The Impact of Agricultural Land on Poverty and Inequality in Rural Vietnam

This paper measures impact of agricultural land on household income and consumption expenditure, and subsequently assesses impact of agricultural land on poverty and inequality in rural Vietnam. It is found that agricultural land increases per capita consumption expenditure and income of the land holders by around 2.7 and 6.7 percent, respectively. As a result, agricultural land helps poverty reduction. Due to agricultural land, the headcount of poverty for land holders is reduced by around 1.2 percentage points. Agricultural land also decreases the poverty-gap and poverty-severity indexes for the land holders by around 5.6 and 6.6 percent, respectively. However, agricultural land increases rural inequality, albeit at very small magnitude