assets activities and income generation in rural mexico factoring in social and public capital in recent years there has been increasing emphasis in the rural development literature on the multiple income generating activities undertaken by rural households and the importance of assets in determining the capacity to undertake these activities controlling for the endogeneity of activity choice and applying lee s generalisation of amemiya s two step estimator to a simultaneous equation model household returns to assets from multiple activities are explored for the mexico ejido sector to incorporate the multiple variables representing social and public capital into the analysis factor analysis is used the results indicate that the asset position of the household has a significant effect on household participation in income generating activities and returns to those activities furthermore the inclusion of measures of social and public capital into the analysis show that these assets play an important role in income generating activities and that the influence is dependent on the type of social and public capital as well as the particular activity

transforming rural economies migration income generation and inequality in rural mexico abstract we analyse how migration shapes the distribution and sources of rural income using nationally representative panel data from mexico income source gini decompositions provide some support for the migration diffusion hypothesis nevertheless migration s influence on other income sources and household re ranking substantially alter distributional impacts we find significant impacts of migration on non remittance income as well as changes in the effects of non migration activities on inequality over time we conclude that migration is transforming rural economies in ways that go beyond the scope of most past research on migration and inequality

wage labour activities by agricultural households in nicaragua this article considers wage labour activities by agricultural households in nicaragua it analyses the role of 1 comparative advantage as determined by individual and household characteristics and 2 agricultural conditions and market imperfections in shaping wage labour supply an econometric specification is developed which allows for random household specific effects results reveal that non agricultural wage work is largely determined by comparative advantages whereas agricultural wage work is used to deal with a number of agricultural conditions and market imperfections

few opportunities much desperation the dichotomy of non agricultural activities and inequality in western kenya summary using data from western kenya we confirm the existence of a dichotomous non agricultural sector the poverty and inequality implications of the differently motivated diversification strategies only partly correspond to expected patterns while high return activities are indeed confined to richer households low return activities constitute an important income source for households across the entire income distribution finally we examine the wider implications of our findings for rural livelihoods we find that only engagement in high return non agricultural activities is significantly associated with increased agricultural productivity it seems that such high return activities play a key role in triggering cumulative effects of relative livelihood success

fair trade organic coffee rural livelihoods and the agrarian question southern mexican coffee families in transition summary we use a random sample of coffee producing households in southern mexico to compare opportunities associated with government subsidies and migration to the role of fair trade organic coffee in household livelihoods although land and labor returns among fair trade organic coffee growers are higher than for conventional growers differences in yields are more important than price premiums moreover investment in education and labor opportunities outside coffee dominate those in fair trade organic coffee the results highlight the value of an integrated approach to the agrarian question that improves productivity and prices and supports other pathways for improving incomes

rural nonfarm incomes in nicaragua abstract this paper examines nonfarm incomes of rural nicaraguan households using a nationwide survey lsms from 1998 the key findings are as follows a rural nonfarm income rnfi constitutes 41 of rural household incomes b rnfi is much more important than farm wage labor income c rnfi tends to be relatively concentrated geographically and socioeconomically toward the rural areas of the managua zone and the rest of pacific zone which are denser in infrastructure and population and toward the upper income quartile of rural households this concentration implies high entry barriers and capital requirements for rural nonfarm activity that the poor are simply not equipped to overcome equipping the rural poor through training and acquisition of diverse forms of capital to have a chance at the higher return nonfarm jobs would be a major step toward helping them to share the benefits of the rural nonfarm economy d self employment small enterprise income in manufactures is very minor probably due to the ease of obtaining manufactured goods from urban industries and imports wage employment constitutes the bulk of rnfi despite it receiving little attention in development programs and debate e three quarters of rnfi is in the service sector and only one quarter is from manufactures that can be contrasted with the emphasis on small manufactures enterprises in rural development programs and research f education road access as well as access to electricity and water were found to be important to nonfarm incomes

transformation of the rural economy in the philippines 1988 2006 abstract this research explores the changing structure of the rural economy in the philippines from 1988 to 2006 we found that the expansion and upgrade of infrastructure such as electricity and roads and investment in secondary and tertiary education are important factors that induced the economic transformation of the rural economy the importance of higher education as an entry requirement to the nonfarm labor market has declined over time indicating that the rural nonfarm sector has been increasingly providing employment opportunities to the unskilled and the uneducated who form the bulk of the rural poor

the calculation of research benefits with linear and non linear specifications of the demand and supply reply this paper provides a comparison of research benefits for linear and nonlinear constant elasticity nlce specifications of supply and demand with a pivotal supply shift framework the comparison allows for a sensitivity test of results to different values for demand and supply elasticity the main finding is that the values of the gross annual research benefits calculated for the nlce specification are larger than those calculated for the linear specification with price elastic supply but are smaller with price inelastic supply the analysis suggests that the use of an nlce specification and a pivotal shift due to research is usually preferable to use of a linear supply curve with pivotal shift

export taxes versus buffer stocks as optimal export policies under uncertainty abstract optimal state dependent export taxes and costly to store buffer stocks are compared in their welfare implications for an exporter possessing monopoly power in the international trade of a volatile commodity optimal stochastic control is used to derive the optimal buffer stock rules it is shown that if the internal and external fluctuations facing the exporter are large if the storage costs are low and if the price elasticity of export supply is small relative to that of export demand the exporter would gain more from a buffer stock than from a optimal export tax world welfare is always increased by buffer stocks as opposed to tariffs and under some conditions the foreign country might also benefit and hence not retaliate

the political economy of public research investment and commodity policies in agriculture an empirical study the paper tests a political economy theory of simultaneous government decision making on income redistribution through commodity policies and on public research investment in agriculture we use data from 37 countries on agricultural protection and public agricultural research expenditures pari the empirical results are consistent with the political economy hypotheses the analysis suggest that structural changes in the economy have important effects on the political incentives for governments not only to subsidize or tax farmers but also to invest in public agricultural research furthermore the analysis supports the hypotheses that the impact of such structural changes on government decision making on pari is non linear and conditional on other factors regarding the impact of political institutions the results suggest that more democracy neither leads to more distortionary transfers agricultural protection nor to lower investment in public goods pari

wildlife conservation in zambia impacts on rural household welfare summary we investigate the impact of wildlife conservation policies in zambia on household welfare in game management areas gmas which are buffer zones around national parks analysis of data from a nationwide survey of rural households shows that gmas are positively associated with household income and crop damage from wildlife conflicts gains and damages were greatest among households in gmas with greater wildlife diversity with net gains relatively greater for wealthier households households in prime well stocked gmas were more likely to participate in off farm wage and self employment compared to other rural households but they were also more likely to suffer crop losses related to wildlife conflicts the findings suggest that wildlife conservation and tourism development can contribute to pro poor development but may be sustainable only if human wildlife conflicts are minimized or compensated

