Decisions by Chinese households regarding renting in arable land—The impact of tenure security perceptions and trust

Policies aimed at strengthening tenure security through the elimination of land reallocations and provision of land certificates have been implemented with different degrees of success in rural China. In this study, we examine the impact of tenure security perceptions and trust on household decisions to rent in land in a region where tenure security is high and in a region where households face much lower land tenure security. Our regression results suggest that when land tenure is less secure, household perceptions of tenure security positively affect decisions to rent in additional land and the size of the rented land, whereas trust is important for the choice between oral and written contracts. When land tenure is relatively secure, household tenure security perceptions are less relevant, and trust becomes more important for land rental decisions. However, tenure security perceptions do seem to play a role in the choice between oral and written contracts in such high tenure security environments.     

Impact of land tenure policy on agricultural investments in China: Evidence from a panel data study

The goal of this paper is to examine the impact of changes in China's rural land policy on agricultural investments. Dramatic changes occurred in China's rural land policies after 2000, including the extension of rural land contractual period, restriction of land reallocation among villages and villagers groups, elimination of agricultural taxes for responsibility land, and rapid development of rural land rental markets. These changes have given farmers more secure tenure on collectively controlled responsibility land and have strengthened farmers' income rights for responsibility lands, incentivizing them to increase their investments on responsibility lands. A panel data method was used to quantitatively investigate the impact of land policy changes on agricultural investment. We considered the application of organic fertilizer as an indicator for long-term agricultural investment, and compared the use of organic fertilizer between private plots and responsibility lands operated by the same household. The results showed that the difference in organic fertilizer use between private plots and responsibility land for the same household has become smaller from 2000 to 2008. Our findings suggest that recent changes in rural land policies have provided farmers incentives to increase land quality investment on their responsibility lands.     

Reallocating wealth? Insecure property rights and agricultural investment in rural China

This paper evaluates the impact of village-level land reallocations in China on household economic outcomes. The primary objective is to analyze the effect of short-term differences in tenure security in the year of a reallocation, employing the past history of land shifts as a source of exogenous variation in current tenure security. The results show that a decrease in the probability of losing the current plot yields an increase in agricultural inputs and production with no change in non-agricultural investments, conditional on household fixed effects that control for any unobserved and time-invariant characteristics of the household. This suggests that even small increases in the security of tenure enjoyed by households could yield benefits in terms of greater agricultural output.     

Access to agricultural extension,credit and markets among small‐scale farmers in southern Zambia

This article used survey data to determine the extent to which small‐scale farm households in the Choma district of Zambia's southern province have access to agricultural extension services, credit and markets. The findings show that the majority of the sample households had access to extension and credit services. They also showed that the resource base or wealth of the households — as manifested by farm size, livestock ownership and human capital or management capacity (the household head's training in agriculture) — is a significant factor when accounting for differential access to extension and credit. On the other hand, study findings suggest that farm households are facing problems with marketing their produce under the liberalised agricultural marketing system. Based on these findings, the article discusses recommendations for providing solutions to some of the problems affecting small‐scale farmers in accessing production services.     

Constraints in Access to and Demand for Rural Credit: Evidence from Uganda

Abstract: Like in most developing countries, Uganda's financial sector is largely underdeveloped and concentrated in urban areas, leaving the majority of the agricultural producers in the rural population with no access. However, agriculture forms a significant part of the lives of the rural households, who constitute about 85 per cent of the population. This study uses the Uganda household surveys conducted in 1992/93 and 1999/2000 to shed some light on access to, and the characteristics of demand for credit among the rural population. We employ the probit, tobit and multinomial logit model estimations and we analyse demand for credit and find that Uganda's credit market is highly segmented. The rural peasant producers are largely served by relatives/friends and self‐help credit associations and their loan applications are less likely to succeed, and of those that do, smaller loans are granted. The educated and the young are more likely to demand credit while women are less likely to, and to apply for smaller loans. Therefore, while government's agricultural modernization policy considers credit as an important input to its success and as the government plans to roll out the ‘wealth‐for‐all’ programme, more needs to be done to get credit to the sector and to ensure that it can be usefully utilized. Programmes to promote skills and vocational training to enhance production and training in appropriate use of credit are also needed.     

