Resource information
This article assesses the impact of the
East Asian financial crisis on farm households in two of the
region's most affected countries, Indonesia and
Thailand, using detailed household level survey data
collected before and after the crisis began. Although the
natures of the shocks in the two countries were similar, the
impact on farmers' income (particularly on
distribution) was quite different. In Thailand, poor farmers
bore the brunt of the crisis, in part because of their
greater reliance on the urban economy, than did poor farmers
in Indonesia. Urban-rural links are much weaker in
Indonesia. Farmers in both countries, particularly those
specializing in export crops, benefited from the currency
devaluation. Although there is some evidence that the
productivity of the smallest landholders declined over the
period in question, it is difficult to attribute this
directly to the financial crisis. At least in Thailand, a
rural credit crunch does not seem to have materialized.
