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The purpose of this paper is to estimate the impact of credit rationing on the amount of capital allocated to inputs used by rice farmers in the Mekong River Delta (MRD).

Based on the literature review, the authors propose nine hypotheses on the determinants of access of rice farmers to credit and four hypotheses on the impact of credit rationing on the amount of capital allocated to inputs used by rice farmers in the MRD. Data were collected from 1,168 farmer households randomly selected out of 10 provinces (city) in the MRD.

Step 1 of propensity score matching (PSM) with probit regression shows that land value, income, education, gender of household head and geographical distance to the nearest credit institution affect the degree of credit rationing facing rice farmers. Step 2 of PSM estimator identifies that the amount of capital allocated to inputs such as fertilizer and hired labour increases when credit rationing decreases while that allocated to seed and pesticide is not influenced by credit rationing because rice farmers use these inputs adamantly regardless of effectiveness.

This paper sheds light on the impact of credit rationing on the amount of capital allocated to inputs used by rice farmers, which is largely different from the main focus of the extant literature just on the determinants of credit rationing facing farmers in general and rice farmers in particular.

This paper investigates the impact of education on output of rice farming households in Vietnam.

Given the literature review, this paper specifies three empirical models (i.e. linear constant coefficient model, partially nonlinear model and linear varied coefficient model) with variables that well describe the mechanism through which education affects output. The data were collected from 901 rice farming households randomly selected out of ten provinces and city in the Mekong River Delta (MRD) of Vietnam. The models are estimated using ordinary least squares (OLS) and Robinson's (1988) double residual estimators.

Estimates of the empirical models show that seed, fertilizer, labor and farm size have significant impacts on output of rice farming households while pesticide and herbicide do not. Education is also found to have a positive effect on output of rice farming households because it helps them better manage farms of larger size via combining various inputs in a more desirable way.

This paper confirms the positive impact of education on agricultural output, which implies that policies aiming to provide better education to rural people will greatly enhance their income as well as trigger long-term economic and agricultural growth.

Over the last decades, there has been an increasing interest among scientists on the linkage between population health and climate and environmental factors, as well as health impacts of climate change and climate variability. Numerous studies have been done and substantial results achieved, but mostly in the developed countries, and not much quantitative evidence or assessment of the impacts at national and local levels has been provided for developing countries.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determinants of the amount of trade credit granted to shrimp farmers in Ca Mau.

Based on the literature review, the authors proposed six hypotheses on the determinants of the amount of trade credit granted to shrimp farmers. Data collected from 120 shrimp farmers in Ca Mau were used to test the proposed hypotheses.

Two out of six determinants, i.e. the size of input order (a pulling factor) and the competition among input suppliers (a pushing factor), are significantly positively associated with the amount of trade credit granted to shrimp farmers. No impact of the other determinants was found. The findings imply that shrimp farmers should join cooperatives to enhance access to trade credit and mitigate the risk for input suppliers.

This paper sheds light on the fact that trade credit is still granted to such risky buyers as shrimp farmers, which has not been explored by previous studies.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of microfinance programs on the income and food expenditure of farm and nonfarm households in Thailand.

The study employs secondary data from the Thai Socioeconomic Survey (cross-sectional data from 2017 and panel data from 2012 to 2017). The cross-sectional data (2017) include 43,210 households. Panel data from the 2012 and 2017 Socioeconomic surveys (SES surveys) include 4,406 households. The estimation methods include propensity score matching (PSM) and a fixed effect (FE) model.

The result shows that village funds (VFs) have a significant negative impact on income and food expenditure for both farm and nonfarm households. The empirical results reveal that the saving groups for production (SGPs) effects are positively significant in terms of income and food expenditure, but only for farm households. The FE model result also shows that while VFs have a negative impact on income they have a positive impact on food expenditure for farm households. In contrast, SPGs have no impact on both farm and nonfarm households' income and food expenditure.

Farm and nonfarm households require both welfare and microfinance programs. Microfinance programs can only help these households once they have the necessary education. The government should provide social programs and business skills for these households; completion of these courses should be a pre-requisite for accessing microfinance programs.

This study is unique because it reveals the microfinance impact between VFs and SGPs programs so that most low-income and poor people in Thailand can access basic financial services.

The purpose of this study is to first examine the factors affecting the intra-household perception of climate change. Second, the study investigates the impact of the perception of climatic stress on the operators’ and spouses’ intra-household adaptation strategies (farm and household financial strategies).

The study uses household survey data from Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. The study uses probit and negative binomial count data approaches to evaluate the empirical model.

Results confirm the existence of intra-household gender differences in the adaptation strategies. The authors found that although spouses perceive climatic stress, they are less likely to adapt to such stresses when it comes farming enterprise, but more likely to adapt to household financial strategies. In contrast, farm operators, in the presence of climatic stresses, undertake both farm and household finance adaptation strategies.

Investment in climate smart agriculture can help households in managing climatic stresses.

A farmer in Asia, and Vietnam in particular, faces significant risks from climatic changes. In Vietnam, agriculture is easily affected by natural disasters and climatic changes. This study provides insights into the perception of climatic changes by operators and spouses in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. Perceived changes in the climate have a greater impact on women because they typically lack the necessary tools to adapt to climate change. The current findings could be useful in managing climatic risk in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta and be helpful to policymakers in designing risk management strategies in response to climatic changes.

This study aims to investigate aspects related to the changing trends of the rainfall extremes in the entire Mekong Delta in the period of 32 years (1984-2015) applying rainfall extreme indices. First, the homogeneity tests were applied to assess the quality of observed rainfall data series. The authors, then, investigated three rainfall indices including the number of very heavy rainfall days 20 mm (R20), number of days above 50 mm (R50) and number of days above 100 mm (R100) applying the Mann-Kendall test and Sen’s slope estimate.

First, the homogeneity tests were applied to assess the quality of observed rainfall data series. The authors, then, investigated three rainfall indices including the number of very heavy rainfall days 20 mm (R20), number of days above 50 mm (R50) and number of days above 100 mm (R100) applying the Mann-Kendall test and Sen’s slope estimate.

The results of R20 pointed out that an insignificant upward tendency was found in the coastal provinces, whereas an insignificant downward tendency was also recorded in the inland provinces. Regarding the number of R50, a similar trend to R20 was recorded with five stations slightly increased and five stations slightly decreased. For the number of R100, the results recorded an absence of significant trends over the entire study area. Approximately 58.5% of stations show a slightly decreasing trend, while 41.5% of the remaining stations recorded a slightly increasing trend.

For the number of R100, the results recorded an absence of the significant trends over the entire study area. Approximately 58.5% of stations show a slightly decreasing trend, while 41.5% of the remaining stations recorded a slightly increasing trend. Of note is the fact that the number of R100 occurred more frequently in the northern provinces, which means the northern region is facing a high risk of flooding.

Mountains provide more than 40% of global goods and services. The ecosystem services arising from the Hindu Kush-Himalayas (HKH) in the form of water, biodiversity and niche products, hydroelectricity, timber, mineral resources, and recreation are enormous. The HKH region is enriched by a diversity of cultures, ethnic groups, and traditional knowledge systems. Thus, it is a paradox that, in spite of rich natural resources and cultures, poverty is rampant. Additionally, the HKH is a hotspot for climate change impacts, but the region has been identified as a data deficient during the 2007 assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Since then, some progress has been made to fill the data gap, specifically relating to biodiversity, cryosphere, and climate change. This chapter introduces the HKH region and elaborates the need for modeling in the context of dealing with climate change.