Ann M. Furbush, Anna Josephson, Talip Kilic, Jeffrey D. Michler
{"title":"Coping or Hoping? Livelihood Diversification and Food Insecurity in the COVID-19 Pandemic","authors":"Ann M. Furbush, Anna Josephson, Talip Kilic, Jeffrey D. Michler","doi":"arxiv-2409.02285","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"We examine the impact of livelihood diversification on food insecurity amid\nthe COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis uses household panel data from Ethiopia,\nMalawi, and Nigeria in which the first round was collected immediately prior to\nthe pandemic and extends through multiple rounds of monthly data collection\nduring the pandemic. Using this pre- and post-outbreak data, and guided by a\npre-analysis plan, we estimate the causal effect of livelihood diversification\non food insecurity. Our results do not support the hypothesis that livelihood\ndiversification boosts household resilience. Though income diversification may\nserve as an effective coping mechanism for small-scale shocks, we find that for\na disaster on the scale of the pandemic this strategy is not effective.\nPolicymakers looking to prepare for the increased occurrence of large-scale\ndisasters will need to grapple with the fact that coping strategies that gave\npeople hope in the past may fail them as they try to cope with the future.","PeriodicalId":501273,"journal":{"name":"arXiv - ECON - General Economics","volume":"58 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"arXiv - ECON - General Economics","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/arxiv-2409.02285","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
We examine the impact of livelihood diversification on food insecurity amid
the COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis uses household panel data from Ethiopia,
Malawi, and Nigeria in which the first round was collected immediately prior to
the pandemic and extends through multiple rounds of monthly data collection
during the pandemic. Using this pre- and post-outbreak data, and guided by a
pre-analysis plan, we estimate the causal effect of livelihood diversification
on food insecurity. Our results do not support the hypothesis that livelihood
diversification boosts household resilience. Though income diversification may
serve as an effective coping mechanism for small-scale shocks, we find that for
a disaster on the scale of the pandemic this strategy is not effective.
Policymakers looking to prepare for the increased occurrence of large-scale
disasters will need to grapple with the fact that coping strategies that gave
people hope in the past may fail them as they try to cope with the future.