A Review of Institutional Alternatives to Collateralized Lending

Abstract: Rural producers’ access to formal finance has often been limited by their inability to provide collaterals, particularly in the form of registered or certified land titles and tenancy contracts or assets which are auctionable as well as by laws that make foreclosure difficult. This paper reviews some of the alternative institutional arrangements (possibilities) for reducing and overcoming collateral requirements such as third party guarantees, ownership of tradeable assets, credit guarantee schemes, group lending, credit‐savings linkages, incremental and loan repayment‐dependent lending, portfolio diversification and an efficient legal system for contract enforcement. It also specifies the land policy and tenure reforms that are desirable, especially in the direction of formal land titling or legally specified rights to the use and ownership of lands, the consolidation of land holdings and the provision of proper cadastres for land and assuring that titles are secure.     

Limited access to services for the urban poor in Windhoek,Namibia

The majority of the population living in the informal settlements of Windhoek, Namibia, have limited access to public municipal services. This paper integrates results from a sample of 97 randomly selected households, interviews with experts and community leaders and review of literature to describe and analyse the relationship between land tenure and municipal services in the informal settlements. Findings from our study show that formalised land tenure is a condition for households to access municipal services privately. However, 85% of the sample of the households in the informal settlements do not own land under current land tenure policy. Further, the need for communities ‘to own land’ seemed more immediate and pressing compared to water access, which is seen as a way to govern themselves towards raising funds for land acquisition. But lack of land ownership remains a constraint.     

Rural household migration in China – the roles of actual and perceived tenure security

Migration can make an important contribution to rural poverty reduction and overall productivity growth, but it may be limited by prevailing rural land tenure arrangements. Since 1998, the Chinese government has implemented a number of land tenure reforms with the aim of improving the tenure security and the transferability of land. Although these reforms enhanced legal tenure security, it is not clear to what extent they remove existing land tenure bottlenecks in migration. Both actual tenure security, i.e. local implementation of laws that warrant tenure security, and household perceptions of tenure security are likely to play a role. In this paper we examine the impacts of actual and perceived tenure security on rural household migration in China, taking into account the degree of development of land rental markets. We argue that actual and perceived tenure security can have both positive and negative effects on migration decisions and that the presence of land rental markets may modify these effects. A two-step control function approach that controls for endogeneity of tenure security perceptions is applied to household and village-level data collected in Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Liaoning provinces and Chongqing municipality. We find that both actual and perceived tenure security affect migration, but the impact of perceived tenure security measured by land reallocation expectations is much stronger and is positive, whereas the independent impact of actual tenure security is negative. Households perceiving a lower risk of losing land when one or more members migrate are more inclined to migrate, independent of the availability of land rental markets in their villages. Actual tenure security, as measured by absence of land reallocations and possession of land certificates, has an independent negative effect on migration only in villages with underdeveloped land rental markets.     

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.     

Formal and informal rural credit in the Mekong River Delta of Vietnam: Interaction and accessibility

This paper examines the factors influencing rural households’ access to credit in the Vietnamese market. Analysis confirms an interaction effect between informal and formal credit sectors in which informal credit positively influences accessibility to microcredit programs. Ignoring this interaction effect may lead to microcredit providers making loan decisions that are less than optimal. In the formal credit sector, the lowest income group faces more credit rationing than other groups, despite the fact that microcredit programs are designed to target households at the bottom of the income pyramid. Results demonstrate that land holding status, informal interest, and informal loan duration are important factors influencing access to informal credit. Factors influencing microcredit accessibility include local government employee status, credit group membership, a “poor” certificate, educational attainment, working skills and village road access. To reduce reliance on informal credit and improve microcredit accessibility, rural households should actively participate in a microcredit group.     

Perceived land tenure security in rural Xinjiang,China: The role of official land documents and trust

The role of formal tenure institutions in reducing land tenure insecurity has been long debated in the development economics literature. This study examines and compares the key determinants of perceptions of security of tenure over contract land and wasteland, two types of land that are characterized by tenure being formally and informally ascribed. The material is drawn from the Chinese region of Xinjiang, an ethnically heterogeneous region which has more complex tenure systems than elsewhere in China. Empirical estimations based on a survey of 352 households, complemented by interviews with key informants, demonstrate that formal institutions (measured by official land documents) do not significantly contribute to households' perceptions of tenure security on either type of land, and that both interpersonal trust and political trust significantly enhance perceived tenure security on either land type in our research area. The empirical evidence further shows that perceptions of tenure security on both types of land are more sensitive to trust towards village cadres than trust in villagers.     

