Drought and Saving in West Africa: Are Livestock a Buffer Stock?

Marcel Fafchamps, Christopher Udry and Katherine Czukas

Working Papers from Stanford University, Department of Economics

Abstract: Households in the west African semi-arid tropics face substantial risk -- an inevitable consequence of engaging in rainfed agriculture in a drought-prone environment. It has long been hypothesized that these households keep livestock as a buffer stock to insulate their consumption from income fluctuations income. This paper tests this hypothesis. Results indicate that livestock transactions play less of a consumption smoothing role than often assumed. Livestock sales compensate for at most thirty percent, and probably closer to twenty percent of income shortfalls due to village-level shocks alone. We discuss possible explanations for these results and suggest directions for future work.

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Related works:
Journal Article: Drought and saving in West Africa: are livestock a buffer stock? (1998)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wop:stanec:97013

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