Study Of Poverty Of Chinese Rural Households Based On Livelihood Assets And Livelihood Strategies

Poverty is a common concern of the whole world.In recent years,China’s poverty alleviation and development work has made remarkable achievements,and China completed the historical task of eliminating absolute poverty in 2020.Summing up the successful experience and characteristic practices of China’s poverty alleviation and development work is of great significance to prevent large-scale return to poverty and realize rural revitalization.Targeted poverty alleviation and multidimensional poverty identification require the micro-level and multiple-dimensional analysis of poverty in China’s rural areas.Meanwhile,the rapid development and change of China’s rural society requires the dynamic analysis of poverty in China’s rural areas.Taking Chinese rural households as the research object and livelihood strategies and livelihood assets as the starting points,this paper studies the poverty of Chinese rural households,in order to provide reference for promoting poverty reduction and development in rural China through livelihood strategy adoptions,livelihood strategy transitions and livelihood asset constructions.Firstly,this paper studies livelihood strategy adoption based on livelihood assets and its enlightenment to poverty alleviation.Using activity choice variables and twostep clustering method,this paper classifies the livelihood strategies of Chinese rural households into four clusters,namely,farming-oriented,wage-employment-oriented,self-employment-oriented and non-production-oriented.The multinomial logit model is used to analyze the impacts of livelihood assets on livelihood strategy adoption,among which,human assets affect the choices between productive and non-productive livelihood strategies;physical assets affect the choices between agricultural and nonagricultural livelihood strategies;and natural and social assets affect the choices between wage-employment-oriented and self-employment-oriented livelihood strategies.Using parametric and non-parametric tests,this paper compares the differences of Chinese rural households adopting different livelihood strategies in livelihood assets,livelihood strategies and livelihood outcomes,and “horizontally” analyzes the forming of poverty along the livelihood process of “livelihood assets-livelihood strategieslivelihood outcomes”.Finally,this paper gets the conclusions that the return of livelihood strategy determines the incidence of poverty,while the vulnerability of livelihood asset and livelihood strategy determines the cause of poverty.Secondly,this paper studies livelihood strategy transition based on livelihood assets and its enlightenment to poverty alleviation.Taking income as the criterion,this paper uses first-order stochastic dominance analysis and non-parametric test to classify,evaluate and re-classify the livelihood strategies of Chinese rural households,and defines three types of livelihood strategy transition,namely,upward transition,no transition and downward transition.The generalized ordered logit model is used to analyze the impacts of livelihood assets on livelihood strategy transition,among which,natural and agricultural physical assets hinder positive livelihood strategy transitions,human and non-agricultural physical assets promote positive livelihood strategy transitions,and the impact of labor migration on upward livelihood strategy transition is inverted U-shaped.This paper analyzes the distribution characteristics of the livelihood strategies of Chinese rural households,and points out that the distribution of the livelihood strategies of Chinese rural households presents olive-shaped or gourd-shaped,with the non-agricultural and the aging trends.Comparing the livelihood strategy distributions of poor and non-poor households via conducting non-parametric test,it can be concluded that providing non-agricultural transition paths for agriculture-dependent households are crucial for poverty reduction and development in China’s rural areas.This paper analyzes the transition trends of the livelihood strategies of Chinese rural households,and points out that the absolute transition rates of the medium-return livelihood strategies are higher,the relative transition rates of the extreme-return livelihood strategies are higher,and livelihood strategies have a certain degree of "sluggishness".Comparing the livelihood strategy transitions of poor and non-poor households,it can be concluded that activating the livelihood vitality of poor households and providing stable upward transition paths for poor households are crucial for poverty reduction and development in China’s rural areas.Further analyzing the impact of labor migration on livelihood strategy transition,it can be concluded that solving the employment problem of the semi-able-bodied labor force is crucial for poverty reduction and development in China’s rural areas.Finally,this paper studies the mechanism of livelihood assets in the industrial poverty alleviation process.According to the different roles of livelihood assets in the different stages of industrial poverty alleviation,this paper constructs a dual circulation model of industry and asset,which includes four stages,namely,industry selection and asset identification,industry construction and asset investment,industry running and capital operation,industry profiting and capital appreciation.Based on the grounded theory analysis,this paper studies the different mechanisms of livelihood assets in the different stages of industrial poverty alleviation.In the industry selection and asset identification stage,poverty alleviation industries are selected through the identification of natural,human,physical and social assets of poor areas.In the industry construction and asset investment stage,the industry foundations are constructed through the form transformation and the property right transfer of natural,physical and financial assets.In the industry running and asset operation stage,the relationships among participants are restructured by embedding different levels of human assets into different types of social organizations in different ways,and the process of industry running is reshaped by separating the functions of farmers from other participants.In the industry profiting and asset appreciation stage,the comprehensive appreciation of natural,human,physical,financial and social assets is realized through the effect-oriented and the processoriented profits of industries.