household income strategies and natural disasters dynamic livelihoods in rural nicaragua this paper assesses the impact of hurricane mitch on livelihood strategies of rural households in nicaragua through destruction or distress sales of productive assets a hurricane or another natural hazard could induce people with relatively remunerative livelihoods to choose more defensive strategies which allow them to survive but at a permanently lower welfare level than before using panel data from before and after hurricane mitch we find that livelihood strategies can be grouped into three welfare categories annual farming and farm employment generate low incomes whereas nonfarm wage employment and livestock farming result in relatively high incomes perennial farming nonfarm self employment and annual cropping with nonfarm employment take an intermediate position high welfare strategies were associated with high levels of capital and the number of people involved was very similar between different years suggesting that households following low welfare strategies were trapped in poverty however many households moved actively between strategies of different welfare levels this indicates that there was no absolute poverty threshold but also that being able to initiate a relatively profitable livelihood strategy was no guarantee that this strategy could be maintained there is no evidence that hurricane mitch affected livelihood strategy transitions livelihood mobility was similar for households inside and outside mitch affected areas

access to water women s work and child outcomes abstractpoor rural women in the developing world spend considerable time collecting water do women living in places where more time is needed for water collection tend to participate less in income earning market based activities do the education outcomes of their children tend to be worse we use micro data for nine developing countries to help address these questions our primary aim is to describe the patterns in the data rather than to infer causality although we do treat the household level access to water as endogenous assuming that community level access is exogenous conditional on a wide range of geographic factors better access to water is not found to be associated with greater off farm paid work but is associated with less unpaid work for women in countries where substantial gender gaps in schooling exist both boys and girls enrollments also tend to be better

nonfarm employment and rural welfare evidence from the himalayas the potential importance of nonfarm employment for the welfare of rural households has long been recognized but whether the nonfarm sector offers prospects for improving the welfare of the rural poor remains a contentious issue we examine distributional and well being effects of nonfarm employment of rural households in the himalayas we account for heterogeneity of nonfarm employment and estimate a system of structural equations to better understand the causal linkages between nonfarm employment and household well being the results confirm that disaggregating nonfarm employment activities matters for understanding the relationship between nonfarm employment and rural welfare while low return nonfarm employment is associated with lower income inequality high return nonfarm activities have a disequalizing effect on the distribution of household incomes we also find that the ability to engage in high return nonfarm activities is associated with higher economic well being poor households on the other hand tend to rely on low return activities that do not contribute to improved well being

the effect of remittances on labour supply in the republic of haiti we examine the labour supply effect of remittances in the republic of haiti the prime international remittances recipient country in the latin american and caribbean lac region relative to its gdp unlike previous empirical literature we address three econometric issues that may bias the estimates we account for endogeneity of the remittances with respect to labour supply for the zero inflated nature of our dependent variable hours of work and for the self selection of the migrant sample our results are in line with previous literature and point to a decline of labour supply in the presence of remittances however contrary to previous findings the labour market response to remittances of female household heads is not as sensitive as male s

trade policies and variability in international grain markets abstract increased instability in international market prices has created new problems for trade participants particularly developing countries however it seems that importing country policies are primarily responsible for market variability in most cases a trade reliant strategy appears more effective than an alternative policy of self sufficiency as long as countries continue to subsidize domestic consumption international market controls appear likely to remain as key components of grain policy in importing countries

are workers close to cities paid higher nonagricultural wages in rural china in the present study we investigate whether workers close to cities are paid higher non agricultural wages than workers in outlying rural areas we find that workers close to urban areas not only benefit from more opportunities to engage in non agricultural activities but also from better paid jobs in addition distance exhibits a strongly nonlinear impact distance always has a negative impact on wages but the effect is more detrimental the closer the village is to the urban center we also find evidence of urban hierarchy effects workers living close to bigger cities are paid higher wages finally we provide evidence on the transmission channels at work

what s so spatial about diversification in nigeria summary many households in developing countries allocate their productive assets among various income generating activities in order to develop a portfolio of income from occupations with different degrees of risk expected returns and seasonal and liquidity constraints the push and pull factors influencing diversification decisions of households are widely discussed in the literature however no study to date has taken into account spatial interdependence of household decisions in spite of various channels of neighborhood effects such as information flow learning from others social networks and agglomeration economies this paper fills in the gap by incorporating spatial dependence in the choice model of diversification using a spatial auto regressive probit model and an advanced bayesian strategy to its estimation empirical analysis is run taking advantage of the nigerian general household survey panel 2010 11 providing gis coordinates for the surveyed households the results imply endogeneity of the neighbors decisions to allocate their productive assets among various occupations and signal the importance of social learning and agglomeration effects favoring the spillover of diversification activities through neighbors networks and local markets the households decisions respond to local environment factors such as weather shocks or infrastructural constraints as shown by the regional differences taking into account spatial interdependence is particularly important in the event of a wide divide of the data available into different zones as for example in case of the nigerian northern region where the states are larger

assets activities and rural income generation evidence from a multicountry analysis summary this paper examines the links between the assets and the economic activities of rural households in developing countries to provide insight into how the promotion of certain key assets particularly education land and infrastructure influences the economic choices of these households nationally representative data from 15 countries which form part of the rural income generating activities riga database are used in the analysis the results indicate that improved land access is linked to agricultural production and thus will lead households to take on average this path for improving household welfare higher levels of education and greater access to infrastructure appear to be most closely linked to non agricultural wage employment

spatial patterns of private sector and public sector non agricultural jobs in rural northeast thailand lohmann c and liefner i spatial patterns of private sector and public sector non agricultural jobs in rural northeast thailand regional studies published evidence from developing countries shows that in rural areas participation in non agricultural wage employment rises with proximity to urban centres while earnings do not this paper explores the reasons for this phenomenon analysing the job characteristics of rural workers in detail the data set consists of 900 jobs the results show that public jobs are over represented in rural remote regions driving up the mean wage of this type of region when considering private sector employment only spatial wage and income differentials do exist showing that workers in remote areas are economically more disadvantaged than workers in peri urban areas

the gains from agricultural research under distorted trade abstract this paper explores the gains from research issue within the framework of a product which is traded with the aid of export subsidies because of the taxpayer burden associated with increased exports it is quite possible for the returns to research to be negative a decline in the rate of protection through a rising world market leads to a linear increase in the gains from research while a rise in the internal support price will cause a non linear and negative response if the supply shift is pivotal and a linear and negative response if it is parallel finally global returns to research will be higher than individual country returns and will always be positive in a free trade environment

