Access to Improved Water Sources and Rural Productivity: Analytical Framework and Cross‐country Evidence

Abstract: In this study we address the issue of access to drinking water in rural areas related to agricultural productivity performance. Considering an agricultural household model as our basic conceptual framework, we analyze the theoretical aspects of increasing the access rate to drinking water on agricultural productivity. First, we show that the increased access rate to drinking water is conducive to agricultural productivity due to increased intrinsic productivity of individuals and additional gain in time for agricultural production. Second, it transpires that the constraints on the access to drinking water may be costly in terms of decreased productivity and well‐being of rural people. Furthermore, based on a sample of 27 African countries over the period 1990–2010, estimation results do not reject the assumption that increasing access to drinking water has a positive effect on rural productivity growth. This positive effect is reinforced by the presence of a better sanitation system, even after controlling for country‐specific effects and for the characteristics of rural areas.     

Perennial grain crops in the West Soudanian Savanna of Mali: perspectives from agroecology and gendered spaces

Perennial grain crops may play an important role in environmentally sound and socially just food systems for Africa. We study the future possibility of integrating perennial grains into Malian farming systems from the perspective of agroecology, and more specifically using a gendered space approach. We interviewed 72 farmers across the sorghum-growing region of Mali. We found that perennial grains offer a vision for transforming human relations with nature that mirrors the resource sharing of customary land tenure, including patterns of extensive and intensive land use in time and space. Women interviewees identified a broad set of potential advantages and challenges to perennial grain production. Advantages include reduced labour, saving seed, and improving food security. Women farmers were concerned about livestock, water access, and resource limitations. We argue that perennial grains may increase access to land and natural resources for women farmers. Perennial grains may improve soil quality, reduce labour early in the rainy season, and provision more resources from fallow lands. Pastoralists stand to benefit from improved pastures in the dry season. We conclude that investments are needed to develop viable crop types in consideration of the complexity of West African farming systems and the local needs of women farmers and pastoralists.     

Financial development and poverty: evidence from the CFA Franc Zone

The financial liberalization in the 1980s and early 1990s led the CFA Franc Zone countries to deepen reforms in their financial systems. These reforms fostered financial development, which in turn may have reduced income poverty, as emphasized by several theoretical arguments in the literature. This study aims at estimating the contribution of financial development to poverty alleviation in the CFA Franc Zone. Results based on a panel of CFA Franc Zone countries show that financial development is associated with a drop in the proportion of poor population. Next, financial development reduces the extent to which the income of individuals falls below the poverty line. Moreover, in some cases, the effect of financial development on poverty may be subject to nonlinearities. Finally, financial instability or unstable financial development leading to crises may mitigate the favourable effect of financial development on poverty reduction. These findings are robust to the use of alternative measures of financial development and hold after controlling for a potential simultaneity and a small sample biases.     

Who justifies attacks on civilians? Analysis of attitudes toward terrorism based on value surveys

What are the common characteristics among individuals who justify attacks on civilians? Using nationally representative Gallup World Poll surveys of 30,787 individuals from 27 developing countries in different parts of the world, this paper identifies the partial correlates of extremism. The results suggest that the typical extremist who supports attacks on civilians is more likely to be young, unemployed, and struggling to make ends meet, relatively uneducated, and not as religious as others, but more willing to sacrifice own life for his or her beliefs. Gender and marital status are not found to explain the individual‐level variation in attitudes toward extremism. These results are robust to various sensitivity analyses, although some of them vary in magnitude and significance across countries and geographic regions.