Subsistence agriculture

About: Subsistence agriculture is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 8069 publications have been published within this topic receiving 156876 citations. The topic is also known as: subsistence farming.

The Dynamics of Productive Relationships: African Share Contracts in Comparative Perspective

Abstract: In recent years empirical enquiry has indicated that share contracts in agriculture often take the form of complex but relatively efficient and equitable working relationships among small farmers, allowing them to assemble the resources to secure subsistence and to develop and expand agricultural production when the vagaries of weather, market and policy are favourable. This book examines four African cases - Ghana, Sudan, Lesotho and Senegambia - in the light of the long-standing debates about sharecropping.

The African-American family in slavery and emancipation

Abstract: Introduction 1. Slave trading and forced labor migrations 2. Family diasporas and parenthood lost 3. Malnutrition, ecological risks, and slave mortality 4. Reproductive exploitation and child mortality 5. Slave household subsistence and women's work 6. The impacts of Civil War on slave families 7. The risks of emancipation for black families 8. Reconstruction threats to black family survival Theoretical reprise.

Resource Use Among Rural Agricultural Households Near Protected Areas in Vietnam: The Social Costs of Conservation and Implications for Enforcement

Abstract: This article examines the use of forests in a protected area by nearby agriculturalists in central Vietnam Research indicates that the majority of rural farmers interviewed who lived near a state designated protected area were receiving both subsistence and cash incomes from forest-based activities, primarily from the collection of forest products However, much of the collection of forest produce was officially illegal, as it occurred in state protected forests, and interdiction efforts were on the increase Yet, little attention has been paid in Vietnam to the need for income substitution for households who lose access to forest produce as a result of conservation enforcement, particularly in the case of farmers who live near, but not in, protected areas; their resources use has been ‘invisible’ due to a lack of attention and research on the topic This misunderstanding of the importance of forests to rural farmers has the potential to result in households facing adverse welfare and livelihood outcomes as protected areas boundaries are tightened, and local communities face increased opportunity costs due to stricter conservation enforcement The article concludes that substitution for loss of income due to conservation activities would best be achieved through carefully targeted interventions to specific high-impact and high-dependency households Additionally, investments in new sources of wage labor and other low capital-input activities, rather than in agriculture, would likely be of most benefit

By the hunter, for the gatherer: Art, social relations and subsistence change in the prehistoric Great Basin

Abstract: The western Great Basin witnessed a transition from generalized hunting and gathering to a strategy emphasizing seed gathering at c. AD 1200. This was matched by accelerated production of ritual art: rock engravings, depicting big game and hunters. To explain this paradox, seed gatherers creating hunters’ art, I examine directly relevant ethnography to show that the art concerns an application of a shaman's power: killing a mountain sheep was a metaphor for making rain. This was increasingly important with a seed‐oriented economy but, since subsistence is more than diet, involving things like the sexual division of labour, it has implications for social relations. An examination of these shows two systems of inequality: men over women, and shamans over non‐shaman males. The increase in male‐oriented ritual art with subsistence change can then be understood in terms of ideological efforts to maintain gender asymmetries, and the growing forms of incipient political organization present in this region.

The Niche Concept: Suggestions for Its Use in Human Ecology

Abstract: The Hutchinsonian concept of the ecological niche can be made operational for studies in human ecology by defining it in terms of thedistinctive ways of using resources for subsistence that set “cultural species” apart. Subsistence variety, the number of resources used for subsistence, and how much each is depended on are measures of distinctiveness, and the amount of variety present can be defined as thewidth of the ecological niche. The calculation of niche width from subsistence data is discussed, and examples are given from several human groups with reference to total resource variety, resource variety in space, and resource variety in time. The importance of selecting niche dimensions for niche width measurement is stressed, and examples are given of width differences resulting from measuring variety in quantity (biomass or calories) and variety in quality (protein, essential minerals, etc.). Finally, some implications of niche width measurements for human ecology are discussed.