THE SUSTAINABLE LIVELIHOODS FRAMEWORK
The sustainable livelihoods conceptual framework is a particular form of
livelihoods analysis used by a growing number of research and applied development
organizations, including the Department for International Development (DfID) of the
United Kingdom (one of its most ardent supporters), the United Nations Development
Program (UNDP), as well as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) such as CARE and
Oxfam (DfID 1997; Carney et al. 1999).1
It is primarily a conceptual framework for
analyzing causes of poverty, peoples’ access to resources and their diverse livelihoods
activities, and relationship between relevant factors at micro, intermediate, and macro
levels. It is also a framework for assessing and prioritizing interventions. The
IFPRI/SPIA study is testing and adapting the sustainable livelihoods framework for use
in agricultural research, with the aim of assisting agricultural researchers to conduct expost
and ex-ante assessments of the impact of their interventions on poverty. To date, the
vast majority of impact assessments in CGIAR centers have used conventional measures
of poverty based on income and consumption data, and sometimes nutrition indicators.
The sustainable livelihoods framework takes as a starting point an expanded definition of
poverty that looks beyond the following:
• conventional poverty measures based on income, consumption, or nutrition to
additional aspects of poverty and well-being, e.g., access land, water, credit, or
education, vulnerability to natural disasters, political rights, physical safety, and
social relationships that provide economic security and social well-being;
• “today’s poor” to who is vulnerable or likely to be “tomorrow’s poor”;
• aggregated household or head counts to the effects of social differentiation by
class, ethnic group, gender, and other locally-specific social differences; and
• external standards to self-perceptions by local communities on who is poor and
what poverty means, taking into account what people themselves value (NarayanParker
et al. 2000).
One feature of this framework is that it looks at more aspects of people’s lives
than how many live on a purchasing power of $1.00 a day or how many households
consume less than 2,000 calories per person per day. For example, participatory poverty
assessments or case study research can identify the features by which people in rural
areas themselves identify poor or well-off households.
A second key feature of the sustainable livelihoods framework is that it
recognizes people themselves, whether poor or not, as actors with assets and capabilities
who act in pursuit of their own livelihood goals. While this may seem obvious, in many
cases the poor have been regarded as passive victims or recipients of government policies
and external aid.
The overall conceptual framework for sustainable livelihoods is illustrated in
Figure 1 (see, also, Carney 1998; DfID 2001). The framework is intended to be dynamic,
recognizing changes due to both external fluctuations and the results of people’s own
actions. The starting point is the vulnerability context within which people operate.
Attention is next given to the assets that people can draw upon for their livelihoods.
Assets interact with policies, institutions, and processes to shape the choice of livelihood
strategies. These, in turn, shape the livelihood outcomes, which are often the types of
impact we are interested in. However, those outcomes are not necessarily the end point,
as they feed back into the future asset base.
The vulnerability context encompasses
• trends in population, resources, and economic indicators such as prices,
governance, or even technology;
• shocks such as changes in human or animal health, natural disasters, sudden
economic changes, or conflict; and
• seasonality in prices, agricultural production, employment opportunities, resource
availability, or health.
Vulnerability here refers to things that are outside people’s control. It is usually
negative but it can also provide positive opportunities. It is not objective “risk” that
matters, but people’s subjective assessments of things that make them vulnerable. These
matter because both perceived and actual vulnerability can influence people’s decisions
and hence their livelihood strategies. This is especially important for whether people are
willing or interested in adopting agricultural technologies.
The asset base upon which people build their livelihoods includes a wider range
of assets than are usually considered. Rather than looking only at land or other classic
wealth indicators, the sustainable livelihoods framework suggests consideration of an
asset portfolio of five different types of assets:
• Natural capital includes land, water, forests, marine resources, air quality, erosion
protection, and biodiversity.
• Physical capital includes transportation, roads, buildings, shelter, water supply
and sanitation, energy, technology, or communications.
• Financial capital includes savings (cash as well as liquid assets), credit (formal
and informal), as well as inflows (state transfers and remittances).
• Human capital includes education, skills, knowledge, health, nutrition, and labor
power.
• Social capital includes any networks that increase trust, ability to work together,
access to opportunities, reciprocity; informal safety nets; and membership in
organizations.
Though most versions of the sustainable livelihoods framework are limited to
these five kinds of capital, some add political capital as a sixth type of asset, which can
include, for example, citizenship, enfranchisement, and membership in political parties—
all assets that can be key in obtaining or operationalizing rights over other assets.
Policies, institutions, and processes affect how people use their assets in pursuit
of different livelihood strategies. This box on the diagram refers to both formal and
informal institutions and organizations that shape livelihoods by influencing access to
assets, livelihood strategies, vulnerability, and terms of exchange. They may occur at
multiple levels, from the household to community, national, and even global levels. The
public and private sectors, civil society, and community institutions may all be relevant
considerations; laws as well as culture can also be included.
All of these influence people’s livelihood strategies, i.e., the choices they employ
in pursuit of income, security, well-being, and other productive and reproductive goals.
As discussed above, what is important about the livelihood strategies approach is that it
recognizes that households and individuals may pursue multiple strategies, sequentially
or simultaneously. This means that, even in the context of agricultural research, we
should not assume that someone is automatically a “farmer,” or that people with other
businesses are not involved in farming. Nor should we overlook even small livelihood
strategies, because they can be very important, especially for the poor, who often pursue
many livelihood strategies either to make up enough income or to provide a measure of
security. The pursuit of multiple activities can have important implications for cash and
labor availability at different times of the year, and for the relevance of specific
development interventions for poverty reduction.
Livelihood outcomes encompass many of the types of impact of interest for the
study of the impact of agricultural research on poverty. Potential outcomes include
conventional indicators such as income, food security, and sustainable use of natural
resources. Outcomes can also include a strengthened asset base, reduced vulnerability,
and improvements in other aspects of well-being such as health, self-esteem, sense of
control, and even maintenance of cultural assets, and thus have a feedback effect on the
vulnerability status and asset base.