## 3 Results
### Understanding Local Farming Systems in the Case Study  
#### 3.2.1 Social-Economic Background of Respondents  
A survey was designed to gather basic socio-economic data concerning the inhabitants of the Song Kon commune. The results of which are presented in Table 6. Based on a review of their experiences, three main findings include: first, all households are ethnic minorities (100%) and their main incomes are reliant upon agricultural and forestry practices (81.26%). There are two local varieties of dry rice cultivated. In addition, wet rice, cassava, and a variety of vegetables are popular as crops in this  
Figure 5: The Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) map of IK and NIK farming system areas. Figure 6: The comparison of EVI between IK and NIK farming systems. study area. According to our \"in-depth-interviews,\" around 30% of the agricultural land could not be cultivated in the Winter-Spring season in 2019 because of an increase drought. They are also highly vulnerable to the risk of soil erosion, which frequently occurs in the hilly regions. As a result, yield loss of wet rice happens quite predominantly. The seasonal calendar is shown in detail in Figure 7. Second, the level of education is low with 42.86% of household heads lacking even primary school education, 15.48% of them have no academic education whatsoever. A contributing factor to this aspect is that the poorer households occupy approximately 26.19% of our total samples. Third, a high proportion of males (69.04%) within the household provided the answers for our interview. This is due to the gender divisions within their culture, where the men are the ones who stay at home to care for their children, and who most often drink alcohol during this time, while women were hired laborers. These communities have low levels of education while also lacking proper clothing, and healthcare services, which is mainly due to the remoteness of their locations and the lack of financial assistance to establish the necessary infrastructures. In this, however, there are also some discrepancies in the cultural lifestyles of the people that create some obstacles in improving their situation. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{l c c} \hline \hline
**Items** & **Unit** & **Results** \\ \hline
1. Number of respondents & Respondents & 84 \\ Male & \% & 69.04 \\ Female & \% & 31.96 \\ \hline
2. Average of age & Age & 40 \\ \hline
3. Education & & 15.48 \\ No formal education & & 42.86 \\ Primary school & \% & 27.38 \\ Secondary school & & 13.10 \\ High school & & 1.19 \\ University/college & & 1.19 \\ \hline
4. Poverty rate & \% & 26.19 \\ \hline
5. Number of labors & labors/household & 2.47 \\ \hline
6. Household income (million VND/month) * & & 30.95 \\ \(<\)1 & & 30.95 \\
1–2 & \% & 29.76 \\
2–4 & & 25.00 \\ \(>\)4 & & 14.29 \\ \hline
7. Income from agriculture activities & \% & 81.26 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}  
* 1 million VND = \(\sim\)45 USD.  
\end{table} 
Table 6: Social-economic background of respondents. Figure 7: Adjusting the seasonal calendar. In Vietnam, the local government is the one who ostensibly holds the responsibility for agricultural development and crop management for whole communes. However, in the minor ethnic communities, they often do not follow the plans recommended by the local authorities. In fact, the development of agriculture is highly dependent on the decisions of each household. These farmers make their decisions based on a combination of their social experience and their economic conditions. The annual seasonal agricultural production calendar can vary markedly from area to area. Generally, within our study group, they have a practice of cultivating wet rice two times per year, most of the respondents often use two local rice varieties as a way in which to adapt to local natural conditions. In particular, these two types of rice are also grown in two different ways and at different times. The first rice variety (_mia_) is planted in June and harvested at the end of November.