Pace, NoemiSebastian, AshwiniDaidone, SilvioCampos, Ana Paula Dela O....
14页
查看更多>>摘要：This paper contributes to the literature on the determinants of rural livelihood diversification and its impact on household welfare in the short and medium term using data from a government-run social protection program in Zimbabwe. First, this study investigates whether cash transfers originally intended to ensure minimum food security in the poorest households can also induce the diversification of their livelihood strategies. Second, since diversification may lead to engagement in both low-return and high-return activities, this paper examines whether diversification resulting from the cash transfer increases household welfare. In the short run, the program causes only a small reduction in engagement in survival-led diversification; in the medium run, the program leads to a large shift from survival-led diversification and specialization in on-farm activities towards opportunity-led diversification. Further heterogeneity analysis shows that the program induces a medium-term change in livelihood strategies in both female-and male-headed households. In both time frames, opportunity-led diversification increases food and non-food consumption.(c) 2022 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
查看更多>>摘要：After a civil war, community support for the reintegration of ex-combatants is crucial for peace-building. Using a crowdfunding campaign to promote trainees' business ideas, we investigate whether university students discriminate against ex-combatants in Colombia. Our results show that there is no discrimination against ex-combatants in terms of donations compared with other trainees, but there is a substantial degree of prejudice and skepticism. This finding suggests that the reintegration of ex-combatants might be affected by the NIMBY phenomena. Although willing to economically support the peace process, individuals are skeptical towards personal encounters with ex-combatants. This suggest that to achieve sustainable peace, policies should focus on decreasing stigmatization towards ex-combatants. (c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
查看更多>>摘要：While the influence of adverse shocks on objective measures of wellbeing has been researched in eco-nomics, little evidence exists on the effects of shocks like natural disasters on subjective wellbeing and aspirations. The paper examines the causal links between an adverse shock, the 2006 Yogyakarta earth-quake in Indonesia, and a range of subjective wellbeing outcomes and aspirations. We combine a house-hold survey panel dataset along with the ground shaking activity (Modified Mercalli Intensity) recorded by the United States Geological Survey. The panel data comprises of self-reported measures on current wellbeing, aspirations about future wellbeing, quality of life, and happiness before and after the earth-quake. The results reveal robust evidence that the disaster led to large and significant reductions in sub-jective wellbeing (including those related to children) and future aspirations. Using a follow-up round of data, we find that such declines in wellbeing persisted years after the disaster, calling into policy action encompassing both material and emotional wellbeing that is crucial for post-disaster revival.(c) 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
查看更多>>摘要：The purpose of this article is to shed light on the implementation of anti-corruption efforts in extractive industries. Through the case study of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI) in Kyrgyzstan, the article aims to capture how the transparency norm is enacted in a development and 'resource cursed' context. Building on the literature on resource governance and anti-corruption and on fieldwork conducted in Kyrgyzstan, this article discusses the implementation of EITI at national and subnational levels, as well as, community discourses and practices around transparent resource governance. It attempts to explain how anti-corruption initiatives function in authoritarian settings and why they fail to deliver the promised outcomes. The study highlights the incongruence between normative claims underlying global anti-corruption standards and actual policy and community practices on the ground. It argues that the implementation and outcomes of global anti-corruption interventions such as the EITI are conditioned by the local domestic context. The article stresses the need for scholars and policymakers to examine how transparency is articulated and implemented at national and subnational levels. (c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
查看更多>>摘要：Climate change is expected to bring higher temperatures, changes to rainfall patterns and in many places increased frequency and severity of extreme weather. Climate change is slated to affect the global food equation both on the supply and demand side as well as local level food systems where small farm communities often depend on local and their own production. As climate change has become more pronounced, the risk to land-based food security faced by many of the world's poor, such as rural communities in Ethiopia and Niger, seems to have become more intense and less predictable. To avoid food insecurity in response to climatic and other stressors, adaptation by small-scale, subsistence farms needs to be accelerated. To effectively intervene to do so, there is a need to understand adaptive behavior in terms of its drivers and its relation with welfare outcomes such as food security. In this paper, we develop a conceptual framework of risk and adaptation, use regression and cluster analysis and the most recent version of the Living Standards Measurement Surveys data for rural areas in Ethiopia and Niger, to advance our understanding. We find that adaptation is associated with lower food insecurity in Ethiopia but not in Niger. Formal education appears as a central element of adaptive capacity and is associated with both adaptive production and income strategies. Female-headed households are much less adapted to a changing climate. Perceived risk based on past hazard experience is crucial for adaptation. Results from the cluster analysis confirm that spatial poverty traps exist. To maintain or enhance welfare in the short term and resilience in the long run in the face of a changing climate, policy makers would do well to focus on micro-regions identified as highly food insecure and build adaptive capacity through, for example, gender inclusive education interventions. (c) 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