agricultural productivity and the sectoral reallocation of labor in rural india abstract how do shocks to agricultural productivity affect the allocation of labor across sectors of the economy to answer this i use data from rural india to show that exogenous increases in agricultural productivity caused by abnormally high levels of precipitation lead to an increase in the labor share of the non agricultural sector i further show that the non tradable sector expands significantly when agricultural output increases this evidence is consistent with increasing agricultural output causing increased demand for local non tradables which in turn increases the non agricultural labor share

toward a u s agricultural export policy for the 1980s in a recent issue of business week a special article on the restructuring of the american economy paid particular attention to the agricultural sector and how it likely would be the prime fuel for inflation in the 1980s the rationale behind this outlook was the projection that international demand for u s agricultural exports would continue to grow rapidly while a combination of slower domestic agricultural productivity growth and sharply increased production costs would temper a contemporaneous increase in output the article concluded by saying that we certainly will need a federal policy on exports and in the next few years there is going to be an intense debate on that p 74 the purpose of this article is to open such a debate on an appropriate u s agricultural export policy for the 1980s for the last decade agricultural exports have comprised on the average roughly 20 of the total value of u s exports agricultural imports on the other hand have sharply and continuously declined in relative importance over the same period from 15 of total u s imports in 1970 to 7 in 1980 the result has been a sharply growing agricultural trade surplus from 1 5 billion in 1970 to 12 6 billion in 1975 to 23 9 billion in 1980 compared to a widening nonagricultural trade deficit always in the red in the last decade and sharply increased in the last five years from 20 7 billion in 1976 to 47 2 billion in 1980 u s agricultural exports are largely concentrated in grains 42 6 of the total agricultural export value in 1979 80 soybeans and products 24 1 and cotton 6 7 while a variety of animal products and tobacco comprise the major part of the remainder u s agricultural imports on the other hand are less concentrated noncompetitive items with u s production like coffee cocoa rubber and bananas make up 41 8 of imports in 1979 80 among the supplementary imports the largest shares are occupied by beef and veal 18 9 of total supplementary imports by value in 1979 80 and sugar 14 9 the remainder being comprised of a wide variety of products of particular importance to trade and the a erican balance of payment position is the growing share of u s agricultural production that is exported table 1 shows proportions of he major agricultural products and the share of t tal u s agricultural production exported from 1965 66 to 1978 79 currently about half of the total agricultural production is exported while a decade ago the proportion was about one third the growing importance of trade for u s agriculture has implications that must be reckoned with in the 1980s

expanding versus greening long term energy and emission transitions in mozambique abstract mozambique is rapidly emerging as one of the leading energy producers in africa we develop a comprehensive scenario analysis to review the energy revolution in mozambique like much of africa mozambique features a competition between development of its vast reserves of renewable energy and fossil fuels we assess the implied energy and emissions transitions as well as the potential impact of a range of sustainable policy options our analysis reveals an emerging energy dichotomy where a spectacular expansion of energy production goes together with an only gradual energy consumption transition we find that over time the share of modern renewable energy sources tends to marginalize in the energy production mix while remaining stable in the energy consumption mix about one third of the ghg emissions associated with energy production can be linked to energy export also we find that sustainable energy policies at the supply side lead to far higher cumulative emission reductions than demand side policies finally we show that even in the long run a complete ban on thermal electricity generation capacity in mozambique would by no means lead to shortages in the domestic electricity market but only slightly limit potential electricity export

using evidence of household income diversification to inform study of the rural nonfarm labor market in africa abstract the labor market literature in developing countries has seldom drawn on the studies of rural household income diversification this paper draws on such studies to inform future study of the rural nonfarm labor market in africa the review of evidence provides some surprising departures from traditional images of nonfarm activities of rural households among the most striking is the dominant importance in the majority of case study areas of nonfarm wage labor as compared to self employment of nonfarm sector earnings as compared to farm sector wage earnings and of local nonfarm earnings as compared to migration earnings the most worrying finding was the poor distribution of nonfarm earnings in rural areas despite the importance of these earnings to food security and farm investments this poor distribution implies significant entry barriers and market segmentation it is probable that this will lead over time to an increasingly skewed distribution of land and other assets in rural africa

unpacking the meaning of market access evidence from rural kenya summary this paper critically examines the dimensions of market access using farm panel survey data from kenya we investigate changes in ten indicators of market access during the 1997 2010 post liberalization period we find major improvements in certain market access conditions and little change in others there is generally low correlation between alternative indicators of market access all purpose indicators may not accurately reflect specific market access conditions of interest distances to physical infrastructure are often not representative of farmers access to markets changes in specific market access conditions may have more to do with the behaviors of marketing agents we consider the implications of these findings for agricultural marketing policies and for research methods

gender and rural non farm entrepreneurship despite their increasing prominence in policy debates little is known about gender inequities in non agricultural labor market outcomes in rural areas using matched household enterprise community data sets from bangladesh ethiopia indonesia and sri lanka this paper documents and analyzes gender differences in the individual portfolio choice and productivity of non farm entrepreneurship except for ethiopia women are less likely than men to become nonfarm entrepreneurs women s nonfarm entrepreneurship isn t strongly correlated with household composition or educational attainment but is especially prevalent amongst women who are the head of their household female led firms are much smaller and less productive on average though gender differences in productivity vary dramatically across countries mean differences in log output per worker suggest that male firms are roughly 10 times as productive as female firms in bangladesh three times as those in ethiopia and twice as those in sri lanka by contrast no significant differences in labor productivity were detected in indonesia differences in output per worker are overwhelmingly accounted for by sorting by sector and size they can t be explained by differences in capital intensity human capital or the local investment climate nor by increasing returns to scale

distributional welfare implications of an irrigation water subsidy the distributional welfare implications of a subsidy for irrigation water for california rice producers are analyzed a more general equilibrium approach than that used in previous studies is taken in order to determine the effects of subsidy on consumers subsidized producers and unsubsidized producers the two important policy conclusions of the results are that unsubsidized producers bear part of the cost of a subsidy through lower prices and that consumers taxpayers may gain by sponsoring increased production through a selective subsidy

