A methodological pathway to quantify livelihood security of the farmers: A confluence of alfares and FAO approach to frame an index

Doubling farmers ’income by 2022 is a big challenge but to attain livelihood security (LS) is far bigger challenge because the research reveals that one-fourth of the world poor lives in 8 Indian states. So, a comprehensive 7 dimensional LS index was crafted with 77 indicators following Alfares and FAO approach. The superiority of Alfares methodological has been shown over 8 widely used existing approaches. By obtaining ordinal ranking from 32 judges, food security had got maximum weightage of 96.24, trailed by health, economic, educational, social, institutional and infrastructural security. Suggested index can be used worldwide with location specific modification.