Food versus fuel: examining tradeoffs in the allocation of biomass energy sources to domestic and productive uses in Ethiopia

Rural households in Ethiopia have limited options to meet their domestic energy needs because they lack access to modern fuels and technologies. Domestic use of certain fuel sources, such as cow dung, can hinder agricultural outcomes and productivity. This article explores the tradeoffs between domestic and productive uses of biomass energy sources in the Nile Basin of Ethiopia using a nonseparable farm household model where labor allocation to energy collection and farming are analyzed simultaneously. We estimate a system of five structural equations using three‐stage least squares and find that the use of dung as a domestic fuel source has negative implications for the value of harvested crops, while use of on‐farm fuelwood is associated with increased value of agricultural output. On‐farm production of fuelwood appears to increase the value of crop output and provide labor savings, by making fuelwood collection more convenient for households. Policy interventions to support the expansion of agroforestry and increase access to new energy‐efficient technologies are needed to ensure that agricultural productivity can be both increased and sustained.     

Welfare Implications of Community Forest Plantations in Developing Countries: The Orissa Social Forestry Project

Community forest plantations are a common intervention in developing countries. We use household and remote sensing data from Orissa, India, to estimate welfare effects of community forest plantations, in terms of the value of decreased collection times plantations afford users. A selection model, accounting for possible jointness in site location and productivity, is used to estimate collection production functions for different household labor categories in natural and community forests. Two measures of an opportunity cost of time are used to determine welfare effects of time saved due to community forests. We find access to community forests is important to marginal productivity of different labor categories, but to different degrees, highlighting the need to disaggregate household data when analyzing these interventions. We also find substantial welfare improvements from time savings for many households and villages.     

山区农村劳动力转移对农地退耕的影响以武陵山区为例

[目的]农地退耕是土地利用变化的重要组成部分,明晰农地退耕的影响因素可以为山区生态恢复提供新的路径。[方法]文章基于武陵山区180份农户调查数据,采用多元线性回归模型分析影响山区农地退耕的因素,重点分析山区农村劳动力转移对农地退耕的影响。[结果](1)研究区劳动力转移现象明显,85%的农户家庭存在不同程度的劳动力转移,劳动力转移比例达到51.61%,户均转移劳动力数量占家庭总人口的29.90%;(2)研究区农户退耕较为普遍,退耕农户占样本农户的55%,户均退耕面积0.31hm2;(3)非农收入和农业劳动力比例对农户的退耕面积产生了显著的正向影响,同时家庭女性劳动力数量、家庭总人数、承包地面积、种植耕地的总块数、两个地区哑变量——万木乡和丁市镇也显著影响了农户的退耕地面积。[结论]山区农村劳动力转移带来的非农收入增加促进了农户的农地退耕,但是劳动力转移带来的农业劳动力供给减少又降低了农户的退耕地面积,最终两者的作用相互抵消,使得农村劳动力转移对农户的退耕地面积产生了不可确定的影响。     

Agrarian class struggle and state formation in post‐colonial Pakistan, 1959–1974: Contingencies of Mazdoor Kisan Raj

State formation in post‐colonial societies is often explained with reference to the roles of elites. In Pakistan, landed elites continue to dominate the rural political economy through informal and formal institutions, but the history of its largest peasant movement shows how agrarian class struggle can change the institutional forms and functions of power. The Hashtnagar peasant movement achieved lasting de facto land and tenancy reforms in north‐western Pakistan in the 1970s through forcible land occupations that were regularized by state intervention. I argue that although divisions among elites were important, the state intervened in favour of peasants due to the rising organizational power of tenants and landless labourers under the centralized leadership of the radical Mazdoor Kisan Party. Agrarian class struggle weakened the informal power of landed elites and gave rise to institutions of peasant power. However, other fractions of the ruling class sought to undermine their landed opponents while co‐opting the militancy of the peasant movement by strengthening state institutions to intervene in favour of upwardly mobile tenants. The latter were separated from poorer peasants and the landless, thus demobilizing the movement.     