weather shocks coping strategies and consumption dynamics in rural ethiopia summary rural households adopt a broad range of strategies to cope with adverse weather shocks previous studies have examined the effectiveness of individual coping strategies in mitigating the impact of adverse weather shocks but no study to date has presented a comprehensive evaluation of alternative coping strategies we employ household panel data spanning 15 years to estimate the impact of weather shocks on consumption and poverty dynamics in rural ethiopia along with the effectiveness of household coping strategies in alleviating the impact of shocks we find that rainfall increases are positively associated with per adult equivalent consumption while high temperatures are negatively associated with consumption in terms of household coping strategies formal social safety net transfers mitigate the impact of adverse rainfall shocks on consumption and off farm employment mitigates the impact of high temperature shocks simulations suggest that rainfall shocks and formal social safety net transfers significantly influence household poverty dynamics by contrast high temperature shocks and off farm employment have less impact on poverty dynamics the results highlight the need for social protection programs that support existing household coping strategies and that can rapidly respond to weather shocks

the determinants of nonfarm activities and incomes of rural households in mexico with emphasis on education abstract this paper presents the main results of a study of the effects of education as well as other household assets on the choice of activities and incomes of rural mexican households our study examines the various income sources as well as the education of the household s head and its members implications are drawn for rural education and development policies to promote rural nonfarm incomes and employment

reflections on agricultural r d productivity and the data constraint unfinished business unsettled issues sixty years ago t w schultz introduced the idea of the productivity residual to agricultural economics 1956 schultz s main message was that growth in conventional inputs accounted for little of the observed growth in agricultural output and that there was work to be done by agricultural economists to understand and ultimately eliminate this unexplained residual called productivity thus was launched the economics of agricultural productivity as a sub field within agricultural economics along with the economics of agricultural r d and innovation and related government policy much progress has been made in the decades since still critical issues remain unresolved this matters because agricultural innovation and productivity matter and so do the related policies that rest to some extent on our established understanding of the economic relationships in this paper i review some unsettled issues related to economic models and measures applied to agricultural r d and productivity and some unfinished business in terms of economic and policy questions that are not yet well answered before doing that i present some evidence on agricultural productivity and why it matters next with a nod to factology i present available productivity measures from the u s department of agriculture usda and international science and technology practice and policy instepp center and compare them in the context of translog cost function models in subsequent sections i use these and other data to develop new evidence related to two contentious questions a do farmers benefit from public agricultural r d b has u s agricultural productivity growth slowed in recent decades the answers are revealed within

influence of spillovers to australia on impacts of the international center for agricultural research in the dry areas abstract there is growing evidence of spillover effects to developed countries from the plant genetic improvement work of international agricultural research centers iarcs that nevertheless benefit the targeted developing countries this paper examines the modes in which such spillover effects from iarcs to developed countries have an impact on the overall benefits from the iarc system a case study of production spillovers in australia from icarda s work indicates a shift of benefits for the rest of the world from producers to consumers with overall benefits to the rest of the world marginally higher in the presence of spillovers these findings suggest spillovers to developed countries can enhance the impacts of the iarcs on developing countries though they can affect the distribution of benefits received

econometric estimation of a global spillover matrix for wheat varietal technology abstract an econometric approach using international and national yield trial data is employed to estimate a spillover matrix for wheat varietal technology the global spillover matrix is estimated based on international yield trial data from 1979 1980 to 1987 1988 that include 195 international trial locations and 209 wheat varieties the locations were classified across countries using the cimmyt s wheat megaenvironment system and varieties were classified by both their environmental and institutional origin the model gave good explanatory power and confirmed the location specificity hypothesis at least for the varieties developed by national programs nars the spillover matrix shows that nars varieties developed in the home environment generally perform better on average than varieties developed in other megaenvironments also the matrix is not symmetric cimmyt varieties perform better on average in irrigated and high rainfall environments than nars varieties developed for these environments the yield advantage of cimmyt varieties in many test megaenvironments indicates the potential of cimmyt varieties to spill over to these test megaenvironments results also indicate that national programs are efficient in selecting from among imported technologies analysis of international data is complemented by the analysis of country level data for pakistan and kenya that confirms the above results the country level analysis however indicates that cimmyt germplasm does not do so well in some sub environments such as the irrigated short duration environment the results of the spillover matrix have implications for the design of crop breeding programs both at the national and international levels information provided by the spillover matrix can be utilized by national programs to deploy their resources more efficiently by following a mixed strategy of direct importation of technology in some environments and local development of technologies in other environments which are unique to the country

welfare implications of commodity price stabilization under export restrictions abstract this article analyzes in a two country framework the welfare implications of domestic and international price stabilization under alternative fixed value export restriction devices designed to exercise market power ad valorem export tax quota and fixed price to exporter the effects of domestic price stabilization on welfare and its distribution between countries and between groups within a country are shown to differ from those under continuous optimal adjustments the distribution of gains and losses from both domestic and international price stabilization generally depends on the source of instability but results may differ according to the instrument used to restrict export

techno economic and environmental analysis of power generation expansion plan of ghana this paper examines the current electrical generation expansion plan of ghana and compares it with proposed expansion pathways with higher penetration of renewable energy technologies an adaptation of schwartz s scenario methodology was used to develop the scenarios which were then analysed using the long range alternatives planning leap model each of the scenarios represents policy options for generation expansion in ghana up to 2040 energy economic and environmental analysis of the three alternative scenarios compared to the base scenarios was undertaken sensitivity results show that if the country were to follow the generation expansion path described in the renewable energy scenarios it could reap economic benefits of 0 5 13 23 depending on the developments in fuel prices and renewable technology capital cost the analysis further quantifies benefits to be derived from a reduction in greenhouse gases of the scenarios policy implications for the generation system of ghana based on the results are also discussed

income strategies among rural households in mexico the role of off farm activities abstract off farm activities generate on average more than half of farm households incomes in the mexican ejido sector participation in these activities helps reduce poverty and contributes to greater equality in the distribution of income this paper analyzes the determinants of access to off farm sources of income across households we find that education plays a major role in accessing better remunerated nonagricultural employment adults of indigenous ethnic origin suffer from an educational lag and have less access to off farm nonagricultural employment than non indigenous adults at identical educational levels the regional availability of off farm employment strongly affects participation in addition women are differentially limited by distance to urban centers in their ability to gain off farm employment

jobs off the farm wealth human capital and social group in rural eastern india abstractthis study examines the effects of wealth human capital and social group on the occupational choice and income of farm households to gain an understanding of the mechanism underlying the

the calculation of returns to research in distorted markets reply abstract most of the emperical literature calculating rates of return to publicly sponsored research assumes that research is the only relevant government intervention for most countries this assumption is untenable this paper shows that improperly measuring government inducedmarket distortions can severely bias research rate of return calculations if the interaction between successful research and other government interventions increases the cost of the other interventions then neglecting market distortions unambigously increases the calculated rate of return three examples of government induced distortions show that the magnitude of the upward bias in calculated rates of return can be extremely large in some cases more than 100 percentage points a normative implication is that governments should account for interactions between research and price interventions when determining research support levels a positive implication is that existing government research funding patterns are more readily explainable as reasonable behavior by a government that accounts for these interactions

