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on Development |
| By: | Sarah Baird; Joan Hamory Hicks; Michael Kremer; Edward Miguel |
| Abstract: | This study estimates long-run impacts of a child health investment, exploiting community-wide experimental variation in school-based deworming. The program increased education among women and labor supply among men, with accompanying shifts in labor market specialization. Ten years after deworming treatment, women who were eligible as girls are 25% more likely to have attended secondary school, halving the gender gap. They reallocate time from traditional agriculture into cash crops and entrepreneurship. Men who were eligible as boys stay enrolled for more years of primary school, work 17% more hours each week, spend more time in entrepreneurship, are more likely to hold manufacturing jobs, and miss one fewer meal per week. We estimate an annualized financial internal rate of return of at least 32.2%. |
| JEL: | I00 I10 I20 J24 O15 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21428&r=dev |
| By: | Hirvonen, Kalle; Taffesse, Alemayehu Seyoum; Worku, Ibrahim |
| Abstract: | The paper revisits seasonality by assessing how the quantity and quality of diets vary across agricultural seasons in rural and urban Ethiopia. Using unique nationally representative household level data for each month over one calendar year, we document seasonal fluctuations in household diets in terms of both the quantity of calories consumed and the number of different food groups consumed. Households in both rural and urban areas consume less calories in the lean season, but interestingly, due to changes in the composition of diets, the diet diversity score increases towards the end of the lean season. |
| Keywords: | nutrition, food consumption, households, seasonality, diet, calorie intake, dietary diversity, |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fpr:esspwp:74&r=dev |
| By: | Laura Abramovsky (Institute for Fiscal Studies); Orazio Attanasio (Institute for Fiscal Studies and University College London); Kai Barron (Institute for Fiscal Studies and University College London); Pedro Carneiro (Institute for Fiscal Studies and cemmap and UCL); George Stoye (Institute for Fiscal Studies) |
| Abstract: | We evaluate the large scale pilot of an innovative and major welfare intervention in Colombia, which combines homes visits by trained social workers to households in extreme poverty with preferential access to social programs. We use a randomized control trial and a very rich dataset collected as part of the evaluation to identify program impacts on the knowledge and take-up of social programs and the labor supply of targeted households. We find no consistent impact of the program on these outcomes, possibly because the way the pilot was implemented resulted in very light treatment in terms of home visits. Importantly, administrative data indicates that the program has been rolled out nationally in a very similar fashion, suggesting that this major national program is likely to fail in making a significant contribution to reducing extreme poverty. We suggest that the program should undergo substantial reforms, which in turn should be evaluated. |
| Date: | 2014–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ifs:ifsewp:14/33&r=dev |
| By: | Bernard, Tanguy (IFPRI, International Food Policy Research Institute); Frölich, Markus (University of Mannheim); Landmann, Andreas (University of Mannheim); Unte, Pia Naima (University of Mannheim); Viceisza, Angelino (Spelman College); Wouterse, Fleur (IFPRI, International Food Policy Research Institute) |
| Abstract: | Trust is crucial for successful collective action. A prime example is collective commercialization of agricultural produce through producer organizations. We conduct a cluster-randomized controlled trial in rural Senegal in which we vary the number and the type of smallholder farmers – members and/or leaders of local producer organizations – invited to a three-day training on collective commercialization. We use this variation to identify effects on intra-group trust, both direct treatment effects of having participated in the training and spillover effects on farmers who did not partake. Looking at different measures of trust in leaders' competence and motives and of trust in members we find that participating in the training significantly enhances both trust in leaders and trust in members. For trust in leaders, we also find a strong spillover effect. Our findings suggest that relatively soft and non-costly interventions such as a group training appear to be able to positively affect trust within producer organizations. |
| Keywords: | rural producer organizations, smallholder farmers, trust, Senegal |
| JEL: | D71 O12 Q13 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9207&r=dev |
| By: | Valente, Christine (University of Bristol) |
| Abstract: | The rapid increase in primary enrollment seen in many developing countries might worsen schooling quality. I estimate the effect of enrollment growth following the removal of primary school fees in Tanzania and find that it led to large increases in the pupil-teacher ratio and a reduction in observable teacher quality, but rule out a substantial effect on test scores overall. These results are robust to instrumenting enrollment growth using predetermined fertility and migration decisions, and not driven by compositional changes. In urban areas, however, where baseline achievement was higher, test scores deteriorated where enrollment growth was larger. |
| Keywords: | universal primary education, pupil-teacher ratio, test scores, Tanzania |
| JEL: | I21 I28 O15 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9208&r=dev |
| By: | Alexander Lippert |
| Abstract: | Do local populations benefit from resource booms? How strong are market linkages between the mining sector and the regional economy? This paper exploits exogenous variation in mine-level production volumes generated by the recent copper boom in Zambia to shed light on these questions. Using a novel dataset, I find robust evidence that an increase in local copper production improves living standards in the surroundings of the mines even for households not directy employed in the mining sector: a 10% increase in constituency-level copper output is associated with a 2% increase in real household expenditure; positive effects on housing conditions, consumer durable ownership and child health are of similar magnitude. The positive spill-overs extend to the rural hinterland of mining cities, neighboring constituencies, and constituencies to the copper transportation route. Additionally,I identify boom-induced changes in the demand for servics and agricultural products as key channels through which the urban and rural populations benefit from the mine expansions. Since the boom failed to generate fiscal revenues, these effects can be interpreted as the result of the mines' backward linkages. Taken together, these findings highlight the welfare potential of local procurement policies in resource rich developing countries. |
| Keywords: | Commodity Shocks, Local Development, Mining, Natural Resources |
| JEL: | I31 O12 O13 Q32 Q33 |
| Date: | 2014–01–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oxf:wpaper:oxcarre-research-paper-131&r=dev |
| By: | Sharon Barnhardt; Erica Field; Rohini Pande |
