Table Of ContentAdvances in Asian Human-Environmental Research
Huỳnh Anh Chi Thái
Livelihood
Pathways of
Indigenous People
in Vietnam’s Central
Highlands
Exploring Land-Use Change
Advances in Asian Human-Environmental
Research
Series Editor
Prof. Marcus Nüsser, South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, Germany
Editorial Board
Prof. Eckart Ehlers, University of Bonn, Germany
Prof. Harjit Singh, PSHVI Penn State Health Hershey Med Ctr, Hershey,
Pennsylvania, USA
Prof. Hermann Kreutzmann, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany
Prof. Kenneth Hewitt, Waterloo University, Canada
Prof. Urs Wiesmann, University of Bern, Switzerland
Prof. Sarah J. Halvorson, University of Montana, USA
Dr. Daanish Mustafa, King’s College London, UK
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research perspectives of area studies, however there is scope for interdisciplinary
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More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/8560
Huỳnh Anh Chi Thái
Livelihood Pathways of
Indigenous People in
Vietnam’s Central Highlands
Exploring Land-Use Change
Huỳnh Anh Chi Thái
Human Geography, Institute of Geography
Heidelberg University
Heidelberg, Germany
ISSN 1879-7180 ISSN 1879-7199 (electronic)
Advances in Asian Human-Environmental Research
ISBN 978-3-319-71170-6 ISBN 978-3-319-71171-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71171-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017960829
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Foreword
The book of Dr. Thái Huỳnh Anh Chi deals with the livelihood situation of minority
people in the South Vietnamese highlands after the reunification of the country in
1975. As one of the many mountain areas in Southeast Asia, this region is influ-
enced by a massive land-use change provoked by external factors such as coffee
producers and also in-migration of “Kinh” people (ethnic Vietnamese, mainly from
the coastal areas and north of the country).
In three different research areas, Dr. Anh Chi analyzes the actors of these changes,
the possibilities and constraints of “making a living” for the indigenous people, and
their resilience against pressures and activities for changing their complicated life
situation.
The PhD thesis of Dr. Thái Huỳnh Anh Chi is one of the first empirical studies
on this region, and the results can be generalized for other peripheral regions in
Southeast Asia. Her work gives deep insights into village structures and their situa-
tion under the governance of a neoliberal economic but still communist country.
Geographisches Institut Hans Gebhardt
Universität Heidelberg
Heidelberg, Germany
v
Preface
As a young person, who was born and grew up in the Central Highlands of Vietnam,
I became familiar with the development of ethnic minority groups who lived adja-
cent to the city. The persistent gap in development between these indigenous com-
munities and the Vietnamese group has been superficially blamed on the communities’
backward thinking and high rate of illiteracy. In recent studies, in particular the
research on development, the situation of minority groups has been examined more
thoroughly. These communities appear to be victims of the transformation in the
Central Highlands after the Vietnam War. They are named a vulnerable group, and
the constraints they are coping with are considered as the vulnerability context.
Thus far, most research places indigenous people in a passive position, and little
attention has been paid to their role as active agents in choosing their livelihoods.
Therefore, I was motivated to examine their actor role and how certain constraints
shape their actions of making a living. These pressing questions finally became the
topic for my doctoral dissertation more than 3 years ago. I challenged myself by not
adhering to the well-known theory of vulnerability, although it is a fundamental
concept. Instead, I applied a hybrid concept in which vulnerability is accompanied
by the actor approach and the resilience concept. It brought me to the discussions of
the complex problems at three study sites in the Central Highlands (Kontum, Lak,
and Lac Duong). Finally, one livelihood option, community-based tourism, was
examined to see whether it could be a sustainable solution for the livelihood con-
straint of the indigenous community.
This work is expected to contribute to questions about the vulnerability of the
ethnic minority groups in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, and possible findings
for empirical cases are crucial to help decision-makers form effective policy
interventions.
However, nothing could have been achieved without the following support and
contributions.
I would like to give my sincerest thanks to my supervisor, Prof. Dr. Hans
Gebhardt, for his mentorship and constructive guidance, as well as his patience and
understanding. He gave me the opportunity to embark on this project and continued
encouraging me during different phases. I appreciate the crucial comments and
vii
viii Preface
suggestions at the beginning of my work from Prof. Dr. Annika Mattissek and Prof.