Estimating labor supply of farm households under nonseparability: empirical evidence from Nepal

This paper examines the labor supply of farm households in Nepal using a recently developed methodology that accounts for the simultaneity between production and consumption decisions of the households. Estimates of marginal products of male and female labor or shadow wages are obtained from an agricultural production function. An instrumental variable approach is then used to recover the household's structural labor supply from variations in the shadow wages and income, as well as other household characteristics. The findings reveal that both male and female total labor supply are sensitive to changes in shadow wages and income. Human capital embodied in education is found to exert a significant positive effect on output, but has no statistically significant impact on total labor supply of individuals. The results also rejects the existence of efficient labor markets in rural Nepal.     

Beyond water-intensive agriculture: Expansion of Prosopis juliflora and its growing economic use in Tamil Nadu,India

Against the backdrop of expanding commercial crop markets and private well expansion, market-oriented agriculture has developed in villages with access to abundant water resources in Tamil Nadu, India. On the other hands, the villages that have failed to secure sufficient irrigation water have experienced sharp decline in cropping. Such land has been rapidly invaded by Prosopis juliflora, a tree species that has wide adaptability of the different environments and high coppicing ability. This species has traditionally been harvested as a fuel for domestic use and small-scale businesses, and recognised as “a tree for the poor”. However, since the establishment of the electricity act in 2003, which completely deregulated participation of private companies in the electricity generation industry, the new usage of Prosopis has been created: several small-scale electricity generating plants began to utilise this tree as an energy source. As a result, the demand for Prosopis tree rapidly increased and the real price of raw wood has more than doubled between 2003 and 2009. A census survey of household income revealed that income generated from Prosopis expansion compensated for the decrease of cropping, and contributed to an increase in the net household income, especially for the landless labourers and middle class land holders. This fact indicates that it is possible to reduce poverty in a semi-arid rural area without securing additional irrigation water, in case proper institutions and technologies are in place.     

Urbanization,the energy ladder and forest transitions in India's emerging economy

Urbanization is currently a major force in tropical land use transitions as economic activities aggregate in urban centers, particularly in Asia. This paper examines relationships among urbanization, household energy source, and forest cover at the state level in India using available census, survey, and remote sensing analysis from the 1990s and 2000s. Central questions include (1) how rapidly are urban and rural households switching from traditional to modern fuel sources; and (2) what are the consequences of changing household energy sources for fuelwood demand and forest cover. Country-wide, 30 and 78% of urban and rural households respectively used fuelwood for cooking in 1993. In urban households, the percentage decreased to 22% by 2005 with a shift towards liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). The shift occurred across almost all income classes. In rural areas, the use of LPG increased fourfold but 75% of households still rely on fuelwood. Despite the decline in percentage households using traditional fuels, fuelwood demand continued to increase from 1993 to 2005 at a national scale due to an increasing total number of households. However, 25% of states and union territories experienced declines in rural fuelwood demand and over 70% declines in urban fuelwood demand. Forest cover has remained steady or increased slightly over the time period, reaffirming the conclusion that fuelwood demand may lead to local degradation but not large-scale deforestation. At the state level, increases in percent forest cover between 2000 and 2004 are positively associated with percent of total households that are urban (corresponding to fewer percentage households using wood) but not related to changes in fuelwood demand. Plantations are a primary cause of increases in forest area, where benefits to ecosystem services such as biodiversity and hydrologic function are controversial. Results suggest that households will continue to climb the energy ladder with future urbanization, resulting in substantial development benefits and reduced exposure to indoor air pollution. Implications of reduced fuelwood demand for forest cover are less certain but the limited data suggest that urbanization will promote a transition to increasing forest cover in the Indian context.     

How poor are women in rural India?

