Myanmar Aquaculture Agriculture Survey: Household component, April-May 2016

\"The Myanmar Aquaculture Agriculture Survey (MAAS) was implemented in April-May 2016 in four townships of Ayeyarwady and Yangon regions, close to the city of Yangon. Respondents from 1,102 households were interviewed, representing a total population of 37,390 households. MAAS was designed with the following objectives (1) Generate baseline information on fish and paddy farm yields, size, tenure status, management practices, and profitability. (2) Quantify the relative advantages of, and tradeoffs between, aquaculture and agriculture by estimating the size of growth linkages and employment multipliers in the local rural economy. (3) Compare the relative performance of large- and small-scale commercial aquaculture in terms of spillover effects, demand for labor, productivity, and returns. (4) Evaluate patterns of rural-rural and rural-urban migration, agricultural mechanization, and the extent and terms of access to credit in aquaculture and agriculture. In order to address these questions, MAAS adopted a two stage sampling strategy to facilitate comparison of the rural economy and livelihoods in groups of village tracts with high concentrations of fish farms (referred to as the aquaculture cluster), and in areas where paddy cultivation was the main farming activity (the agriculture cluster). The MAAS survey instrument was comprised of three elements: (1) A household section, containing modules on household composition, migration, employment, land and asset ownership, production of non-field crops, and consumption expenditures. (2) An aquaculture section, comprised of modules on: pond acquisition and tenure status; input utilization and costs (including labor); harvesting and marketing; trends in production over the preceding 10 years; and credit utilization. (3) An agriculture section, incorporating modules on: land ownership and tenure; irrigation; agricultural machinery and draft animal use; input application; marketing practices and costs; changes in production practices over the last decade; and access and utilization of agricultural credit. A short community survey was conducted with small focus groups of knowledgeable long-term residents in 73 of the 78 selected enumerations areas covered by the household survey. The questionnaire was designed to generate additional data on the physical accessibility of the communities, changing village populations, historical wage data, landownership structures and historical inventories of non-farm enterprises over the period 2011-2016, including those playing a role in aquaculture and agriculture value chains.