World Development Perspectives最新文献

Ever since the late 1880s when cocoa began to be grown commercially in Ghana, land and labour has been mobilized to expand the area under cocoa trees and cultivate the crop. The first cocoa farmers ingeniously used and adapted existing social norms for land acquisition and recruitment of labour from both the extended family and from migrants. The resulting development of cocoa was a remarkable story of African innovation and enterprise that made the then Gold Coast one of the most prosperous parts of Africa by the mid-twentieth century. We look at how land and labour has been mobilized for cocoa in Sefwi, western Ghana, from the start of cocoa growing in the region in the 1940s through to 2019. We ask what current norms are, how they have evolved, and why changes to them have been made. Changes in land and labour relations in the area have not followed the linear evolutionary theory of land tenure change neither have they remained as unique immutable customary structures. We note a flexible, reversible and highly pragmatic logic in tandem with the ruling exigencies that account for patterns of change over time.

The success of Turkey's inclusive health policies has served as a strategic tool for building progressivity and improving social welfare. The objective of this study is to examine the inequality trend in out of pocket (OOP) health expenditures in Turkey. Data from the Turkish Statistical Institute's Household Budget Survey conducted in 2015 and 2019 were used to measure inequalities in OOP total health, pharmaceutical and hospital expenditure variables across socioeconomic status. Decomposition analysis was conducted to identify the factors contributing to inequalities. The study findings demonstrate that OOP health expenditure is higher among the poor in Turkey. Evidence suggests that in Turkey inequalities in OOP health expenditures continue to persist. The results show that OOP health, pharmaceutical, and hospital expenditures increased from 2015 to 2019. The inequality index and curve approaches reveal that the pro-rich distribution of OOP health expenditures is remarkable from 2015 to 2019. The burden of OOP pharmaceutical and hospital services expenditures stands on the shoulders of poor households. Progressive universalism is essential to achieve poverty alleviation strategies and reduce inequality for egalitarian development.

Countries in Africa experience both violent and non-violent conflicts during elections. Ghana, specifically Jirapa Municipality, has experienced this challenge in eight national elections since 1992. The Theory of Social Identity was used to establish the theoretical framework. The mixed research design for data collection and analyses was adopted. The study administered household questionnaires with a sample size of 400, and interviewed 15 key informants. The questionnaires were analyzed descriptively using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 22 while the interviews were analyzed using the thematic analysis. The results showed that the major multiple causal factors responsible for the periodic violence were youth unemployment, political parties/politicians seeking re-election, clientelism and inadequate political education. These have had an effect on the social structure of the community relative to weakened communal cohesion, reduced loyalty to traditional leaders, voter apathy, weak public institutions, slowed down economic activities and general distortion of democratic development. The study recommends that the dictates of chapter nine of the 1992 Fourth Republican Constitution of Ghana should be strictly followed by public institutions in charge of electoral governance without biases.

Using the 2016/2017 and 2019/2020 Uganda National Household Survey (UNHS), this study analyses the effect of saving and credit community groups, both cooperatives and associations, on multidimensional poverty. Access to livelihood capitals reduces poverty. Poverty being a rural phenomenon in Uganda, this study assesses whether households in rural Uganda with community group members have access to livelihood capitals. The study also examined the effect of non-membership in a community group on multidimensional poverty and whether being multidimensionally poor affects membership in community groups. The Alkire-Foster method is applied to calculate the Adjusted Headcount Ratio (M0), which is used in the propensity score model to establish the effect of membership in a community group on household multidimensional poverty. Analysis of how the estimated multidimensional poverty varies with the estimated propensity score is achieved using the estimated Average Treatment Effect of the Treated (ATET) obtained with four matching methods (nearest neighbour, radius, kernel, and stratification). Findings reveal that community groups enable rural dwellers to access livelihood capitals, hence enabling them to overcome their multiple deprivations and reducing their likelihood of being multidimensionally poor. Membership in community groups is robustly linked to a decreased probability of being multidimensionally poor by over 3 percentage points.

Women's microfinance groups are increasingly recognized as a space for empowerment, access to financial and social capital, and personal growth. However, few studies have attempted to evaluate these groups' performance, as evidenced by the lack of adequate instruments to measure their success. This study proposes and tests a financial maturity model (FMM) for assessing and monitoring women's groups' performance and supporting effective intervention design. The proposed FMM was conceived based on applicable theoretical and operational frameworks for women's groups. Three groups of grassroots stakeholders validated and ranked the FMM constructs in terms of their importance. A sample of 31 Self-Help Groups in rural India was utilized to test the applicability of the FMM. One of the most important findings relates to the necessity of enhancing the loan management capabilities of groups, including loan repayment, identification of defaulters, delinquency ratio, risk management, and financial reporting. These results can provide stakeholders with baseline measures for designing and implementing interventions to improve the performance and sustainability of women's groups, as well as testing the efficacy of these interventions. While FMM was developed in the Indian context with 7 million registered groups, it has the potential to be adapted in other international contexts to inform decision-making in low- and middle-income countries where women's economic groups are promoted for socioeconomic empowerment and poverty reduction.

Conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs have been the most used tool to reduce poverty and inequality in developing countries in the last decades. In addition to the objectives pursued by these programs, it has been shown that they can have unintended effects on different dimensions. Particularly, they can have an impact on fertility due to an increase in the household's income. This paper examines the relationship between non-labor income and women's childbearing behavior in a developing country. The assignment mechanism of the Uruguayan cash transfer program Asignaciones Familiares – Plan de Equidad (AFAM-PE) alters non-labor incomes across the applicant’s households. I estimate the impact of this program on women's fertility and teenage pregnancy. The identification strategy exploits the discontinuity present in the program eligibility criteria. I combined longitudinal vital statistics provided by the Ministry of Public Health and administrative data to assemble a panel of AFAM-PE applicants aged between 15 and 49 (in 2008 and 2009). The study finds no statistically significant impact of AFAM-PE on fertility rates or teenage pregnancy. These results are robust to different specifications and women samples. This provides evidence against the idea that transfer programs targeting disadvantaged individuals generate a direct effect on fertility.

Government ministers can play such a significant role in the implementation of development projects under their portfolio that a high turnover of ministers may have implications for aid effectiveness. This paper examines the link between ministerial continuity in borrower governments and the performance of World Bank education projects implemented between 2000 and 2017 in 114 countries. I use a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to trace the link between number of ministers during project implementation and project outcome ratings. There is a statistically significant and qualitatively meaningful negative correlation between ministerial turnover and project performance. Delays caused by transition and reshuffling of senior managers by new education ministers are shown to constitute possible causal mechanisms. There is some evidence that strong supervision by World Bank staff could mitigate the negative implications of ministerial turnover on project outcome.

Globally, girl’s education is seen as a human right and means through which to achieve gender equality and is frequently championed by the international development community as the ultimate empowerment of girls (Desai, 2016; Khoja-Moolji, 2018; Robinson, 2021; Tarabini, 2011). Along the same lines, girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) is also presented in international development discourse as a fundamental right and precondition for achieving gender equality (UNFPA, 2021). However, the relationship between girls’ right to education and girls’ right to sexual and reproductive health has not been adequately explored. In the context of Tanzania, the prevalence of teenage pregnancies is high and one of the leading causes of girls' attrition from school (Centre for Reproductive Rights, 2013). Therefore, pregnancy in school has been prohibited by the Tanzanian government, and as a response many schools have practised a number of regulations aimed at preventing girls from becoming pregnant in the first place (ibid.). While many studies³ have focused on the different factors leading to teenage pregnancy in Tanzania and how education serves as an antidote to it, this paper explores the relationship between girls’ right to education and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights by specifically looking at how girls’ bodies and sexuality are regulated through secondary school in Tanzania. Based on semi-structured online interviews with Tanzanian women, I argue that girls’ secondary education in Tanzania is gained at the expense of their sexual and reproductive rights. In doing so, this paper sheds light on girls’ education and the “trade-off” that emerges between, on the one hand, girls’ right to education, and on the other hand, girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights.

This paper utilizes household level panel data from Zambia to analyze the impact of a LSLA on small holder farmers’ productivity, differentiated by male and female-owned farms. Our results suggest that while LSLA is not a significant determinant of smallholder agricultural productivity overall, female-headed households seem to gain a moderate productivity increase. There is also evidence of beneficial spillover effects in terms of technology use, with increase in modern seed use as a result of LSLA (but not on fertilizer use or crop diversification). However, the results do not show significant gender-differentiated impacts of LSLA neither on technological spillover, nor on tenure security. In sum, while LSLA seems to benefit women overall, the two potential avenues through which LSLA affects men and women differently-technological spillover and tenure insecurity, do not seem to have gender-based impacts.

This study assesses the impact of the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) on poverty and social cohesion in conflict-affected areas of ex-FATA, Pakistan. Using multidimensional analysis and data from 600 households, we employ propensity score matching (PSM) to examine BISP's effects. Results reveal significant reductions in poverty measures, including livestock ownership, living standards, and economic well-being. Cash transfer recipients strategically invested in livestock and agricultural tools, boosting daily income and resilience. However, BISP cash transfers have negatively affected social cohesion within the study areas. This outcome suggests the potential for alienation among non-beneficiaries. The study contributes to policy formulation by navigating the complex interplay between cash transfers, poverty, and social dynamics in conflict-affected settings.