the politics of underinvestment in agricultural research this paper develops a political economy framework that determines the factors causing underinvestment in public research expenditures governments are unable to fully compensate for unequal income distribution effects of research because of either their inability to make credible commitments or ofdeadweight costs associated with compensation

the long term forecast of taiwan s energy supply and demand leap model application abstract the long term forecasting of energy supply and demand is an extremely important topic of fundamental research in taiwan due to taiwan s lack of natural resources dependence on energy imports and the nation s pursuit of sustainable development in this article we provide an overview of energy supply and demand in taiwan and a summary of the historical evolution and current status of its energy policies as background to a description of the preparation and application of a long range energy alternatives planning system leap model of taiwan s energy sector the taiwan leap model is used to compare future energy demand and supply patterns as well as greenhouse gas emissions for several alternative scenarios of energy policy and energy sector evolution results of scenarios featuring business as usual policies aggressive energy efficiency improvement policies and on schedule retirement of taiwan s three existing nuclear plants are provided and compared along with sensitivity cases exploring the impacts of lower economic growth assumptions a concluding section provides an interpretation of the implications of model results for future energy and climate policies in taiwan

price and yield effects of spill overs in international agricultural research evidence from icrisat and australia international agricultural research aimed at improving productivity in developing countries also has spill over effects on developed countries research that affects the supply of commodities is also likely to affect the world price of tradeable commodities in this paper the effects of spill overs to australia from successful cost reducing research into sorghum and chickpeas at the international crops research institute for the semi arid tropics icrisat aimed at developing countries are assessed genetic materials developed and distributed through icrisat are used in australia to increase productivity the price reducing effects of successful research are incorporated into the analysis of spill over impacts on productivity the net effects on welfare for producers and consumers of sorghum and chickpeas in australia and the rest of the world row are identified the consequences of the impacts are discussed and the implications for further funding of international agricultural research are also discussed

employment dynamics in the rural nonfarm sector in ethiopia do the poor have time on their side abstract we study rural employment transitions in ethiopia between farming and both low and high return nonfarm employment we find that initial asset holdings and access to saving and credit are important factors for transition into high return rural nonfarm employment and that households participation in high return rural nonfarm activities is robust to their experience of health shocks however shocks that affect their wealth or liquidity may trigger descents into low return nonfarm employment on the other hand shocks that reduce agricultural income motivate transitions into high return rural nonfarm employment

entrepreneurship selection and performance a meta analysis of the impact of education in developing economies this meta analytical review of empirical studies of the impact of schooling on entrepreneurship in selection and performance in developing economies looks at variations impact across specific characteristics of the studies a marginal year of schooling in developing economies raises enterprise income by an average of 5 5 percent which is close to the average return in industrial countries the return varies however by gender rural or urban residence and the share of agriculture in the economy furthermore more educated workers typically end up in wage employment and prefer nonfarm entrepreneurship to farming the education effect that separates workers into self employment and wage employment is stronger for women possibly stronger in urban areas and also stronger in the least developed economies where agriculture is more dominant and literacy rates are lower

the dismantling of conasupo a mexican state trader in agriculture in the 1990s mexico gradually dismantled and ultimately liquidated conasupo its state enterprise in agriculture conasupo was a typical less developed country ldc parastatal exacting control over an important component of mexico s food chain this paper examines the demise of conasupo in the context of domestic economic reforms and trade liberalisation it documents the process by which conasupo was eleminated the political environment that made this possible and the implications for agricultural production and trade the paper concludes by distilling lessons from mexico s experience for other ldcs as the liberalisation of domestic and international markets continues to unfold

determinants and impacts of rural land market activity evidence from nicaragua summary use of data from nicaragua to examine the performance of land rental and sales markets during 1995 98 which coincide with the implementation of major macroeconomic and sectoral reforms leads to three main conclusions first even though the data point toward an inverse farm size productivity relationship and large differences in land productivity between large and small producers land markets have not led to an equalization of returns among the groups considered second both in 1995 and in 1998 land sales markets have contributed to land concentration suggesting that credit market imperfections impeded demand in land sales markets third the policy reforms undertaken after 1995 have led to a structural shift in the performance of the land rental market instead of transferring land to large owners as it did in 1995 the land market now moves land from large to small producers the quantities involved however remain limited we conclude that if it is to contribute to equity and efficiency liberalization of land sales markets has to be complemented by measures to reduce the attractiveness of speculative land accumulation furthermore measures to reduce the transaction costs of land rental e g titling and to increase effective demand from small producers e g technical assistance and credit will be needed 2003 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

does the nonfarm economy offer pathways for upward mobility evidence from a panel data study in ethiopia summary empirical studies across many developing countries routinely document a positive correlation between participation in rural nonfarm employment and households wealth or income this paper explores whether nonfarm employment leads to higher consumption expenditure growth in ethiopia we find that 1 households consumption expenditure growth is positively correlated with the initial share of nonfarm income 2 the growth elasticity of nonfarm income share is higher for wealthier households and 3 the main source of growth for nonfarm participants comes from the higher rates of return participants enjoy on their human and physical capital

rural nonfarm employment and incomes in the himalayas abstract nonfarm activities generate on average about 60 of rural households incomes in the himalayas this article analyzes the determinants of participation in nonfarm activities and of nonfarm incomes across rural households a unique data set collected in the himalayan region of india allows us to deal with the heterogeneity of rural nonfarm activities by using aggregations into categories that are useful both analytically and for policy purposes we conduct an empirical inquiry that reveals that education plays a major role in accessing more remunerative nonfarm employment other household assets and characteristics such as land social status and geographical location also play a role

motives for private transfers over the life cycle an analytical framework and evidence for peru abstract this paper tests for the motives for private income transfers we consider two motives altruism and exchange the question of private transfer motives is important because such motivation can influence the effects of public income transfers on the distribution of income using a household survey for peru we find that transfer amounts received increase with recipient pre transfer income which contradicts a key prediction of the strong form of the altruism hypothesis but is consistent with exchange we also find that capital market imperfections are likely to be an important cause of private transfers and that social security benefits crowd out the incidence of private transfers

off farm work decisions of farm couples and land transfer choices in rural china although previous studies have widely examined the association between off farm work participation and land use behaviours of rural households little attention has been paid to the effects of the