Land,ladies, and the law: a case study on women's land rights and welfare in Southeast Asia in the nineteenth century†

This study evaluates women's de jure and de facto land rights and their implications for household welfare in nineteenth‐century Bangkok. Women constituted a significant share of agricultural landowners holding government‐issued land deeds in central Siam (now Thailand)—a pattern that stands in contrast to both historical and contemporary developing economy contexts where the structure of land rights often favours men. The findings show, through both direct and indirect evidence, that women's de jure rights were upheld in practice. Women made significantly more agricultural investments than male or mixed‐gender owners, which supports the assertion that women perceived their land rights as secure under Siam's traditional usufruct land rights system. An assessment of land‐related court cases directly supports our claim, showing that women in Siam had access to legal representation and were protected when their land rights were challenged by investors and local elites in the context of high demand for both agricultural and urban land. Such secure land rights helped preserve women's livelihoods as agriculturists and household well‐being. We estimate that the median female‐owned orchard could support 10 adults annually, achieving a standard of living comparable to unskilled labourer households in Beijing and Milan during the same period.     

Informal settlement upgrading,assets and poverty alleviation: Evidence from longitudinal research in South Africa

This paper investigates the relationship between housing as an asset and the accumulation of other assets. Using data from a longitudinal research project stretching over nearly 25 years, we have found that besides actual income, there have also been improvements in self-perceived wealth ranking, asset holding, housing size, infrastructure access and human capital. Not all households have however benefited or been found to be better off. We have found that those households who had settled in Freedom Square after 1994 were indeed better off than the earlier settlers. Asset building is a slow process, one driven by stability (accessing urban land and secure tenure), finding an address, accessing education and finding work or remaining employed (though not necessarily in this particular sequence). Contrary to what the Department of Human Settlements suggests, we have found little evidence that informal settlement dwellers build assets by means of the secondary housing market.     

Financial instruments of the poor: initial findings from the South African Financial Diaries study

A new data set called the South African Financial Diaries has been produced, based on a sample of 166 households, drawn from three different areas in South Africa – Langa, Lugangeni and Diepsloot. The selected households represent a range of dwelling types and wealth categories. A unique methodology was used to create a year-long daily data set of every income, expense and financial transaction used by every one of these households. Within this sample, households used, on average, 17 different financial instruments over the course of the study year. A composite household portfolio, based on all 166 households, would have an average of four savings instruments, two insurance instruments and 11 credit instruments. The same composite household portfolio would have about 30 per cent formal instruments and 70 per cent informal instruments. Interestingly, it was found that rural households use as many financial instruments as urban ones.     

Supply and Demand for Livestock Credit in Sub-Saharan Africa: Lessons for Designing New Credit Schemes

Based on analysis of credit supply in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Nigeria, it is shown that public credit institutions do not have sufficient funds to meet the demand for livestock credit and cannot mobilize savings from their clients or other commercial sources for one reason or another. In addition, available credit does not reach those who need it the most and with whom it could have the greatest impact due to the application of inappropriate screening procedures and criteria to determine creditworthiness. The analysis of demand based on borrowing and nonborrowing sample households using improved dairy technology, it is shown that not all borrowers borrowed due to liquidity constraint while some borrowers and some nonborrowers had liquidity constraint but did not have access to adequate credit. Logistic regression analysis show that sex and education of the household head, training in dairy, prevalence of outstanding loan and the number of improved cattle on the farm had significant influence on both borrowing and liquidity status of a household, though the degree and direction of influence were not always the same in each study country. Based on the findings it is suggested that combining public and commercial finance could solve the problem of inadequate credit supply while inventory finance to community level input suppliers and service providers might help in getting credit to worthy and needy smallholders at lower cost than providing credit to smallholders directly.     