| Abstract: | A housing lottery in an Indian city provided winning slum dwellers the opportunity to move into improved housing on the city’s periphery. Fourteen years later, relative to lottery losers, winners report improved housing farther from the city center, but no change in family income or human capital. Winners also report increased isolation from family and caste networks and lower access to informal insurance. We observe significant program exit: 34% of winners never moved into the subsidized housing and 32% eventually exited. Our results point to the importance of considering social networks when designing housing programs for the poor. |
| JEL: | C93 H42 O12 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21419&r=dev |
| By: | Tuccio, Michele (University of Southampton); Wahba, Jackline (University of Southampton) |
| Abstract: | Does international return migration transfer gender norms? Focusing on Jordan, an Arab country where discrimination against women and emigration rates are high, this paper exploits unique data in which detailed information on female empowerment allows us to construct several measures of discriminatory social norms in Jordan on the role of women, female freedom of mobility, and female decision-making power. Controlling for both emigration and return migration selections, we find that women with a returnee family member are more likely to have internalized discriminatory gender norms than women in households with no migration experience. Further analysis shows that results are driven by returnees from conservative Arab countries, suggesting a transfer of negative norms from highly discriminatory destinations. We also show the implications of our results beyond perceptions for several economic and development outcomes, such as female labour force participation, education and fertility. |
| Keywords: | international return migration, gender inequality, transfer of norms |
| JEL: | F22 J16 O15 O53 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9216&r=dev |
| By: | Diva Dhar; Tarun Jain; Seema Jayachandran |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the intergenerational transmission of gender attitudes in India, a setting where discrimination against women and girls is severe. We use survey data on gender attitudes (specifically, views about the appropriate roles and rights of women and girls) collected from adolescents attending 314 schools in the state of Haryana, and their parents. We find that when a parent holds a more discriminatory attitude, his or her child is about 15 to 20 percentage points more likely to hold the view. As a benchmark, classmates' average gender attitudes have a similar effect size. We find that mothers influence children's gender attitudes more than fathers do. Parental attitudes also affect their children's aspirations; girls with more discriminatory parents are less likely to want to continue their schooling beyond high school. |
| JEL: | J16 O1 |
| Date: | 2015–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:21429&r=dev |
| By: | Minten, Bart; Dereje, Mekdim; Engeda, Ermias; Tamru, Seneshaw |
| Abstract: | Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS) are rapidly increasing in global value chains. While consumers, mostly in developed countries, are willing to pay significant premiums for such standards, it is not well understood how effectively these incentives are transmitted to producing countries. We study VSS in Ethiopia’s coffee sector, the country’s most important export commodity, using a unique census of transaction data at the export level and large-scale data at the production level. We find that transmission of the export quality premiums to coffee pro-ducers is limited, with only one-third of this premium being passed on. Moreover, as quality premiums are small and average production levels in these settings are low, these premiums would only lead to an increased income for coffee farmers of 20 USD per year even with a perfect transmission scenario, and therefore would have little effect on the welfare of the average coffee farmer. |
| Keywords: | Sustainability, coffee, exports, Commodities, Quality, value chains, high value agricultural products, |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fpr:esspwp:71&r=dev |
| By: | Britta Augsburg (Institute for Fiscal Studies); Paul Rodriguez-Lesmes (Institute for Fiscal Studies) |
| Abstract: | Poor sanitation is an important policy issue facing India, which accounts for over half of the 1.1 billion people worldwide that defecate in the open [JMP, 2012]. Achieving global sanitation targets, and reducing the social and economic costs of open defecation, therefore requires effectively extending sanitation services to India's citizens. The Indian Government has shown strong commitment to improving sanitation. However, uptake and usage of safe sanitation remains low: almost 50% of Indian households do not have access to a private or public latrine (2011 Indian census). This highlights the need for novel approaches to foster the uptake and sustained usage of safe sanitation in this context. This study contributes to addressing this need in two ways: First, we use primary data collected in both rural and urban contexts in two states of India, to understand determinants of toilet ownership and acquisition. A theoretical model is presented accompanying our empirical findings. Second, while ours is not a randomized control trial, we are able to offer a rich picture on the main determinants and potential outcomes of sanitation uptake. Contrary to many studies on sanitation, our focus is not primarily on health outcomes but we emphasize economic and social status considerations. Further, toilet acquisition is analyzed in the context of an intervention that alleviated one of the major constraints to acquisition - financial resources - which allows us to highlight the importance of attending this constraint. These three contributions have important implications for the design of strategies to promote sanitation, a major focus of many governments of developing countries and international organizations at present. |
| Date: | 2015–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ifs:ifsewp:15/15&r=dev |
| By: | Ozier,Owen |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates the impacts of secondary school on human capital, occupational choice, and fertility for young adults in Kenya. The probability of admission to government secondary school rises sharply at a score close to the national mean on a standardized 8th grade examination, permitting the estimation of causal effects of schooling in a regression discontinuity framework. The analysis combines administrative test score data with a recent survey of young adults to estimate these impacts. The results show that secondary schooling increases human capital, as measured by performance on cognitive tests included in the survey. For men, there is a drop in the probability of low-skill self-employment, as well as suggestive evidence of a rise in the probability of formal employment. The opportunity to attend secondary school also reduces teen pregnancy among women. |
| Keywords: | Public Examination System,Education For All,Population Policies,Secondary Education,Tertiary Education |
| Date: | 2015–08–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:7384&r=dev |