Dr. Paul Reuber. This study cannot be finished without a fieldtrip. Many thanks also
go to Ms. Kim Jee Young and Mr. Nguyen Ngoc for their valuable advice to navi-
gate my fieldwork and to my research assistant, Thanh Lan, for her tireless effort in
helping me in the field. I wish to acknowledge Ho Chi Minh City University of
Culture, Can Tho University, and state agencies at Kontum, Dak Lak, and Lam
Dong Province for their support of my data collection and data analysis. I would
like to give special thanks to communities in Kontum City, Lak District, and Lac
Duong District for accepting me and being such willing participants in my research.
My thanks are extended to all staff members, the HiWis, and my fellow doctoral
students in Prof. Dr. Gebhardt’s group for their company, friendship, valuable com-
ments, and sincere support. They are Dr. Klaus Sachs, Dr. Simon Runkel, Holger
Köppe, Diana Griesinger, Schniepp Volker, Antonia Opelt, Warangkana
Thawornwiriyatrakul (Pink), Jinliao He (Victor), Mehdi Ebadi, Guo Jie, Bonato
Michela, Sok Sopheaktra (Tra), Azadeh Akbari, Juri Kim, and Peter Wongpan. My
greatest appreciation and love go to my beloved family and my best friends for their
unconditional love.
Finally, I am particularly grateful to the Katholischer Akademischer Ausländer-
Dienst (KAAD) for their scholarship and the Kurt-Hiehle Stiftung Heidelberg and
Fazit Stiftung for their contributions in making this research possible.
Heidelberg, Germany Huỳnh Anh Chi Thái
Contents
1 Vulnerability Context: A Study on Livelihood Pathways
of the Indigenous People . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Key Research Concepts: Vulnerability, Actor,
Livelihood Resilience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.2.1 Vulnerability and Human-Environment Interaction. . . . . . . . 4
1.2.2 The Actor-Oriented Approach and Internal-External
Factors of Vulnerability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.2.3 Resilience Livelihood: An Asset Approach
and Livelihood Pathways of Indigenous Farmers . . . . . . . . . 13
1.2.4 Vulnerability in Vietnam’s Central Highlands . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
1.2.5 Synthesis Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.3 Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.3.1 Land Use-Land-Cover (LULC) Change and Remote
Sensing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
1.3.2 Secondary Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
1.3.3 Case Study Methodology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2 Exposure Context: Socioeconomic Transformations and Land-Use
Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.1 Political and Economic Conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.1.1 Land Tenure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
2.1.2 Market Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
2.1.3 Population Trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
2.2 Land-Use Change: Consequences of Policy Reforms
and Market Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
2.2.1 The Common Trend of Land Transformations
in the Central Highlands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
2.2.2 Various Land-Use Sceneries at Study Sites: Kontum City,
Lak District, and Lac Duong District . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
2.2.3 The Precarious Situation of the Indigenous People . . . . . . . . 55
ix
x Contents
2.3 The Indigenous People’s Perception of Their Vulnerability
Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.3.1 Perception of Reasons for Land-Use Change . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
2.3.2 Perception of Land-Use Change Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
2.3.3 Perception of Land Tenure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
2.3.4 Relationship of the Indigenous People with Land
and Agriculture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
2.4 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
3 Sensitivity in Livelihood Pathways . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
3.2 Available Typology in the Households’ Livelihood . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.2.1 Agricultural Intensification and Diversification . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.2.2 Labor-Oriented Income . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
3.2.3 Migration-Oriented Income . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
3.3 Factors Forming Livelihood Pathways: A Region
Scale Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
3.3.1 Structural Approach: Historical, Economic,
and Cultural Characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
3.3.2 Delineation Beyond Ethnic Boundaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
3.3.3 Role of Middlemen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
3.4 An Insight into Livelihood Pathways at the Household
Level: Actor Role . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
3.4.1 Assets Approach. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
3.4.2 Non-Assets Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
3.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.5.1 Dynamic Livelihood Pathway . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
3.5.2 Factors Forming Livelihood Pathways . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
4 Livelihood Resilience – A Case Study: Community-Based
Tourism (CBT) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
4.1 Introduction: Transition from Farm to Nonfarm
and Community-Based Tourism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
4.2 Tourism Resources and the Reliance on Own Resources . . . . . . . . . 104
4.2.1 Tourism Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
4.2.2 Other Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
4.2.3 Reliance on Own Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
4.3 Human Capital and Willingness to Participate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.3.1 Human Capital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
4.3.2 Willingness to Participate in Tourism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
4.4 Role of Social Capital and the General Model of CBT
Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
4.4.1 Social Transformation and the Bonding Social Capital . . . . . 120
4.4.2 Bridging Social Capital and the Three Development
Stages of CBT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
