Livelihood Diversification and Residents’ Welfare: Evidence from Maasai Mara National Reserve

Qi Sun, Chao Fu (), Yunli Bai, Ayub M. O. Oduor and Baodong Cheng ()
Additional contact information
Qi Sun: School of Economics and Management, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China
Chao Fu: Key Laboratory of Ecosystem Network Observation and Modeling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Yunli Bai: Key Laboratory of Ecosystem Network Observation and Modeling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Ayub M. O. Oduor: Department of Applied Biology, Technical University of Kenya, Nairobi P.O. Box 52428-00200, Kenya
Baodong Cheng: School of Economics and Management, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing 100083, China

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 5, 1-21

Abstract: The contradiction between environmental protection and livelihood development is becoming increasingly serious for most protected areas in developing countries. Livelihood diversification is an efficient way to increase household income to alleviate poverty related to environmental protection. However, its impacts on household welfare in protected areas have rarely been quantitatively explored. This article investigates the determinants of four livelihood strategies in the Maasai Mara National Reserve and explores the association between livelihood diversification and household income and its heterogeneities. Based on the sustainable livelihoods framework and the information collected from 409 households through face-to-face interviews, this study adopted multivariate regression models to obtain consistent results. Results show that the determinants of the four strategies differed. Natural capital, physical capital, and financial capital had significant associations with the probability of adopting the strategy of livestock breeding. Physical capital, financial capital, human capital, and social capital were associated with the probability of adopting the joint strategy of livestock breeding and crop planting and the joint strategy of livestock breeding and off-farm activities. The probability of adopting the joint strategy of livestock breeding, crop planting, and off-farm activities was associated with all five kinds of livelihood capital except for financial capital. Diversification strategies, especially those involving off-farm activities, played greater roles in raising household income. The findings indicate that the government and management authority of Maasai Mara National Reserve should provide the households around the protected area with more off-farm employment opportunities to increase the welfare of local residents as well as to utilize natural resources appropriately, especially for those located far away from the protected area.

Keywords: livelihood diversification; strategies; income; Maasai Mara National Reserve; off-farm activities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/5/3859/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/5/3859/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:5:p:3859-:d:1076161

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().