CREDIT DEMAND AND CREDIT RATIONING IN THE INFORMAL FINANCIAL SECTOR IN UGANDA1

This paper investigates the household and individual characteristics that influence the demand and supply of informal credit in Uganda, which credit is important for improving the welfare of the poor. Informal credit demand is positively and significantly influenced by age, sex, education level, dependency ratio, household expenditure, and regional location. On the supply side, informal lenders' credit rationing behaviour is negatively and significantly influenced by age, sex, asset values, and regional location. Government policies should focus on increasing both the productive capacity and wealth of households in order to enhance the poor's creditworthiness and make them less susceptible to credit rationing by lenders.     

Is Livestock Important for Risk Behaviour and Activity Choice of Rural Households? Evidence from Kenya

This paper presents an alternative view on causes of differentiationin rural Kenya, focusing on the role of livestock as liquidassets. We use cross-sectional household data in Central andWestern Kenya. We first examine the extent to which householdsare liquidity-constrained in relation with livestock holdings.It is suggested that many rural households are currently liquidity-constrainedand liquidity constraints are closely associated with cattleholdings. We also find that a differentiation process in whichthe households with high endowments and livestock can augmenttheir income by directing more inputs to high-return activities,while poor households who are more likely to be liquidity-constrainedcannot. Our results show that the difference in liquid assetsand associated credit constraints is one of the possible causesfor differentiation of households in rural Kenya.     

Economic incentives in the subsistence areas of South Africa and the need for reform

While land tenure reform within the subsistence areas of South Africa will not address fundamental black grievances about land inequality, it is essential that the land in these areas, as well as other agricultural land used for resettlement, be used in a productive and sustainable manner. This article examines the way in which discriminatory policies with respect to land distribution and public support, together with the high level of transaction costs under existing black tenure systems, have structured economic incentives within the subsistence areas, leading to the apparent under‐ and over‐utilization of arable and grazing land respectively. The potential for formal private tenure to reduce these constraints is then explored, while noting the necessity for property institutions to be both impartially administered and well adapted to the particular needs and resource constraints at the community level. Finally, a number of reforms which would increase the level of information provided by informal tenure are examined.     

Trade policy impacts under alternative land market regimes in rural China

In this paper we apply a simulation model of a village economy in Guizhou province, China, to assess impacts of trade reform at the household and the village level under alternative land market regimes. Putting special emphasis on the modeling of household migration a trade reform scenario is simulated with and without the existence of a land rental market in the village.Significant impacts of the land market on the policy outcome regarding household production, income and welfare are found. The possibility to trade land within the village leads to increasing specialization into agriculture and migration among the households as a response to the policy shock. In a situation with a land market, incomes of households which expand agricultural production are less negatively affected by trade reform than incomes of households which migration more.At the village level, a land market does not influence the poverty outcome of the reform but reduces its inequality enhancing impact. Village migration and exports of agricultural outputs increase.     

COVID-19 pandemic,health risks,and economic consequences: Evidence from China

This paper introduces the Susceptible-Infectious-Recovered model into the Bewley-type incomplete market model and uses it to study the impact of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic on China's macroeconomics. The calibrated model predicts that the average propensity to consume household wealth will decline, while the demand for money will increase, and these predictions are consistent with the data. Monetary policy is effective because it provides enough liquidity for households to buffer health risks. Monetary stimulus is more effective in an economy with greater health risks and consumption uncertainty. Counterfactual experiments show that abandoning the containment policy too early would avoid a sharp drop in output and employment in the short term, but it would greatly increase mortality and ultimately lead to a decline in social welfare.     