The assessment of poor women in India as dependent and exploited regardless of poverty focused strategies is reflected in this review of relevant literature. The scholarly approaches to the problems of poor women involve redirection and expansion of resources to women (increase bank credit) through policy and institutional changes, and involve improving women's welfare through changes in class and gender hierarchies; both pertain to restructuring power groups. A little ascribed to belief is that the organization of women's numbers will empower women; the constraints are stated. There is also some argument over whether to design women-specific programs or integrate women into existing programs; some examples are given of successes and difficulties. The regionalization of poverty in eastern and central India is discussed. The growth of the poor has been among the landless, wage-dependent households. 9.6% of households (7.5 million) are headed by women. Women work fewer hours and at lower wage scales and have fewer employment opportunities. Lower earnings are coupled with differentials in demand for female and male labor in agriculture and a crowded labor market. There is a concentration of women in less visible, nonmonetary subsistence production and domestic work. Women are undercounted in employment studies. Women predominate in agricultural activity. Women's status is influenced by economic status, caste, and ethnic background. Domestic work increases status for women and households. The poorer households have greater labor force participation, particularly as wage laborers rather than unpaid family workers. Regional factors affecting rural household strategies are factors affecting the economy (topography, rainfall, climate) and the degree of development, plus sociocultural variables (kinship and religious beliefs which affect the social domain of women), and the degree of dependence on hired vs. family labor. There are sharp contrasts in the value and survival of women regionally. Female labor force participation is low in all regions; the nature and distribution of agricultural laborers is discussed followed by examples from 3 different regions (east, south, and north). The gender inequalities in access to basic needs are reviewed for sex ratio, mortality, and nutrition, and education. The preference is for gender-based policies targeting women.     

Has China’s new round of collective forest reforms caused an increase in the use of productive forest inputs?

Forestland tenure and financial incentives are the most important policy issue to sustainable forest resource management. The new wave of reform of collective forestland tenure (NRCFT) has been launched since 2003 and the governmental matching reform measures (MRMs) for the NRCFT have been introduced since 2009. The objective of these reforms is to enhance sustainable forest resource management in Chinese collective regions by encouraging rural households’ productive forest inputs. We use a unique dataset of 1778 sample households in 18 counties of nine provinces with six years and employ a fixed effects model with clustered standard errors. Our empirical results indicate that: 1) the NRCFT has increased households’ forestland area of different tenure types, and the effects of the MRMs on rural households’ labor input and production expenditures for forestry purposes are generally positive, especially household used forestland as collateral for a loan and afforestation or reafforestation subsidy and reform of Annual Allowance Cut (AAC) have significantly contributed to increase in the use of productive forest inputs; 2) the NRCFT and the MRMs have different impacts on the use of productive forest inputs for different tenure forests, and these reforms have caused the most significant changes in rural households’ production decision changes for household responsibility forestland; 3) both the NRCFT and the MRMs have significant effects on rural households’ rent-in and rent-out forestland; and 4) forestland fragmentations have caused additional labor and investment inputs for rural households’ forest resource management and protection. And finally, market drivers and household and village characteristics factors also affect households’ decisions for productive inputs for their managing forests.     

How has microcredit supported agriculture? Evidence using panel data from Bangladesh

Improving agricultural productivity has received a greater attention in recent years amid concerns about rising food insecurity, population pressures, and climate change. Many believe that better access to institutional credit, spanning microcredit as well as commercial and agricultural banks, can help rural households smooth risks, and access inputs and other technology to modernize agriculture and improve farm/nonfarm linkages. We use recently augmented household panel data spanning over 20 years in Bangladesh to examine the effects of rural credit expansion (both microcredit and formal bank channels) on outcomes for agricultural households. We find that microcredit has benefited households with lower landownings, raising agricultural income from activities such as livestock rearing that require less land, as well as nonfarm income diversification for all households, but with the strongest effect for landless or near‐landless households. We do not find effects of microcredit on crop income, but do, however, find that reported supply‐side credit constraints significantly lower crop income. Borrowing by both men and women has contributed to nonfarm income growth for marginal farmers, but only men's borrowing has contributed to nonfarm income growth among higher landowning groups.     

LABOUR MARKET DUALISM,THREAT OF EVICTION AND CROPSHARE TENANCY

Landlords in some countries commonly adopt a policy of short-term leasing such that their tenants perpetually face a threat of termination of the contracts if their performance is not satisfactory. By explicitly modelling the threat of termination in a multi-period framework, this paper demonstrates that: (a) a landlord may prefer a landed rather than a landless tenant, (b) although tenants are free to choose the amount of land for cropsharing, the marginal product of land is not driven down to zero, and (c) the efficiency of cropshare cultivation may not be ranked unambiguously against owner or wage cultivation.     

