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The occurrences of disasters have become a common phenomenon in the world and there is evidence that the frequency and intensity of disasters are increasing. There have been more than 7,000 disaster events and around 265 million displacements in the period from 2008 to 2018, which constitutes more than three times of conflict and violence-related displacements (Disaster Displacement – A global review, 2019). Natural disasters are responsible for nearly 60,000 deaths per year on average and are responsible for 0.1% of global deaths. Various forms of natural disasters pose significant threats to lives, livelihoods, economic development, and ecological diversity around the world. Similar to the world scenario, Sri Lanka has a similar situation. Sri Lanka has been identified as a drought hot spot. Nearly, 15,000 people per million are at risk of disaster-induced displacement every year in Sri Lanka. During the Tsunami, in 2004, 31,000 human lives were lost, and more than a million people were displaced. Thus, natural disasters cause a huge negative impact on society and the economy in Sri Lanka. In this context, the main objectives of this study are to overview the disasters and displacements that have occurred during the last two decades and to explore the livelihood activities of the affected people and their best practices of disaster resilience. Secondary data were used to overview the disasters and displacements of the last two decades and the related policy framework of the country. Primary data were used to identify livelihood activities and disaster-resilient strategies of the affected people. In-depth interviews were conducted with an unstructured questionnaire from 15 recovered families who have been affected by Tsunami and landslides that occurred in the country. The purposive sampling method was used to select families from the most disaster-affected areas. Descriptive methods were used to analyze the data. The study revealed five recovery strategies followed by displaced people from tsunamis and landslides. Those are continuing with the previous livelihood activities as much as possible, moving to different livelihood activities, moving to different areas to find better jobs, attaining external assistance, and self-management on household finance. Finally, policy guidelines for building resilience in communities that will help to enhance their capacity to cope and recover from vulnerability are proposed in improving their lives.

Risk factors for population relocation as a result of severe catastrophes are increasing on a global scale. The frequency of catastrophic weather events is rising, infrastructure is getting older, the population is expanding, and urbanization is increasing. This study explores the influencing factors of livelihood, vulnerability, and livelihood resilience of climate-induced displaced people in developing countries, particularly in South Asia. A mixed-method approach comprising a systematic review and a narrative review has been applied in this study. A systematic review guided by PRISMA has been used to identify the relevant documents and the extracted information has been described through a narrative review approach. This study reveals that climate-induced displaced people are generally vulnerable to maintaining their livelihood, but there are a few exceptional cases where displaced people could diversify their livelihood strategies. The major influencing factors of their livelihoods are riverbank erosion, loss of assets and properties, food insecurity, seasonal hunger, low access to finance, and low job opportunity. This study argues that climate-displaced people have a long struggle to enhance their livelihood resilience, but it is a challenging task for them, particularly at the household level. The major influencing indicators under adaptive, absorptive, and transformative capacities of livelihood resilience are income and food access, agricultural and non-agricultural assets, sensitivity, climate variability and hazards, basic services, social safety nets, and institutional participation. Appropriate governance in the structural and non-structural transformation of livelihood capitals can enhance the livelihood resilience of climate-induced displaced households. In the case of Bangladesh, the coastal and Riverine Island communities are the key victims of climate-induced hazards, so they migrated frequently to reduce their vulnerability and enhance livelihood resilience. The study recommends ensuring transparency and accountability, proper coordination among stakeholders for promoting the resettlement, disaster-resilient housing and infrastructure, and Khas land (government-owned land) to the displaced people can enhance their livelihood resilience.

