Katrine Olsen & Mikkel Schou Jensen
The impact of intensified pig production on smallholders in the pig sector - A case study in the Phong Dien District, Vietnam
Abstract
Vietnam’s pig production sector is undergoing significant transformations as government policies increasingly emphasize intensified production, promoting large-scale farms, greater efficiency, and enhanced biosafety. These changes have major implications for smallholder pig producers, who depend on their pig production as a part of their livelihood. This thesis investigates how the transformation towards intensified pig production in Vietnam is affecting smallholders’ livelihoods To achieve this, the Sustainable Livelihood Framework and concepts of transformative change are applied. The results show that there are significant differences in the livelihood of farmers in the three categories: smallholders with pigs, commercial farmers, and smallholders without pigs who used to have pigs. The findings suggest that the new intensification policies greatly affect the smallholders with pigs, forcing them to either stop production or intensify their production. However, not all farmers are able to intensify, leading to exclusion from the sector’s development.
Problemstatement
How is transformation towards intensified pig production in Vietnam affecting smallholders’ livelihoods?
To address this question, the thesis investigates three sub-questions:
- What is driving the transformation in Vietnam’s pig sector?
- What are the characteristics of a pig producer's livelihood?
- What is the prospect for SH pig producers in the future?
Focusing on a concrete case within transformative change, this research contributes to the understanding of how pig production fits into a smallholder's overall livelihood, including income, access to resources, knowledge, social relations and vulnerability to risks, as well as how smallholders balance a new pathway with traditional practices into a future with a more industrialized, regulated, and standardized sector.