De-agrarianisation and re-agrarianisation in patches: understanding microlevel land use change processes in Nepalese smallholder landscapes

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the ongoing reproduction crisis in Nepal. We utilize farmer context-specific actions of ‘hanging in’, ‘stepping out’ and ‘stepping up’ to unpack the pathways of de-activation, de-agrarianisation and re-agrarianisation in four spatially and socially differentiated landscapes. We detail a continuum of land use and labour use intensity, the microlevel variations and repertoires of actions in relation to landscape, shrinking farm sizes, labour shortages, forest expansion and increasing wildlife encroachment. The analysis focuses on specific landscape and social contexts and shows how smallholders are fine-tuning agricultural practices to meet subsistence needs. But account also must be taken of ecological variability and socially differentiated access to land to understand how households allocate labour between different land uses and between farm and off-farm activities. Household survival depends as much on the allocation of scarce labour resources as on that of scarce land. It suggests that household rather than just land has become a key unit of production.

KEYWORDS:

• Remittance economy
• idling land
• subsistence farming
• Mid-Hills
• agrarian change
• wildlife

Acknowledgements

We greatly appreciate the people of Cyasku (Ramechhap), Jhunga (Sindhuli), Kalang (Dolakha) and Khimti (Ramechhap), especially the respondents, who dedicated much time and interacted with us throughout the research period. We would like to express our sincere thanks to two anonymous reviewers, whose comments were extremely helpful in guiding changes to the structure and framing of the paper and greatly improved its quality. We deeply thank Dr. Bishnu Hari Poudyal and Sanjaya Khatri for their help during the fieldwork. We acknowledge funding from Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) grant no. 2017-0544.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/14728028.2023.2283022

Notes

1. Inner Tarai is the elongated valley between Chure and Mahabharat hills of Nepal. The climate and temperature are similar to Tarai (i.e. sub-tropical), which is the southern flat land of Nepal.

2. Jirel is one of many indigenous groups in Nepal which are collectively denoted as Janajati, Dalit refers to the lowest caste communities which were categorized as ‘untouchables’ in the past.

3. Birta was the land granted to key officials by the rulers in lieu of salary on an inheritable and tax-exempt basis (Regmi 1978), these grants were terminated by the Birta Abolition Act in 1959. The lands were converted into private property or raikar after the implementation of this Act.

4. The Madan Bhandari Highway.

5. Unclear from what disease but probably from foot and mouth disease.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) grant no. 2017-0544.