Human beings are inseparable from the environment because of their dependence on ecosystems and their services (Schroter, 2009). The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) identifies ecosystem services as vital links between humans and ecosystems because these services are essential for human well-being, especially in terms of security, basic materials for a good life, health, good social relations, and freedom of choice and action. Ecosystem services include flows of materials, energy, and information from natural resources that combined with manufactured and human resources contribute to human well-being (Costanza et al., 1997). These include provisioning services (e.g., food, fresh water, wood and fiber, fuel), regulating services (e.g., climate, flood and disease regulation, water purification), supporting services (e.g., nutrient cycling, soil formation, primary production), and cultural services (e.g., aesthetic, spiritual, educational, and recreational value). The regulating services provided by ecosystems, in particular, are critical for disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation. Ecosystems primarily affect both the probability and the severity of events and modulate the effects of extreme events. For example, soils store large amounts of water, facilitate transfer of surface water to groundwater, and prevent or reduce flooding, and natural buffers reduce hazards by absorbing runoff peaks and storm surges.

This chapter examines changes in smallholder agriculture in terms of processes of de-agrarianization in a rapidly changing regional economy of Costa Rica long characterized by small-scale commercial coffee farming.

The study is based on multiple periods (1990–1991, 1993, 2006, 2010–2012) of ethnographic research on household economic strategies among farming families in two districts in the canton of Pérez Zeledón, Costa Rica.

Though occupational multiplicity and non-farm-based livelihoods are on the rise, smallholder agriculture continues to play a substantial role in the livelihood strategies of both young and old and in the regional economy, not in spite of these trends, but because an expanding business sector and an increase in non-farm employment opportunities are creating a demand for agricultural produce and providing new opportunities for smallholders to diversify agricultural production, stabilize their incomes and maintain a significant presence in the regional economy. Specific historic conditions and state policies have been important factors in shaping rural economic change, livelihood strategies and smallholder agriculture in this region.

Sample sizes are relatively small and some data on children’s economic activities were obtained second hand from siblings and/or parents.

This research has implications for policy makers, planners and social activists interested in agrarian change.

This research provides an important longitudinal lens on the economic strategies of farming households, processes of de-agrarianization and the persistence of small-scale family farmers in today’s world.

Tourism sites around the world which are often hit by calamities caused by climate change normally affect extremely the regions and economies. Disasters affect directly or indirectly the number of tourist arrival, the hotel industry, tourism receipts, employment, and the overall economy of a region (Naeem, Bhatti, & Khan, 2021). To thrive or adapt in this novel and rapidly changing environment, tourism communities need to be resilient in order to maintain the economic benefits (Wu, Chiu, & Chen, 2019). This requires strategic approach in local tourism development with strong public private partnership and collaboration. Economy, environment, emergency management and response, disaster risk management, community-based participation, post-disaster tourism recovery management, psychological behavior of people, nature-based tourism, dark tourism, responsive consumer behavior, and transportation are the key areas to focus on. Developing resilient and sustainable local tourism communities must be guided by the carefully defined goals and objectives depending on the dynamics and resources of the communities, and anchored of guidelines, pertinent laws and policies implemented by the local, national, and international governing and regulatory bodies.

In this chapter, we advance an understanding of entrepreneurial resourcefulness in relation to context by focusing on challenging and sometimes outright hostile environments and the way they shape, and are shaped by, entrepreneurial resourcefulness. Drawing on selective evidence from several projects in post-socialist countries in both Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia and other published research covering these countries, we argue for contextualized conceptualizations of resourcefulness. More specifically we emphasize that temporal, historical, socio-spatial, and institutional contexts are antecedents and boundaries for entrepreneurial behavior, while at the same time allowing for human agency. This is visible in individuals’ actions to negotiate, reenact, and cross these boundaries, and as a result, intentionally or inadvertently contributing to changing contexts. We suggest that resourcefulness is a dynamic concept encompassing multiple practices, which change over time, and it results from a close interplay of multiple contexts with entrepreneurial behavior. We also propose that from a theoretical point of view, resourcefulness not only needs to be contextualized, but it also needs to be explored together with its contextual outcomes – the value it creates and adds at different levels of society.

Higher education can offer hope and a way forward for vulnerable populations. In particular, access to internationally recognized degrees and credentials has the potential to be a key protection priority for refugee populations, opening alternative solutions to displacement through economic empowerment and increased mobility.

While innovations in online learning have opened new pathways, the delivery of higher education to refugee learners in resource-deprived settings – including camps and urban environments – remains notoriously challenging. Therefore, there is an imperative to draw upon lessons learned from existing programs in order to identify promising practices and emerging innovations.