Expectative land rights, house consolidation and cemetery squatting: Some perspectives from Central Java

With more than 40% of the urban population of the Third World living in informal settlements, quasi- and extralegal adaptations have been utilized to appropriate land for housing. The most direct of these — squatting — has its inherent risks, however, for those who wish to improve their dwellings. Research has shown that house consolidation is more a function of resident perceptions than of strict legal categorization. This paper reports how such perceptions have triggered a greater rate of house consolidation among Javanese cemetery squatters than that in an adjoining area with formal land tenure.     

Video evidencing and palmtop computer technology to support the formalisation of land rights

Technology can be used to improve the legitimacy, accuracy and currency of land tenure information in urban informal settlements, site-and-service schemes and rural land restitution cases. Video images of landholders providing testimony as to their rights, interests and obligations regarding land, and palmtop computers using icon-based graphic interfaces, are two such technologies. Video imaging has the advantage that respondents can describe unusual situations in the tenure system on camera that might not normally be recorded in a written document, and thus improve the completeness of the record. Palmtop computers that can be used by community members to collect socio-economic data are one of many tools that enable a community to work in partnership with the land administration authorities to improve the quality of land records. This article describes pilot studies of how video images were integrated into a geographic information system with spatially referenced socio-economic data collected with a palmtop computer linked to a hand-held Garmin II Plus receiver. These studies were conducted as a part of a research programme in land tenure and cadastral systems in a rural community and an urban informal settlement.     

新区土地改革中的地方政府行为分析

1950年冬到1952年底的新区土地改革中,面对中央政府显著强势和极其有限的授权,地方政府作为农地产权制度变迁的“次级行动集团”,在中央宏观政策、地方法规和干部素质以及农村社会现状的约束下,运用政治、行政、法律和宣传等多重行为手段,追求政治和经济利益最大化。地方政府在农地产权制度变迁中连接中央和农民的中枢地位与执行中的微观配置角色,使其成为实现这一制度变迁的重要力量和农地制度领域研究中不可忽视的主体。     

日本城市化、农地制度与农民社会保障制度关联分析

在城市化进程中,日本政府适应不同发展阶段的需要,适时调整农业发展政策和农村土地制度,并在解决与城市化、农地制度改革相关的农民利益保障问题的过程中,建立并不断完善包括农村在内的社会保障制度,实现城乡协调发展。     

Informal trading in Soweto

Informal sector trading is re‐examined five years after initial investigations in Soweto. Structural changes in informal trading are manifestations of rising unemployment in the formal economy. More important is the widening differentiation between business enterprises at the apex of the informal spectrum with substantial turnover and employment opportunities through to most informal enterprises operating at ‘survival’ levels. These results confirm the domination of the laws of supply and demand in informal trading and emphasize the free market character of the sector.     

“公司＋农户”型产业链合作机制的演进与优化研究——以“皮毛之乡”桑坡村为例

文章回顾了河南桑坡村“公司＋农户”型皮毛加工产业链网系统的演进与优化历程，解释了这种链网系统如何破解公司与农户正式契约关系中由买方垄断所带来的机会主义问题。同时，文章对正式制度演化过程中非正式制度所发挥的关键作用，以及地方政府部门在链网系统日常维护中的政策导向等相关问题进行了延伸思考。     

Women's participation in housing delivery: the case of Ezilweleni,South Africa

As part of a study on housing delivery in post-apartheid South Africa, research was conducted to explore women's participation. The interest in women was based on the assumption that their involvement would contribute to greater equity in the residential construction sector. Focus group discussions and a household survey were conducted. Participants were asked about their income sources and their involvement in various phases of housing delivery such as securing tenure, planning, procuring materials and building. The findings indicate that women influenced decisions about the level of infrastructural services in Ezilweleni. They participated in housing delivery but reverted to informal sector activities despite training in building. Both formal and informal education are necessary if greater equity is to be achieved in the construction sector.     

冲突视阈下城中村的社会互动与整合

社会冲突论认为社会在本质上就充满着各种矛盾,社会系统是一个交织着各种矛盾与冲突现象的统一体。作为城乡二元社会结构矛盾典型代表的城中村,充满着重重矛盾与冲突,体现在集体资产、经济利益、拆迁改造、文化隔阂等方面。然而普遍存在的冲突并不仅仅意味着对立与斗争,冲突对社会系统同样具有整合功能。处于冲突状态下的城中村经过集体产权制度改革、多元利益主体的互动与博弈、多元文化与价值观的碰撞与融合,将逐步融入城市,实现城乡有效整合。     

Land tenure in an urban area∗

The paper considers land tenure in black townships in Grahamstown. The legal and practical difficulties which the township dwellers have in acquiring secure land rights is a reflection of their subordinate political status. All decisions about where blacks live and the laws and regulations under which they have operated since the establishment of Grahamstown have been made and administered by whites. At some periods individual whites, welfare and religious organizations have shown some sympathy and concern for the problems of blacks in the area. But such sympathy and concern has never gone so far as to permit blacks effective participation in the life of the city nor even real control over their affairs in the areas allocated to them. In view of the legal restrictions which limit the chances of blacks to gain access to land, the paper is largely a demonstration of the causes and extent of urban landlessness and what implications this situation has on policy making regarding land tenure.     