查看更多>>摘要：This study provides evidence that links industrial clusters and rural income in China. Based on a pooled cross-sectional dataset composed of rural households from 109,121 and 313 counties in 1995, 2002 and 2007, respectively, as well as a unique density-based index measuring the existence of industrial clusters calculated from firm-level data, we identify the mechanisms by which industrial clusters simultaneously increase rural income and reduce income inequality among rural households in China. Furthermore, we provide systematic evidence that specialization, urbanization and industrialization, measured in standard ways, do not have such effects on rural household income or inequality. Our evidence suggests that in China's context, industrial clusters developed under joint efforts of entrepreneurs and local governments have lessened institutional constraints and provided relatively equal opportunities for rural residents to participate in nonfarm activities. As a result, in those areas, rural household income is increased, and income inequality is reduced. The findings of this study have important policy implications for reducing poverty and inequality, and, smoothing income gaps between socioeconomic groups in economic transitions.(c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
查看更多>>摘要：Recent econometric work suggests that there is a positive link between the development of land rental markets and the migration of workers out of agriculture in the developing world. I investigate this claim using a two-sector model of structural transformation that takes into account the well-known inverse relationship between farm size and farm productivity. The model studies how the allocation of employ-ment between agricultural and non-agricultural activities is affected by the presence of transaction costs in the land rental market, as well as by the initial distribution of land ownership. Theoretically, a reduc-tion in transaction costs induces outmigration from agriculture if agricultural prices are sufficiently flex-ible, while rigid agricultural prices may lead to the reverse phenomenon of immigration in agriculture. Practically, the model predicts that for most of the countries tested, a reduction in transaction costs causes little labor movement between sectors. This is equally true concerning the effect of a land redis-tribution. In spite of this, these reforms are found to increase substantially the production efficiency and welfare of farmers. These results suggest that the main benefit of stimulating land rentals is not in fos-tering structural transformation, but in improving the livelihoods of farmers. (c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
查看更多>>摘要：Deficient taxpayer information is a major impediment for taxation, particularly in developing countries. However, in contrast to the well-established literature on nudging tax compliance, field experimental evidence on low-cost interventions to improve the taxpayer registry is scarce. This paper presents the first evidence on promoting registration in an online tax registry. We randomized outreach communications to over 160 K Brazilian property taxpayers, thereby targeting a tax considered a sleeping giant in Latin America. A simple request to join the registry, embedded in a graphically designed e-mail, substantially increased registration relative to a control treatment. Strikingly, however, adding a lottery reward unintendedly reduced registration in comparison to the simple request. Survey evidence, unavailable in previous studies, points to altered effective motivations to register as an explanation. We highlight one mechanism that can reconcile different results in the literature: rewards may signal voluntariness and lack of enforcement. This is also consistent with the results of our analysis of property tax payments. It suggests that the e-mails increased tax payments of certain taxpayers, but that the lottery treatment lowered payment rates for high-value properties. In sum, nudging may be one element of a successful strategy to improve taxpayer registration. However, while simple low-cost outreach activities improve registration, the use of low-powered incentives can have adverse effects. (c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Voth-Gaeddert, Lee E.Fikru, Mahelet G.Oerther, Daniel B.
13页
查看更多>>摘要：The child stunting rate (low height-for-age) in Guatemala is the sixth worst in the world. Child stunting is correlated both with short and long-term economic costs. While technologies to improve water, sanitation and hygiene (WaSH) are effective at ameliorating child stunting, current household investment in WaSH technologies is constrained (i.e., self-supply). To understand this constraint, data on household spending priorities and barriers to investment in WaSH technologies must be assessed. We utilize primary data from our partner community in Totonicapan, Guatemala to populate a structural equation model and benefit-cost analysis assessing the association between household WaSH technologies and child height-for-age. To test regional variations, we scale-up our approach to examine four additional regions across western Guatemala. The results suggest there is limited monetary gain for households to invest in WaSH technologies. Among the communities and regions where higher returns on investment for households were identified, significant WaSH technologies were cumulatively low cost and simple to obtain and use. We encourage stakeholders supporting a self-supply model to evaluate that incremental improvements in WaSH technologies financed by the household do not impose large costs without sufficient benefits, facilitating healthy WaSH mobility (a household's ability to improve their WaSH technology status).(c) 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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