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Does the location of salmon farms contribute to the reduction of poverty in remote coastal areas? An impact assessment using a Chilean case study

Capital intensive salmon aquaculture reduces poverty in remote coastal areas in Chile.
Geographic distance between salmon farm and residency affects impact on poverty.
Two thirds of rural poverty reduction is explained by the impact of salmon farming in the period.
Poverty
Salmon
Aquaculture
Small area estimation
Impact assessment

Adams Ceballos, Jorge Dresdner, and Miguel Quiroga, “Does the location of salmon farms contribute to the reduction of poverty in remote coastal areas? An impact assessment using a Chilean case study,” Food Policy 75 (February 2018): 68-79, doi: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2018.01.009

Authors
Affiliations

Adams Ceballos

University of Florida

Jorge David Dresdner-Cid

Universidad de Concepcion

Miguel Angel Quiroga-Suazo

Universidad de Concepcion

Published

January 2018

Doi

10.1177/0899764020971045

Other details

Presented at the IX Annual Meeting of the Regional Studies Chilean Society in 2017, held in Chillán, Chile. Additionally, it was presented at the 2nd Annual Transdisciplinary Conference: “Sustainable Development in Chile & Latin America: Where is the Missing Link?” in July, 2018 held in Nottingham, England.

Media coverage

Abstract

We test if the establishment of salmon farms in remote coastal areas had a significant impact on poverty reduction in the period 1992–2002 in Los Lagos Region, Chile. We employ impact assessment techniques using as control group people residing in geographic areas where no salmon farms were established during the period studied. Poverty incidence is estimated using small-area models at the household level that combines socioeconomic surveys with census data. Our results show that poverty decreased considerably more in localities where salmon farms were installed than in localities without salmon farms. We identify the distances between localities and salmon farms where this impact was significant. Our findings contribute to the debate on the socioeconomic effects of aquaculture for capital-intensive, international market-oriented industries.

Important figures

Figure 2: The impact pathways of aquaculture on poverty reduction. Source: Modified from Toufique and Belton (2014). Figure 2: The impact pathways of aquaculture on poverty reduction. Source: Modified from Toufique and Belton (2014).

The study employed two control locality types. Control 1 consisted of rural localities without any salmon concessions before 2002, used to evaluate the impact of new farm installations. Control 2 involved localities with salmon concessions before and after 1992. This second control is established for the possibility that some localities of Control 1 are not good controls because some may have characteristics that do not permit the installation of salmon farms.

  • WOAR: regressions without additional regresors
  • WAR: regressions with additional regressors
  • GEN: genetic matching

Figure 4 & 5: Estimated average treatment on the treated at different distances for different models (WOAR, WAR, GEN). Control 1 & Control 2, respectively. The shaded areas represent the 95% confidence interval. Figure 4: Estimated average treatment on the treated at different distances for different models (WOAR, WAR, GEN). Control 1. The shaded areas represent the 95% confidence interval. Figure5: Estimated average treatment on the treated at different distances for different models (WOAR, WAR, GEN). Control 2. The shaded areas represent the 95% confidence interval.

Citation

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@article{ceballos_does_2018,
    title = {Does the location of salmon farms contribute to the reduction of poverty in remote coastal areas? {An} impact assessment using a {Chilean} case study},
    volume = {75},
    issn = {0306-9192},
    doi = {10.1016/j.foodpol.2018.01.009},
    language = {English},
    journal = {FOOD POLICY},
    author = {Ceballos, Adams and David Dresdner-Cid, Jorge and Angel Quiroga-Suazo, Miguel},
    month = feb,
    year = {2018},
    note = {Place: THE BOULEVARD, LANGFORD LANE, KIDLINGTON, OXFORD OX5 1GB, OXON, ENGLAND
Publisher: ELSEVIER SCI LTD
Type: Article},
    keywords = {Aquaculture, Impact assessment, Poverty, Salmon, Small area estimation},
    pages = {68--79},
}