嵌入型劳资关系的分析维度探讨

作为外资企业的集中地的东南沿海,外资企业将本国的管理理念、企业文化带到东道国与当地企业和员工结合形成了特有的嵌入型劳资关系。本文将形成因素、生产与分配、冲突与合作、正式制度与非正式制度作为研究嵌入型劳资关系的四个分析维度,并根据这个四个维度对嵌入型劳资关系进行探讨。     

Structure of Sectoral Decomposition of Aggregate Poverty Changes in Cameroon

Abstract: This paper reviews theoretical frameworks for sectoral decomposition and assesses the within‐ and between‐sector contributions to changes in aggregate poverty in Cameroon informed by the Shapley Value decomposition rule. Between 1984 and 1996 poverty remained a rural phenomenon in Cameroon. It became more widespread, deeper and severer in both rural and urban areas, but more so in urban than rural areas. While the within‐sector effects disproportionately accounted for the increase in poverty in the period 1984–96, the between‐sector contributions in both rural and semi‐urban areas played a mitigating role on the worse effects of the increase in poverty. These findings infer the potential positive feedback effects of migration such as remittances, and/or increases in rural consumption expenditure in the face of rural underemployment, as effective strategies used by migrants to lift their families and villages out of the worse effects of poverty. The implication of this interpretation is that decision‐makers need to better understand the factors that push or pull potential migrants. Rural–urban mobility could, therefore, be viewed as a strategy used by households to moderate the worse effects of poverty and a vector of shared growth. The implications for public policy, in terms of open unemployment and associated social and insecurity problems at the receiving end, point to the wisdom of addressing the push‐factors via targeting more in favour of rural areas.     

Aspects of the law relating to the allocation of agricultural land in Bophuthatswana

Development activities in Bophuthatswana are usually influenced by the existence of different land rights and land tenure systems. The nature of these rights are dependant on the laws which govern the allocation of different types of land and ultimately influence the utilization of land for, inter alia, specific development purposes. The allocation and utilization of land are regulated by tribal, common and statute law developed over many years. These laws are, however, often inadequate to meet the demands of well planned, integrated development strategies. Individual and national development needs, as well as official government policy, call for amendment to the existing laws relating to the allocation and utilization of especially. agricultural land. The object of this discussion is to expose some aspects of existing laws which lay down the limits within which planning and development must take place at present and further reveals efforts by the legislature to participate in planning and implementation of a more effective land use strategy, such as introduced by way of the Allocation of Agricultural Lands Acts, Act 20 of 983, as amended.     

Peri‐urban land tenure: Problems and prospects

Informal settlements in Natal are discussed. The need for and the reasons against informal settlement are examined. Means of overcoming the shortcomings of informal settlement are suggested and the need for security of tenure in order to promote ‘self‐help’ is highlighted.     

Rural Land,Emerging Rental Land Markets and Public Policy in Ethiopia

Abstract: While farmers today access land mainly through administrative‐based land distribution, transactions in rental markets are on the rise. Different rental contracts are informally arranged with varied land use and transfer rights and degree of enforcement. These contracts are often interlocked to overcome the problem of incomplete or missing non‐land factor markets. The empirical evidence is thin but shows mixed records on performance of rental markets. Transactions in rental markets provide an additional venue to access land, reduce disparity in distribution of area of land operated, correct imbalances in factor proportions at farm level, and partly substitute for missing or incomplete factor markets. However, rights to rental land are restricted and poorly enforced, and markets are localized and thinly traded. While participation in rental markets is potentially welfare improving, increasing scarcity of land and demands for higher rent, a fee for right to rent land, payment in cash, farming skills and experience, and proof of no‐default are tightening conditions to access to land, particularly to the young poor farmers. Public policy has an important role in formalizing and enhancing the development of rental markets through strengthening enforceable long‐term security of tenure, providing legal cover to rental contracts, allowing tradability of long‐term use rights through rental markets, and providing the institutional mechanism to enforce contracts and reduce the burden of self‐enforcement. These policy measures need to be nested within a broad framework of market development, and informed by policy research and experimentation.