南湖新闻网讯（通讯员 张子康 闵师）近日，我校食物经济与管理团队闵师教授作为通讯作者在国际发展经济学主流期刊World Development上发表了题为“Falling price induced diversification strategies and rural inequality: Evidence of smallholder rubber farmers”的研究论文，探究了天然橡胶价格下降背景下的小农户多样化生计策略与农村不平等问题。
天然橡胶价格从21世纪初到2011年经历了一次持续上涨的阶段，引起了橡胶种植园在湄公河流域的迅速扩张。受全球市场大宗商品价格下跌的影响，橡胶价格在2011年达到顶峰，并迅速回落至2005年价格水平，这促使种植橡胶的小农户家庭选择多样化的土地使用和劳动力供给策略，以此来应对橡胶价格下降对家庭收入水平产生的负面影响。
该研究利用对我国云南省西双版纳橡胶种植农户开展的实地调研面板数据，实证检验了影响小农户土地使用和劳动力供给决策的诸多因素，并采用多项式内生转换模型与反事实分析法，研究了家庭生计策略多样化与收入之间的因果关系。从结果上看，橡胶价格下跌后，农户家庭土地使用和劳动力供应呈多样化趋势，家庭生计策略的多样化可以显著提高家庭收入，并且对于低收入家庭的增收效应明显高于高收入家庭；同时，农户家庭劳动力呈现出兼业化的趋势。从机制上看，农户对橡胶种植的路径依赖限制了家庭生计策略的多样化，扩大了收入差距；相反，较少依赖橡胶种植的家庭更容易实现土地使用和劳动力分配的多样化，从而拥有更多的收入来源，实现逆境增收。
该项研究填补了现有研究中关于生计策略多元化与收入之间因果关系的经验证据。文章验证了在全球化浪潮下，经济冲击对一个拥有丰富自然资源而相对贫困地区的小农户可持续发展、生计安全、社会公平的深刻影响，这对湄公河地区和东南亚的其他橡胶种植区，乃至世界范围内依赖单一作物主导经济发展的类似地区小农户发展具有政策参考价值。
【英文摘要】
While the expansions of natural rubber in the greater Mekong region from the 1990s were ambitious, the persistently low commodity price of rubber from 2012 makes smallholder rubber farmers suffer from vulnerable livelihoods. This study sheds light on the adjustments in livelihood strategies of smallholder rubber farmers when the upsurge in rubber prices came to an end. Based on the two-wave panel data from some 600 smallholder rubber farmers in the upper Mekong region, Southern Yunnan province of China, this study shows the diversification strategies of smallholders in response to falling rubber prices and examines the impacts of livelihood diversification strategies on farmer income and rural inequality. The results suggest that smallholder rubber farmers tend to shift family labor from farms to off-farm employment and diversify their livelihoods in the context of declining rubber prices. Notably, farmers with relatively low dependence on rubber are more likely to diversify their livelihoods. The falling price induced diversification strategy makes smallholders more resilient against future risks and narrows the rural income gap. The findings of this study advance the literature by providing evidence on how farmers’ livelihood strategy and rural inequality change in the face of periodical rubber price volatility.
论文链接：https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X21002199
审核人：李谷成
