During March and April 2016, ASSAR India’s researchers from the Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS) conducted 18 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) in nine villages in Kolar District, Karnataka. The FGDs were gender-differentiated and ensured representation from different income groups, castes, and religions.
Focussing on migration as a key livelihood strategy to address vulnerability, and one that spans the rural-urban continuum, this project conducted research in the Kolar District. Kolar falls in the eastern dry agro-climatic zone in south Karnataka.
The district is characterised by erratic rainfall, low soil moisture, high groundwater exploitation, and rapid land use change, all of which are mediated by social inequalities and governance challenges to shape local vulnerability.
Climatic and non-climatic stressors challenge natural resource-based livelihoods in the district and people are coping by moving into tenuous and unsafe employment in urban centres to work as construction labourers, gardeners, and domestic helpers. Migration and commuting has emerged as a key livelihood strategy, but one that may further exacerbate the vulnerability of those who move into cities and those who are left behind.
Key messages:
- climatic factors such as drought and erratic rain shape livelihood vulnerability (especially of farmers in Kolar). Other factors such as natural resource degradation, lack of capital to invest in farming, market fluctuations,
village proximity to road networks, one’s gender and caste, as well as changing aspirations of the youth shape the choices that people are making to deal with this vulnerability - in Kolar, many people are coping with everyday risk by diversifying their livelihoods into non-agricultural jobs, but these jobs are often informal and impermanent in nature
- while external actors such as the government and local NGOs are investing in building local capacity, without addressing the multi-scale structural issues that drive vulnerability (e.g., caste-based differential access to subsidies), these investments may not meet intended outcomes of adaptation