Coping or Hoping? Livelihood Diversification and Food Insecurity in the COVID-19 Pandemic

TL;DR

This study investigates whether livelihood diversification helps households in Ethiopia, Malawi, and Nigeria cope with food insecurity during COVID-19, finding it ineffective for large-scale shocks like the pandemic.

Contribution

It provides causal evidence that livelihood diversification does not enhance resilience against large-scale disasters such as COVID-19.

Findings

Livelihood diversification does not significantly reduce food insecurity during the pandemic.

Small-scale shocks may be mitigated by diversification, but not large-scale crises.

Policy implications suggest rethinking resilience strategies for large-scale disasters.

Abstract

We examine the impact of livelihood diversification on food insecurity amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Our analysis uses household panel data from Ethiopia, Malawi, and Nigeria in which the first round was collected immediately prior to the pandemic and extends through multiple rounds of monthly data collection during the pandemic. Using this pre- and post-outbreak data, and guided by a pre-analysis plan, we estimate the causal effect of livelihood diversification on food insecurity. Our results do not support the hypothesis that livelihood diversification boosts household resilience. Though income diversification may serve as an effective coping mechanism for small-scale shocks, we find that for a disaster on the scale of the pandemic this strategy is not effective. Policymakers looking to prepare for the increased occurrence of large-scale disasters will need to grapple with the fact that coping strategies that gave people hope in the past may fail them as they try to cope with the future.