land property rights and international migration evidence from mexico abstract in this paper i ask whether there is a relationship between land property rights and international migration in order to identify the impact of property rights i consider a country wide land certification program that took place in mexico in the 1990s my identification strategy exploits the staggered implementation and the households eligibility for the program i find that the program increased the eligible households likelihood of having one or more members abroad by 12 in terms of the number of migrants my coefficient estimates explain 26 of the 1994 1997 increase in migrants from ejido areas and 13 15 of the increase from all of mexico consistent with our theoretical model the impact is strongest for households without a land will this implies that land inheritance issues drive at least part of the effect

the gains from research into tradable commodities this paper develops a model for assessing the aggregate level and distribution of the benefits of reseach into tradable commodities it estimates gains to australia and to the rest of the world from research into the wool and wheat industries

conditional transfers labor supply and poverty microsimulating oportunidades this article summarizes a microsimulation exercise for the mexican human development program oportunidades and presents a series of simulations of its actual and potential impact upon poverty at the national urban and rural levels the microsimulation tool used for this paper makes accounting and behavioral exercises and aims to answer three main questions what would have happened to poverty if the program had been cancelled if benefits were doubled or if urban beneficiaries were doubled we conclude that oportunidades can be associated with up to a third of the reduction in rural poverty in mexico by the year 2002 doubling benefits and targeting urban beneficiaries would reduce poverty a further 30 percent from its 2002 level we also find that each percentage point of poverty reduction at the rural level costs around 326 million pesos per month in cash transfers that is 1 2 percent of the central government s total spending in 2002 further reductions of poverty would have higher or lower average costs depending on the area and on whether they are performed either by extensions in coverage or by enlargement of benefits finally behavioral simulations suggest that labor supply does not seem to be much affected by current cash transfers from oportunidades

influence of trade policies on price integration in the world beef market abstract the article develops three hypotheses about how policy interventions in major trading nations influence price integration in the world beef market simple correlation coefficients tests for significant differences between coefficients and granger causality tests are used to test the hypotheses first segmentation between prices in foot and mouth disease fmd free and fmd endemic countries is found but it is much less than previously assumed second european community policies that closed the e c import market have isolated prices in the e c from other markets these policies also led to greater integration among prices in fmd free and fmd endemic market segments by forcing exporters from both segments to compete directly in new import markets third the u s a is found to be the price leader in world beef markets due not only to market size but also to u s policies that allow transmission of price information from the u s market to the world market but not vice versa

rural nonfarm employment and incomes in chile abstract this article analyzes the evolution of rural nonfarm employment rnfe and income in chile during 1990 96 the data used come from the national socioeconomic survey casen and from a household survey undertaken by the authors in two municipalities in 1999 the latter contrasted two zones very different in terms of economic dynamism and rural poverty we show that during the period rnfe and incomes increased 10 and 18 respectively in 1996 reaching 39 of rural employment and 41 of rural incomes the rate of multiactivity the share of households participating in more than one sector was only 20 lower than expected indicating a tendency toward economic specialization in rural income strategies the determinants of such employment are mainly household characteristics in particular variables related to human capital such as the age and gender of the household head and the schooling of the household members although also important are access to credit and physical capital the level of nonfarm income of rural households is determined mainly by the economic context in particular the economic level and dynamism of the overall zone and the quality of the roads it is proposed that policies to develop rnfe should be geared to zone characteristics and should in general favor investments in education in roads and in access to credit moreover households headed by women should be the object of special attention to promote such policies it will be necessary to address important gaps and weaknesses in the public institutional structure

non farm activity household expenditure and poverty reduction in rural vietnam 2002 2008 summary diversifying into non farm activities has been suggested as an effective way out of poverty for rural households in developing countries using the vietnamese household living standards surveys of 2002 2004 2006 and 2008 we test this claim and investigate the effect of non farm sector involvement on poverty and expenditure growth our endogeneity corrected estimates show that an additional household member involved with non farm activity reduces the probability of poverty by 7 12 and increases the household expenditure by 14 over a two year period our findings also indicate that non farm involvement reduces the hours worked on farm but not the household agricultural income

introducing mozleap an integrated long run scenario model of the emerging energy sector of mozambique since recently mozambique is actively developing its large reserves of coal natural gas and hydropower against this background we present the first integrated long run scenario model of the mozambican energy sector our model which we name mozleap is calibrated on the basis of recently developed local energy statistics demographic and urbanization trends as well as cross country based gdp elasticities for biomass consumption sector structure vehicle ownership and energy intensity we develop four scenarios to evaluate the impact of the anticipated surge in natural resources exploration on aggregate trends in energy supply and demand the energy infrastructure and economic growth in mozambique our analysis shows that until 2030 primary energy production is likely to increase at least six fold and probably much more this is roughly 10 times the expected increase in energy demand most of the increase in energy production is destined for export as a result mozambique may well become one of the leading global producers of natural gas and coal we discuss the opportunities and challenges that this resource wealth poses for the country

the calculation of returns to research in distorted markets comment abstract in a recent article oehmke reported that a high internal rate of return for investment in research when the interaction between research and price policy costs was disregarded could become very low or even negative when the effects of research on the costs of price policy were considered in this paper the social returns from research in the presence of the price policies considered by oehmke are reexamined using a simple geometric approach the analysis suggests that an output subsidy in a small importing economy an output subsidy in a closed economy and a target price in a large exporting economy will on oehmke s assumptions cause only small reductions in the internal rate of return from investment in research this implies that the apparent underinvestment by governments in agricultural research cannot be explained away by a large upward bias known to governments in measured rates of return due to failure to account for interactions between research and the costs of price policy measures

fishing and nonfishing income decisions the role of human capital and family structure resource dependent households often diversify their income we model demand for remittances and supply of off resource labor as a joint decision and discuss household trade offs we extend the off farm labor supply literature to a rural fishery contrasting our results to common findings in the farm literature and providing empirical evidence of the interdependence between education and family structure in determining income diversification using a unique dataset from malaysia we find that more educated households are less likely to diversify their income with caveats depending on family composition policy implications for resource management in a remittance economy with alternative livelihoods are discussed

determinants of off farm work and its effects on farm performance the case of norwegian grain farmers limited attention has been given in the literature to the impact of off farm work on farm performance more knowledge about the determinants of part time farming and its effects on farm performance could help policymakers to introduce better targeted rural development policies the aim in this article is to fill part of the above mentioned gaps by analyzing factors that influence the choices of off farm work by either the farmer alone or jointly by both the farmer and partner and simultaneously examining how off farm work influences farm performance these analyses were based on an unbalanced panel data set from norwegian grain farms during 1991 to 2005 among the determinants of off farm work hours we found that in addition to demographic time trend and some regional effects there was a significant negative effect of farm output on farmers off farm work hours the production function results revealed that off farm work had a positive effect on farm output at first increasing but then decreasing with increase in hours spent in off farm work furthermore our analysis revealed no systematic effect of off farm work on farm technical efficiency

