI. Little, P. D. (2008). Food aid dependency in northeastern Ethiopia: myth or reality? World Development, 36(5), 860–874. Mabuza, M. L., Hendriks, S. L., Ortmann, G. F., & Sithole, M. (2009). The impact of food aid on maize prices and production in Swaziland. Agrekon, 48(1), 85–105. Maitrot, M., Barrientos, A., & Nino-Zarazua, M. (2010). Social assistance in developing countries database. Manchester: Chronic Poverty Research Centre. Maxwell, S. (1995). The disincentive effect of food aid: A pragmatic approach. In E. Clay & O. Stokke (Eds.), Food aid reconsidered: Assessing the impact on third world countries (pp. 66–90). London: Frank Cass. Maxwell, S. (1996). Food security: a post-modern perspective. Food Policy, 21(2), 155–170. Maxwell, S., & Smith, M. (1992). Household food security: a conceptual review. In S. Maxwell & T. Frankenberger (Eds.), Household Food Security: Concepts, indicators, measurements.Rome and. New York: IFAD and UNICEF. McCubbin, S., Smit, B., & Pearce, T. (2015). Where does climate fit? Vulnerability to climate change in the context of multiple stressors in Funafuti, Tuvalu. Global Environmental Change, 30, 43–55. McKay, K. H., Zahnd, A., Sanders, C., & Nepali, G. (2007). Responses to innovation in an insecure environment in rural Nepal. Mountain Research and Development, 27 (4), 302–307.

Y. Gautam / World Development 116 (2019) 54–65 Morton, J. F. (2007). The impact of climate change on smallholder and subsistence agriculture. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 104(50), 19680–19685. Nagoda, S. (2015). Reproducing vulnerability through climate change adaptation? Policy processes, local power relations and food insecurity in north-western Nepal PhD Thesis. Norwegian University of Life Sciences. Nagoda, S., & Eriksen, S. (2014). The role of local power relations in household vulnerability to Climate Change in Humla, Nepal. In T. H. Inderberg, S. Eriksen, K. O’Brien, & L. Sygna (Eds.), Climate change adaptation and development: Transforming paradigms and practices (pp. 200–218). New York: Routledge. NFC (Nepal Food Corporation). (2017). Historical Background. Retrieved December 18, 2017, from: http://nfc.com.np/Organization/Introduction. NPC (National Planning Commission) (2010). Food Security Atlas of Nepal. Kathmandu: Nepal Planning Commuission, World Food Program and Nepal Development Research Institute. Ojha, H. R., Shrestha, K. K., Subedi, Y. R., Shah, R., Nuberg, I., Heyojoo, B., et al. (2017). Agricultural land underutilisation in the hills of Nepal: Investigating socioenvironmental pathways of change. Journal of Rural Studies, 53, 156–172. Onta, N., & Resurreccion, B. P. (2011). The role of gender and caste in climate adaptation strategies in Nepal: Emerging change and persistent inequalities in the far-western region. Mountain Research and Development, 31(4), 351–356. Pangeni, R. (2014). Donor programs make Karnali folks vulnerable to food insecurity. MyRepublica Daily, October 10, 2014. Nepal Republic Media Pvt. Ltd. Available at: http://admin.myrepublica.com/portal/index.php?action= news_details&news_id=84520. Pant, L. P., Krishna Bahadur, K. C., Fraser, E. D., Shrestha, P. K., Lama, A. B., Jirel, S. K., et al. (2014). Adaptive transition management for transformations to agricultural sustainability in the Karnali Mountains of Nepal. Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, 38(10), 1156–1183. Paudel, K. P., Tamang, S., & Shrestha, K. K. (2014). Transforming land and livelihoods: Analysis of agricultural land abandonment in the mid hills of Nepal. Journal of Forest and Livelihoods, 12(1), 11–19. Pinstrup-Andersen, P. (2009). Food security: Definition and measurement. Food Security, 1(1), 5–7. Pyakuryal, B., Roy, D., & Thapa, Y. (2010). Trade liberalization and food security in Nepal. Food Policy, 35(1), 20–31. Quisumbing, A. R. (2003). Food aid and child nutrition in rural Ethiopia. World Development, 31(7), 1309–1324. Riddell, R. C. (1996). Aid dependency. In G. Edgren, R. C. Riddell, & R. Sobhan (Eds.), Aid dependency: Causes symptoms and remedies. SIDA (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency). Roe’s, E. M. (1991). Development narratives, or making the best of blueprint development. World Development, 19(4), 287–300. Roy, R. (2015). Food insecurity in Upper Humla: A fallacy or reality, The Science Reader. Retrieved August 8, 2015 from: http://thesciencereader.com/foodinsecurity-in-upper. Roy, R., Schmidt-Vogt, D., & Myrholt, O. (2009). ‘‘Humla Development Initiatives” for better livelihoods in the face of isolation and conflict. Mountain Research and Development, 29(3), 211–219. Ruel, M. T. (2003). Operationalizing dietary diversity: A review of measurement issues and research priorities. The Journal of Nutrition, 133(11), 3911S–3926S.