The Theory of the Farm Household: An Application to Saskatchewan

A theoretical model is presented which integrates the consumption and production components of the rural household. A theoretically determined system of expenditure equations, derived factor demand equations and an off-farm labor supply equation are estimated using primary data for Saskatchewan farm households. From the empirical results we conclude that if the wage rate can be observed or estimated, the farm household's behavior can be explained empirically in a manner consistent with received theory. Summary and Conclusions A theoretical model integrating the consumption and production sides of the farm household or enterprise is estimated empirically using primary data for Saskatchewan farm households. The farm household was assumed to maximize its utility function subject to farm production and cash flow constraints. The empirical results indicate that the theoretical model can be estimated successfully even when data are sparse. While the coefficients for the expenditure, derived demand, and off-farm labor supply equations are consistent with coefficients from similar equations estimated separately by others, the theoretically more precise integrated approach specifies the simultaneous effect of the variables across equations. From the empirical results and the theoretical considerations it is obvious that the wage rate is a key explanatory variable in the model. The wage rate links the three components of the model–final expenditures, the derived input demands and off-farm labor hours. The wage rate is one determinant of the allocation of the operator's time (although other factors such as the nature of the operation and opportunities to work off-farm dominated in this study), and both the wage rate and the allocation of the time determine the eventual income available to the rural household. In essence, then, the problem of explaining farm household behavior when the household's business enterprise function cannot be separated from its consumption activity is similar to that of traditional models based on the theory of the firm and models of consumer behavior. The only difference is that the wage rate is observable in the traditional models but needs to be estimated as a shadow price in models which seek to explain rural household behavior. As a result, research in this area must start with an explanation of the allocation of (at least) the operator's labor and a measure of the shadow wage rate. If the entire household's allocation of time between on-farm and off-farm labor and leisure is determined, it is possible to treat its consumption and production activities separately. Further research is required to extend the model to explain household labor supply to both the farm and off-farm labor markets.     

规模经济抑或分工经济——来自农业家庭经营绩效的证据

农地规模经营与农业分工深化是实现农业规模经营的两类相互关联的路径选择.本文探讨了农地经营规模、农业分工与农业家庭经营绩效之间的关系,并利用江汉平原地区的1701个样本农户调查数据进行实证检验.结果表明:(1)农地流转及其规模经营内生的交易费用与组织管理成本问题,导致农地规模对农业家庭经营绩效的改进效应存在适度规模水平;...     

广东农村无地人口现状与获地途径研究

在落实了土地承包期30年不变的背景下,通过对广东省内传统的村庄、农户采取入户访谈的方式,就有关无地人口生产状态方面的问题进行调查后发现,在广东省内传统的农村地区,国家土地政策和各村是否严格执行国家土地政策对无地人口的数量有重要的影响,不断增加的无地人口对土地调整有影响,对土地转入没有直接影响却在一定程度上限制了农地转出,农村无地人口通过家庭继承的方式获取土地更普遍。     

Wage and employment effects of Malawi's fertilizer subsidy program

This article uses three waves of nationally representative household‐level panel data from Malawi to estimate how a large‐scale fertilizer subsidy program impacts the agricultural labor market, known as ganyu in that country. I find that when looking across the entire population of smallholders, receiving an additional 100 kg of subsidized fertilizer causes the average household to supply about three fewer days of ganyu. The fertilizer subsidy program also has a small positive effect on the probability that a household demands agricultural labor, with the results approaching statistical significance. In addition, a 10 kg increase in the average amount of subsidized fertilizer acquired per household in a community boosts the median agricultural wage rate by 1.4% in that community. The increase in wage rates translates to a US $1.40 per year increase in average household income in the years after Malawi's subsidy program was scaled up, and a US $1.86 per year increase in average household income for those who sold their labor before the subsidy program was scaled up. This finding suggests that households who sell their labor off farm may experience some small spillover benefit from the program in the form of higher agricultural wage rates.     