the incidence of benefits from u s soybean productivity gains in a context of world trade a new procedure for measuring the k shift in the supply function from new technology is introduced this procedure is used to show that u s soybean total factor productivity increased by 1 6 per year between 1974 and 1983 brazilian and argentine soybean productivity increased 2 4 per year during this period total economic surplus in the u s and the rest of the world increased between 1 7 and 3 2 billion of this total u s resource owners received between 1 3 and 1 5 billion and u s consumers received between a 0 1 and 0 2 billion increase in income from increased soybean productivity

rural nonfarm employment and incomes in latin america overview and policy implications abstract rural nonfarm employment rnfe and incomes rnfi are crucial to latin american rural households the 11 rural household income studies in this volume reviewed in this paper use 1990s data and show that rnfi averages 40 of rural incomes rnfi and rnfe have grown quickly over the past three decades the review of evidence provided some surprising departures from traditional images of nonfarm activities of latin american rural households in terms of shares of rural incomes 1 nonfarm wage incomes exceed self employment incomes 2 rnfi far exceeds farm wage incomes 3 local rnfi far exceeds migration incomes 4 service sector rnfi far exceeds manufactures rnfi these findings suggest the need for more development program attention to wage employment in the service sector versus the traditional focus on small enterprise manufactures moreover poor households and zones tend to have higher shares in their incomes but lower absolute levels of rnfi as compared to richer households and zones the rnfe of the poor tend to be the low paid nonfarm equivalent of semi subsistence farming raising the capacity of the poor to participate in the better paid types of rnfe is crucial via employment skills training education infrastructure credit finally rnfe has grown fastest and been most poverty alleviating where there are dynamic growth motors in particular in the agricultural sector but also in tourism links to urban areas mining and forestry this means that developing rnf jobs cannot be done at the expense of programs promoting agricultural development

diffusion and spillover of new technology a heterogeneous agent model for cassava in west africa understanding what determines the geographic spread of innovations can help guide the funding and implementation of research and extension programs our approach uses household survey data as model parameters to simulate behavior across the entire surveyed population and avoid the aggregation bias associated with representative farm models such a heterogeneous agent approach allows us to infer the distribution of a technology s impacts across one set of households and predict the potential for spreading to another set that shares similar characteristics with respect to natural resource endowments and farming systems we apply the technique to new cassava varieties in west africa finding a strongly poverty alleviating impact with substantial spillover potential from nigeria to neighboring countries

impact of off farm labor supply on food expenditures of the farm household abstract farm households diversify their income sources by working off the farm this is a risk management strategy that is used by farm households in both developed and developing countries income diversification via off farm work is associated with higher incomes and food consumption however little is known about the association between off farm work and farm household food expenditures in an effort to bridge this gap this study attempts to assess the impact of off farm work decisions by the operator and or the spouse on the food expenditures of the farm household using a nationwide farm household survey in the united states and new econometric method we find that the decisions of the operator and or the spouse to work off the farm are significantly interrelated 29 however these two decisions affect food expenditures in different ways the operator s off farm work decision is positively related to food expenditures while the spouse s decision is negatively associated with expenditures on food by the farm household

welfare implications of price stabilization with monopolistic trade the welfare effects of domestic and international price stabilization are examined and then compared employing a two country model where one country exercises market power through continuous optimal trade restriction while the other behaves competitively the two types of stabilization have quite different implications on the distribution of welfare between and within countries the country exercising market power gains from domestic price stabilization regardless of the source of instability but the government and private producers and consumers are affected differently the country facing trade restriction can exercise some countervailing power by stabilizing international price fluctuations resulting from internal disturbances early studies of the welfare effects of price stabilization have adopted a perfectly competitive framework massell 1969 demonstrated that while price stabilization increases welfare to society its effects on individual groups depend crucially on the source of instability consumers producers gain from price stabilization if price fluctuations arise from

the rural non farm economy prospects for growth and poverty reduction summary policy makers have high expectations for the rural non farm economy rnfe given high income shares growing employment and frequently low capital requirements they see the rnfe as a potential pathway out of poverty for their rural poor yet available evidence suggests that pro poor rural non farm growth does not occur automatically for the poor to benefit from rural non farm growth policy makers must stimulate buoyant rural economies with robust non farm income growth not simply low productivity employment moreover the poor must gain access to growing market niches fluid labor markets provide one important bridge linking the rural poor to growing non farm opportunities

the impact of migration on rural poverty and inequality a case study in china large numbers of agricultural labor moved from the countryside to cities after the economic reforms in china migration and remittances play an important role in transforming the structure of rural household income this article examines the impact of rural to urban migration on rural poverty and inequality in a mountainous area of hubei province using the data of a 2002 household survey since migration income is a potential substitute for farm income we present counterfactual scenarios of what rural income poverty and inequality would have been in the absence of migration our results show that by providing alternatives to households with lower marginal labor productivity in agriculture migration leads to an increase in rural income in contrast to many studies that suggest that the increasing share of nonfarm income in total income widens inequality this article offers support for the hypothesis that migration tends to have egalitarian effects on rural income for three reasons 1 migration is rational self selection farmers with higher expected return in agricultural activities and or in local nonfarm activities choose to remain in the countryside while those with higher expected return in urban nonfarm sectors migrate 2 households facing binding constraints of land supply are more likely to migrate 3 poorer households benefit disproportionately from migration

energy models for demand forecasting a review abstract energy is vital for sustainable development of any nation be it social economic or environment in the past decade energy consumption has increased exponentially globally energy management is crucial for the future economic prosperity and environmental security energy is linked to industrial production agricultural output health access to water population education quality of life etc energy demand management is required for proper allocation of the available resources during the last decade several new techniques are being used for energy demand management to accurately predict the future energy needs in this paper an attempt is made to review the various energy demand forecasting models traditional methods such as time series regression econometric arima as well as soft computing techniques such as fuzzy logic genetic algorithm and neural networks are being extensively used for demand side management support vector regression ant colony and particle swarm optimization are new techniques being adopted for energy demand forecasting bottom up models such as markal and leap are also being used at the national and regional level for energy demand management

pull and push individual farming in hungary this paper is motivated by the fact that part time individual farming is commonly observed among rural households in a number of transition economies but it is not clear prima facie if such resource allocation is optimal a conceptual model of household labor allocation between individual farming and off farm wage employment is developed the model explicitly accounts for the role of household endowments in labor allocation as the analysis is conditioned on the status of factor markets the hypotheses are empirically tested using 1998 data from a country representative survey of rural households in hungary an advanced transition country which only recently became eu member state results provide evidence that capital market imperfections still remain implications for the policies related to agricultural sector restructuring employment and rural development are discussed