65

Savy, M., Martin-Prével, Y., Traissac, P., Eymard-Duvernay, S., & Delpeuch, F. (2006). Dietary diversity scores and nutritional status of women change during the seasonal food shortage in rural Burkina Faso. The Journal of Nutrition, 136(10), 2625–2632. Saxer, M. (2013). Between China and Nepal: Trans-Himalayan trade and the second life of development in upper Humla. Cross-Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review, 2(2), 424–446. Schubert, J. N. (1981). The impact of food aid on world malnutrition. International Organization, 35(02), 329–354. Sejuwal, K. (2014). Kina Feriyena Karnali. Nagariknews Daily, December 6, 2014. Nepal Republic Media Pvt. Ltd.. Shahi, J. B. (2005). Don’t Kill Karnali with Your Aid Available at:. The Nepali Times Weekly, August 12, 2005-August 18, 2005. Himalmedia Pvt. Ltd.. Shahi, J. (2006). Hope for Humla. The Nepali Times Weekly, December 8, 2006– December 14, 2006. Himalmedia Pvt. Ltd.. Shahi, J. B. (2016). Karnaliko Krandan, Kina Sundaina Rajya? Onlinekhabar (Online digital newspaper), Retrieved October 14, 2016 from: https://www. onlinekhabar.com/2016/05/424622. Somers, M. R., & Block, F. (2005). From poverty to perversity: Ideas, markets, and institutions over 200 years of welfare debate. American Sociological Review, 70 (2), 260–287. Stephenson, E. S., & Stephenson, P. H. (2016). The political ecology of cause and blame: Environmental health inequities in the context of colonialism, globalization, and climate change. In M. Singer (Ed.). A companion to the anthropology of environmental health (30, pp. 302–324). San Fransisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons. Tanner, T., & Allouche, J. (2011). Towards a new political economy of climate change and development. IDS Bulletin, 42(3), 1–14. Tashakkori, A., & Teddlie, C. (1998). Mixed methodology: Combining qualitative and quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, London, New Dehli: Sage. Tschakert, P. (2007). Views from the vulnerable: Understanding climatic and other stressors in the Sahel. Global Environmental Change, 17(3), 381–396. Tschirley, D., Donovan, C., & Weber, M. T. (1996). Food aid and food markets: Lessons from Mozambique. Food Policy, 21(2), 189–209. Tusiime, H. A., Renard, R., & Smets, L. (2013). Food aid and household food security in a conflict situation: Empirical evidence from Northern Uganda. Food Policy, 43, 14–22. Upreti, A. (2010). Nakkali Bhokmari (Fake Hunger). Kantipur Daily. April 23, 2010, Kantipur Publication. Retrieved from http://www.ekantipur.com/np/2067/1/ 10/full-news/310444/ WFP (World Food Programme) (2013). Evaluation of the impact of food for assets on livelihood resilience in Nepal: A mixed method impact evaluation. Lalitpur: World Food Program. WFP (World Food Programme). (2017). What the World Food Programme is doing in Nepal. Retrieved on October 20, 2017 from: http://www1.wfp.org/countries/ nepal. World Bank Group (2016). Global monitoring report 2015/2016: Development goals in an era of demographic change. Washington DC: World Bank. World Bank. (2016). Nepal poverty map for all districts. Retrieved on October 15, 2016 from http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.ARBL.HA.PC/countries? display=default.