World Food Policy Volume/Issue 2-2/3-1 Fall 2015/Spring 2016 | Page 92

Constructing a Database for Food Security Assessments in Southeast Asia

Shocks and coping strategies

medium to high severity. Demographic
shocks including events such as birth,
death, illness, and accidents of household
members also appear to play a major
role. In total, households reported 246 of
those shocks accounting for more than
one third of the total shocks reported.
Notably, illnesses make up 83% of this
shock type. Economic shocks such
as price fluctuations and theft only
account for 8% of the total shocks, but
nevertheless their impact is perceived
as being very high. Social and other
shocks—due to weddings or funerals
or in case of conflicts with neighbors or
relatives—have been hardly reported.
This finding is supported by the estimated
losses in terms of income and assets as
well as extra expenditure associated with
the different shock types. As Figures 2a
and b show, the high impact of social and

This case study from Stung Treng
province in Cambodia shows that shocks
influence the food security situation
and livelihood strategies of households.
Our household dataset which has been
already described at the beginning of
this section includes information on
agricultural, economic, demographic,
and social shocks as perceived at the
household level over the preceding year.

Agricultural shocks such as
floods, droughts, or storms, but also
livestock diseases and crop failures are
the most common shocks in Stung Treng
(Table 5). They account for slightly more
than half (54%) of all reported shocks and
relate especially to drought and livestock
diseases (69%). Two thirds of the
agricultural shocks are perceived to be of

Figure 2a: Average loss from shocks by category (in PPP USD)
Source: Bühler et al. (2015b)

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