resource use and technological progress in agriculture a dynamic general equilibrium analysis we analyze the global effects of economic and population growth and the impact of a slowdown in agricultural total factor productivity tfp on agriculture and forest resources using a dynamic multi region computable general equilibrium model with land use and cover detail given the current consensus about the growth of the world economy our results suggest that food security will not be threatened and agricultural activities will not encroach on forest resources over the next decade a slowdown in agricultural tfp growth might lead to higher crop prices in all regions with south east asia facing the steepest increases a slowdown in agricultural tfp growth also might be accompanied by higher conversion rates of forestland to farmland as well as by greater environmental or ecological damages on the remaining forestland

the sloping land conversion program in china effect on the livelihood diversification of rural households summary through addressing the motivations behind rural households livelihood diversification this paper examines the effect of the sloping land conversion program slcp on livelihood diversification using a longitudinal household survey data set spanning the overall implementation of the slcp our results show that the slcp works as a valid external policy intervention to increase rural livelihood diversification in addition the findings demonstrate that the implementation of the slcp has had heterogeneous effects on livelihood diversification across different rural income groups the lower income group was more affected by the program in terms of income diversification

electricity demand and supply scenarios for maharashtra india for 2030 an application of long range energy alternatives planning abstract forecasting of electricity demand has assumed a lot of importance to provide sustainable solutions to the electricity problems leap has been used to forecast electricity demand for the target year 2030 for the state of maharashtra india holt s exponential smoothing method has been used to arrive at suitable growth rates probable projections have been generated using uniform gross domestic product gdp growth rate and different values of elasticity of demands three scenarios have been generated which include business as usual bau energy conservation ec and renewable energy ren subsequent analysis on the basis of energy environmental influence and cost has been done in the target year 2030 the projected electricity demand for bau and ren has increased by 107 3 per cent over the base year 2012 and ec electricity demand has grown by 54 3 per cent the estimated values of green house gas ghg for bau and ec in the year 2030 are 245 2 per cent and 152 4 per cent more than the base year and for ren it is 46 2 per cent less sensitivity analysis has been performed to study the effect on the total cost of scenarios policy implications in view of the results obtained are also discussed

energy policy for low carbon development in nigeria a leap model application this paper applied a scenario based analysis to explore nigeria s future energy demand supply and associated ghg emissions from 2010 to 2040 using the long range energy alternative planning leap model the impact of different energy policies are analysed for the nigerian energy system by considering four scenarios the reference scenario ref the low carbon moderate scenario lcm the low carbon advanced scenario lca and the green optimistic scenario go by considering aggressive energy policies and strategies from lcm to lca and even more aggressive options in the go scenario we find that under the ref scenario energy demand is expected to reach 3 075 pj and a corresponding increase in ghg emissions of 201 2 mt co2e by 2040 more aggressive policy intervention by the nigerian government as in the go scenario would lead to a decrease in energy demand 2 249 pj and ghg emissions 124 4 mt co2e in 2040 a cost benefit and energy system analysis were also carried out in the study

market interventions international price stabilization and welfare implications the welfare effects of price stabilization are quantified under free trade and under distortionary policies when an exporting country protects domestic producers with price supports an importing country pursues a price fixing policy and a second importing country follows a free trade policy results show that distortionary interventions cause greater world price variability world gains from international price stabilization through a costless buffer stock scheme are higher under distortionary trade than under free trade

decent rural employment and farm production efficiency empirical evidence from tanzania and ethiopia promoting decent rural employment by creating new jobs in rural areas and upgrading the existing ones could be one of the most efficient pathways to reduce rural poverty this article systematically investigates the impact of decent rural employment on agricultural production efficiency in ethiopia and tanzania the analysis applies an output oriented distance function approach with an estimation procedure that accounts for different technological demographic socioeconomic institutional and decent rural employment indicators data of the 2011 round of living standards measurement study integrated surveys on agriculture for the two countries are used and a set of indicators is derived to proxy core dimensions of decent rural employment the findings of our analysis show that decent rural employment contributes to agricultural production efficiency

in the eye of the storm the welfare impacts of a hurricane summary the impact of a large covariant shock namely hurricane mitch is examined in the context of household asset holdings in rural nicaragua utilizing household panel data from the period it is found that the hurricane did not have an adverse impact on the ownership of productive assets among the affected households on average on the other hand nonproductive asset holdings seem to have been significantly reduced a further examination confirms that the shock affected the poorest households disproportionally especially in terms of nonproductive assets finally this study presents strong suggestive evidence of a geographical poverty trap within the shock affected areas of the country

potential benefits of agricultural research and extension in peru the benefits of agricultural research and extension are examined in an ex ante consumer producer surplus framework for five commodities in peru the effects of demand shifts over time and government pricing policies on research and extension benefits are considered data for the analysis include the results of research and extension questionnaires administered at seven sites in peru the projected rates of return to research and extension indicate substantial returns to public investments

is environmental income reporting evasive in household surveys evidence from rural poor in laos abstract literature has consistently reiterated that the self employed non poor underreport their business income to tax authorities and in household surveys in this work we measure the extent to which poor households engaging in illegal environmental activities underreport income in laos we use a two year panel data and apply the engel curve to detect and estimate the reporting gap we further use a switching probit regression to identify the factors of income underreporting and its impact on income poverty outcomes results show that on an average rural households who earn at least a quarter of their income from the environment underreport by over 50 in household surveys resulting in overestimation of income poverty moreover we find that a perceived threat to food security drives rural poor to engage in illegal environmental extraction

market distortions and benefits from research the benefits from cost reducing research and their distribution under a range of price policies are compared with those that would arise in the absence of the policies while any price policy affects the distribution of research benefits the net national or world benefits may be reduced lef unchanged or increased depending on the nature of the policy and the significance of the country in the world market for the commodity some implications for decisions on price policies and for distortions in incentives for the allocation of resources to research are raised

forests livelihoods and conservation broadening the empirical base summary more than 10 000 years after the agricultural revolution started millions of rural smallholders across the developing world may still derive as much income from foraging forests and wildlands as from cultivating crops these steady environmental income flows come often from public forests and are extracted by men and women alike however inflexible supplies from nature the physical hardship of harvesting and commonly low returns limit their role as safety nets and pathways out of poverty while their harvesting does not preclude the ongoing conversion of wildlands to agriculture privileged access to high quality environmental resources can become a strong local conservation motive