In this chapter, we draw on our experiences of developing a higher education model for refugee and vulnerable learners to argue that successful delivery of accredited degrees to populations affected by forced displacement relies upon the following three key elements:

• 1)

  Flexible mode of degree delivery and assessment.

• 2)

  Robust blended learning model with in-person academic support.

• 3)

  Provision of adaptive and context-specific interventions and resources.

Flexible mode of degree delivery and assessment.

Robust blended learning model with in-person academic support.

Provision of adaptive and context-specific interventions and resources.

The case study for this chapter is an initiative called the Global Education Movement at Southern New Hampshire University, which delivers accredited degrees to refugee and refugee-hosting populations in five countries. Evidence from the program in Rwanda, operated in partnership with a local partner, Kepler, suggests it is possible for a full degree program to be successful in reaching vulnerable learners, including refugees.

The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of off-farm work on food security in rural Bangladesh. We use rural household-level data and a nonparametric propensity score matching (PSM) estimator. Matching estimators are used in observational data to address the potential selection biases caused by nonrandom allocation of the treatment. Monthly food-consumption data and household income and expenditure surveys from rural Bangladesh for 2013–2014 are used in this chapter. We found that rural Bangladeshi households participating in nonfarm income-generating activities, especially in higher return nonfarm employment, enjoy higher levels of per-capita food expenditures and diet diversity – two of the measures of food security. In particular, we find that rural households increased diet diversity in cereals, fruits and vegetables, and meats. Finally, our estimates reveal that rural households participating in off-farm work increased per-capita food consumption by about Taka 1,576, on average, and increased per-capita expenditures on milk and milk products (Taka 212), and fruits and vegetables (Taka 235) significantly. Policy makers should design and implement policies that create off-farm livelihood activities. These nonfarm activities would help smallholder farm families to diversify, to supplement their income, and to continue their agricultural operations as well as increase food security.

Throughout the world, at one period or another in its history, it has been the practice to cultivate tree species and agricultural crops in intimate combination in most of the countries. The history of cultivating trees and crops in home gardens, social tree planting, protecting and managing forests, appreciating wildlife, and sustaining the beauties of nature in Sri Lanka go back to more than about 25 centuries. In chronicles, there are some references on social tree planting practices, and home gardens planted with flowering and fruit-bearing trees in Sri Lanka. Because of the traditions, influencing factors of the existing environment, and nature of agroforestry, the numerous examples of agroforestry practices are found in all agro climatic and ecological zones of Sri Lanka. Today, the traditional knowledge of agroforestry is being developed and expanded with the objective of improving living standards, especially the rural communities in Sri Lanka.

The predominate Western approach applied to agricultural research and development in Vanuatu is to focus on sector-specific or crop-by crop basis that is universally applied rather than designing context-specific research objectives. The findings from a gender livelihoods analysis conducted with 45 households in East Coast Santo, Vanuatu show that this sectorial focus inherently excludes women. Female smallholder livelihood activities were found to be centred around activities within the informal economy (traditional economy) and agricultural input is focused on harvesting of Non-timber Forest Products (NTFPs) and food crops for subsistence and local markets, while male smallholder farmers generally focus on cash crops and the formal commercial sector.

The strategies put forward by the Declaration of the International Forum for Agroecology, Nyeleni, Mali, 2007, recognise the central role of women in rural development, and align closely with the traditional economy and the political, economic and social foundations of Vanuatu. Therefore, it is recommended that research and development projects operating in this space consider the integration of agroecology and sustainable livelihoods into their project designs through frameworks such as the Agroecology and Sustainable Livelihoods Framework (ASRLF). The ASRLF approaches research through a critical lens that challenges and transforms structures of power in society and sees minority groups (such as women and youth) and their knowledge, values, vision and leadership as critical for moving forward. This chapter demonstrates the application of the ASRLF to a gender livelihoods analysis and the development of a strategy to engage and empower rural farming women.