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Does Livestock Loss Affect Livelihood? An Investigation on Char Residing Mishing Community of Assam

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Abstract

Char areas are one of the important geographical structures of Assam covering about state’s 5% of total land with about 10% of total population. Mishings are the second largest tribe of Assam inhabitant mostly in Char areas of Upper Assam. Livestock plays an important role in the Mishing community from both socio-cultural as well as economic point of view and amongst all; pigs have a significant importance among the community. The study comes with objectives of understanding the role of livestock and the effect of livestock loss amongst the Mishing char dwellers and their adaptation behavior (if any) to smoothen their income fluctuations due to loss of livestock. While studying these issues, the piggery sector is given much importance since along with economic, pig has a great social importance too. The study is influenced by the idea of ethnographic research, using both quantitative and qualitative approach to achieve the proposed objectives. The study presents that the loss of livestock due to both disease and disaster has a significant impact on the vulnerability of the Mishing char dwellers and the share of loss of piggery is found to have greater contribution towards it. The study recommends the need for policies to be taken to tackle the issues and the enhancement in the adaptation techniques that has been taken by the char dwellers.

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Data Availability

The study is based on the primary data and the authors are not willing to share the data publically. However, for the review process, the data can be accessed on request.

Notes

  1. Char-Chapori areas are “the new riverine lands and islands created by the continual shifting of the rivers, and emerge from the deposition of sand and silt from upstream. Chars are found along all the major river systems, both lining the banks of rivers and as mid-river islands” (DFID, 2000, p. 3).

  2. The states of Assam are divided into five regional divisions: Upper Assam, Central Assam, North Assam, Lower Assam and Barak Valley.

  3. Upper Assam division comprises the districts Dhemaji, Dibrugarh, Charaideo, North-Lakhimpur, Jorhat, Golaghat, Tinsukia, Sivsagar and Majuli.

  4. Multi-stage sampling technique is a sampling technique which involves more than one stages of random sampling and the process is based on some structures of natural clusters within the total population considered for the study. These clusters are selected randomly at every stages of sampling and the final stage involves in the selection of the final set of sample (Sedgwick, 2015).

  5. Khuti are the places where rear cow, buffalo, and goat in some large quantities say 30/40 numbers to more than 100 numbers of cattle.

  6. Doha is the ritual of Mishing community, usually performed after the death of any member of Mishing household. It is not necessary for them to perform just immediately after the death, they can postpone it.

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  1. Department of Economics, Gauhati University, Guwahati, India

    Mrinal Saikia & Ratul Mahanta

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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Data collected and Manuscript written by Mrinal Saikia. Manuscript reviewed and corrected by Ratul Mahanta. All authors read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Appendix

Appendix

Figures 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8

Fig. 4
figure 4

Livestock in char. Source: Author’s own capture

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Fig. 5
figure 5

Pig rearing in Mishing villages in char. Source: Author’s own capture

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Fig. 6
figure 6

Floating bodies of dead pigs in the river. Source: Author’s own capture

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Fig. 7
figure 7

High-land constructed within the char areas to protect livestock from flood. Source: Authors’ own capture

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Fig. 8
figure 8

Results of VER model. Note: *, ** and *** presence the 10%, 5% and 1% levels of significance respectively. Coefficient values are given in the brackets

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Saikia, M., Mahanta, R. Does Livestock Loss Affect Livelihood? An Investigation on Char Residing Mishing Community of Assam. Int. Journal of Com. WB 6, 327–351 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42413-023-00198-6

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