Labor force participation of women left behind in Tajikistan

This paper examines the impact of male migration on the labor force participation of the women left behind in Tajikistan. Studies from many countries show that when men migrate, female labor force participation decreases and this is largely explained by the income effect from remittances. Our study challenges this finding. Using panel data from 2007, 2009 and 2011, we find that, in Tajikistan, migration has no significant effect on the number of hours that women work. We use panel data which allow us to control for unobservable heterogeneity, rather than the cross-sectional data used by others. We analyze several countervailing factors that may have neutralized the income effect, such as the need to substitute for the missing labor in the household. We also find that women work more when the household has a farm, regardless of the presence of a migrant in the household.     

Modeling farmers' decisions on child labor and schooling in the cocoa sector: a multinomial logit analysis in Côte d'Ivoire

Since 2000, children working in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire have found themselves in the media spotlight. This situation has assumed particular importance because approximately 40% of the world's cocoa production occurs in Côte d'Ivoire. Concerned parties have since taken great interest in this thorny issue. There is a need to better understand the reality of child labor utilization in this sector. This article investigates child labor issues in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire in conjunction with schooling status of children. The study is based on a survey done in 2002, over a representative sample of more than 11,000 members of cocoa households. The multinomial logit model is used to capture choice probabilities across work and/or school options. The results reveal that child labor in cocoa farms and nonenrollment in schools are significant. Moreover, many children are involved in potentially dangerous and/or harmful tasks. Data also highlight gender and age dimensions in the participation of children in tasks and the way labor is allocated. Econometric results generally indicate that the gender and age of children, whether or not the child is the biological child of the household head, parents' education, the origin of the farmer, household welfare, household size, the household dependency ratio, the size of other perennial crop farms, the number of sharecroppers working with the household head, and communities' characteristics are all pertinent in explaining the child work/schooling outcome in the cocoa sector of Côte d'Ivoire.     

Expenditure Pattern for Food Away from Home Consumption in Turkey

ABSTRACT

One of the largest recent changes in consumer food purchasing behavior is the trend towards greater consumption of food eaten outside the home. Between 1994 and 2000, the share of total food expenditures spent on food away from home (FAFH) increased from 7 to 15% with an increasing share for fast-food facilities. This study focuses on whether demographic and socioeconomic factors have detectable effects on Turkish FAFH expenditures. This question is of interest because previous studies suggest that increasing household income, education, female labor participation and changing lifestyle especially in developing countries increased household FAFH consumption share but decreased food at home consumption share. However, no study to our knowledge has examined the combined effect of income, education, employment, and family status on Turkish FAFH consumption. The data for this research were obtained from personal interviews of representative sample households of the province of Adana in Turkey. The findings of this study generally indicate that restaurant facilities, employment of wife and education, composition of household, and income are statistically significant determinants of FAFH consumption.     

Market imperfections,liquidity, and farm household labor allocation: the case of rural South Africa

Asset endowments and market imperfections shape households’ labor allocation decisions and lead to different production regimes within rural farm households in South Africa. This article uses a farm household model to explain the presence of three main household groups determined on the basis of the labor regime adopted: small peasants (working both on and off farm), self‐cultivators (autarkic in labor) and hiring‐in households. A partial generalized ordered logit is used to test the main predictions of the model and a Brant test on threshold constancy is performed to identify the household‐specific factors affecting labor market participation. The results show that liquidity constraints and market imperfections matter in the choice of the labor strategy adopted. Liquidity‐constrained households are more likely to sell labor off farm while access to information facilitates the hiring in of workers.     

A System Comparison Approach to Distinguish Two Nonseparable and Nonnested Agricultural Household Models

This study distinguishes two nonseparable agricultural household models for a self-employed farm household. One assumes heterogeneity of farm and nonfarm labor and a competitive market for nonfarm labor. The other assumes homogeneity of the two types of labor and a restricted market for nonfarm labor. We compare demand systems that are derived from them, which have different dependent variables and different numbers of equations. We apply a Cox-type test to compare these complicated nonnested systems. Results show clearly that the former is better for Japanese rice-farming households. Comparison of price elasticities for those models verifies the importance of that test.