ASSESSMENT OF LIVELIHOOD STRATEGIES IN SELECTED RURAL AREAS IN SYRIA

The diversification of income sources becomes of major importance in rural areas since agriculture alone is unable to meet rural people's needs. Aiming to assess the role of livelihoods strategies in rural development and poverty alleviation in selected areas in Syria, the present study discusses the role of income diversification in poverty reduction and income inequality. Using the asset-based approach as the main framework, qualitative and quantitative methods were employed for the purpose of this study. In addition to secondary data, primary data was collected in five rural areas in Syria, a sample of 444 households was chosen to represent five distinguished farming systems, and the interviews used a structured and comprehensive questionnaire. The results reveal that diversification of income sources is connected with the households status and endowments, poor households depends mainly on labor-intensive and low-waged activities, while non-poor households rely on their assets to engage in more profitable activities especially self-employment. The study also finds evidence that engaging in non-farm activities increases inequality among households and decreases poverty; the use of income decomposition analysis revealed that waged non-farm income is inequality-decreasing sources to overall income sources, while non-farm self-employment is inequality-increasing source of income. These results combined with findings from households' asset description suggest that poor households lack the access to capitals (i.e. irrigated land, financial capital) which means that it is important to focus on non-agricultural activities in order to become better-off. Moreover, results from econometric analysis evidently indicated that better education has a positive impact on poverty status as well. These results imply that the attainment of higher education level will move poor people out of poverty and improve their well-being.