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How many zones?
Q. How many livelihood zones should there be in a country?
A. There are always practical considerations or compromises to keep in mind when defining livelihood zones. It is possible to define more and more detailed livelihood zones and to finally end up with hundreds of zones that are nearly indistinguishable and a complicated system that will never be used. It is generally more practical to have a smaller number of broader zones, but it depends on the purpose of your zoning exercise. For what purpose is the information going to be used? It may take little effort to define and draw a new zone and to calculate its estimated population, but if the percentage of the national (or regional) population in the zone is tiny (i.e. less than 1%- 2%) then how useful will the information be for emergency or development purposes? Will it be worth the effort to gather and continuously update information on a very small zone? At the same time, in the interests of having a ‘manageable’ number of livelihood zones, outright inaccuracy must not be allowed. Geographical areas that clearly have different livelihood patterns should not be combined. So there is obviously a trade off between simplification and accuracy. A small country, or a country with little geographical and livelihood variation, will generally divide into 8-15 rural livelihood zones. A large country with great geographical and livelihood variation6 may divide into as many as 70-80 rural livelihood zones. Please see examples below. 