How do trust and property security influence household contributions to public goods?: The case of the sloping land conversion program in China

Trust and property rights are generally considered to influence farmers' behavior regarding resource use and environmental management. Previous studies show that higher trust levels may enhance contributions to public goods. This paper investigates how trust and (land) property rights security influence the provision of one concrete public good: land protection through the Sloping Land Conservation Program in China. The analysis is based on household survey data from Ningxia Autonomous Region in China. From our questionnaire two trust factors are derived and distinguished, using factor analysis: general trust and kinship trust. Farm households are less likely to contribute to public goods when they perceive more secure land rights, but trust has mixed effects on public goods. The results show that general trust and kinship trust may rely on two opposite effects for influencing public goods provision. On the one hand, high levels of general trust may directly enhance people's willingness to provide contributions to public goods (by reduced likelihood to reconvert forest land) when farmers are aware of the positive environmental effects of the program, that's the public goods effect. On the other hand, general trust may also make it more likely that people invest more in their own private goods to pursue their own welfare (a more likely reconversion of forest land to arable land), that's the private goods effect. The final outcome depends on the size and direction of both effects. Compared to general trust, kinship trust is more inward-looking and self- or group-interested compared to more reciprocal general trust. Thus, unlike general trust, kinship trust may have no significant public goods effect on the provisioning of public goods.     

Impacts of an international bridge on households: Evidence from Thailand

This paper empirically investigates the impacts of an international bridge between Thailand and Laos on households in Thailand. Based on the significance of agricultural sectors near the bridge, we investigate how its effect on household income differs between agricultural households and other types of households. We found that the bridge increased the income of agricultural households with agricultural land, especially those near the bridge. In contrast, agricultural households without agricultural land or non-agricultural households with agricultural land did not enjoy such an income increase. We also investigated whether it induced households near the bridge to participate in the agricultural sector, but the results were insignificant. In short, agricultural households in Thailand enjoyed positive gains from establishing the second bridge.     

秀山县林权改革与农户万元增收问题研究

集体林权制度改革,是继土地家庭承包之后我国农村经营制度的又一次重大变革。本文通过对集体林权制度改革的背景、秀山县推行林权改革及实施农户万元增收工程的特色和成效进行简要分析,透视了林权改革和农户万元增收工程的制约瓶颈,从而提出了加大宣传力度、强化技术培训、探索建立农户万元增收长效机制的对策思路,为深化林权改革、做活林下经济、助推农户万元增收提供决策参考。     

The link between credit markets and self-employment choice among households in rural China

Our paper examines how credit markets operate through wealth to influence households’ entrepreneurial choices. Our results show that policy-led bank branch withdrawal in rural China has a significant negative impact on credit availability to rural households, though unexpectedly the effect is felt more strongly in informal than formal credit markets. Furthermore, we observe that self-employment is impeded by reductions in wealth associated with credit contraction. Policies which provide more and better formal financial services to rural households are predicted to increase the flow of credit, through both formal and informal channels, thereby supporting accumulation, diversification, and economic growth.     

Liquidity Constraints and Postharvest Selling Behavior: Evidence from China's Maize Farmers

This paper addresses the impacts of liquidity constraints on household postharvest commodity selling behavior. Using data collected from China's maize farmers, we find that households with debt, in general, sell their maize much earlier than debt‐free households, thus potentially losing inter‐temporal arbitrage opportunities. Segmenting our sample into wealthy and poor households, we find that the relationship between a liquidity constraint and postharvest sales is apparent only among poor households. Using the occurrence of an illness in children or an elderly household member as an instrument for liquidity, we control for potential endogeneity associated with liquidity. We find that poor households in which there were children or elderly people with sicknesses in previous years are more likely to sell maize early than other poor households.     

Household,community, and policy determinants of food insecurity in rural Malawi

This study examines how socio-economic characteristics of households, local conditions, and public programmes are associated with the probability that a farm household in rural Malawi is food insecure. The statistical analysis uses nationally representative data for 8350 randomly-selected households interviewed during 2004/05 for the second Malawi Integrated Household Survey. Regressions are estimated separately for households in the north, centre, and south of Malawi to account for spatial heterogeneity. Results of a multilevel logit model reveal that households are less likely to be food insecure if they have larger cultivated land per capita, receive agricultural field assistance, reside in a community with an agricultural cooperative and relatively high annual rainfall, and are headed by an individual with a high school degree. Factors that positively correlate with household food insecurity are price of maize, price of fertiliser, number of household members, and distance to markets. Implications of these findings for policy are discussed.