Intergenerational Mobility and Interracial Inequality: The Return to Family Values

This paper investigates two questions. First, what is the relative importance of the components of childhood family environment—parental values versus parental class status—for young adult economic outcomes? Second, are interracial differences in labor market outcomes fully explained by differences in family environment? We find that both family values and family class status affect intergenerational mobility and inter‐racial inequality. Consideration of racial differences in parental values and class status alters but does not eliminate the impact of race on the labor market outcomes of young adults.     

Socioeconomic impacts of school feeding programmes: empirical evidence from a South Indian village

Tamil Nadu a poverty-stricken rural community in South India, funds a school feeding program with about 10% of the state budget. Comparisons of nutrition and literacy show that they are significantly related. No studies have yet been performed to analyse the effect of the feeding programs on aspects of a household's economic and social welfare. The feeding program in Tamil Nadu extends throughout the year, 7 days a week. It provides not only a reason for children to attend school, but also employment opportunities for those who wish to cook. 455 households were surveyed from 1 village using. A Gini coefficient of inequality to determine inequality levels of nutrition, food, and consumption expenditure. Sen's index of poverty was used to calculate the reduction in poverty levels. 3 household groups were defined: the agricultural labor, the silk weaver, and the cultivator. Linear program modelling utilized these 3 groups to study the total effect of nutrition on education. Linear regression was then used to determine the effect of the feeding program on participation in school. At the village level, a reduction of inequality in consumption and intake, an increase in energy intake, and a decrease in poverty level were found. In agricultural labor and silk weaver households, most of the money was spent on cereal food grains and children were mostly uneducated. If modelled to assume that children must be educated and are educated in schools providing food, results suggest that the increase in nutrition helps retain the children in the schools. Cultivator household response to the food programs was poor, since they usually have enough money to meet nutritional needs. Household income and school nutrition, but not adult literacy affect school participation. In general, nutrition offered in school caused a subsequent increase in household purchases of non-cereal items in the first 2 household types.     

Seasonal rural labor markets and their relevance to policy analyses in developing countries

Seasonality is a salient feature of rural livelihoods and particularly within agriculture the demand for labor varies with the seasons and weather. In low-income countries, agriculture employs almost two-thirds of the labor force and incomes from labor are a major determinant of welfare. Therefore, an appropriate model representation of rural labor markets is critical when analyzing agricultural and food policies. Economy-wide models are commonly used for ex-ante policy analysis, but have so far ignored the influence of seasonality, implicitly assuming separability of seasonal labor demand and supply. This study relaxes that assumption using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model calibrated to the Bhutanese economy as an illustrative case. Using model setups with and without seasonal labor markets, a cereal export ban of India is simulated leading to higher import prices for Bhutan. Results demonstrate that neglecting the influence of seasons on rural labor markets systematically biases model results. Assuming homogeneity of labor units, i.e., allowing substitution across seasons, understates the impacts of policy changes on rural wage rates, distorts households' labor-leisure trade-off decisions and overstates agricultural supply response. Given the widespread use of economy-wide models, the results are important for understanding the implications of domestic and global policy changes for agriculture and welfare in developing economies.     

Seasonal poverty in Madagascar: magnitude and solutions

Seasonal reductions in food consumption pull about one million Malagasy below the poverty line during the lean season. There they join the nine million more who remain chronically undernourished throughout the year. Because the seasonality of food shortages coincides with the increased prevalence of diarrhea and other diseases during the rainy season, the resulting lean season exacts a heavy toll in the form of increased rates of malnutrition and child mortality. Combining the results of recent field studies with a seasonal multi-market model, this paper measures the probable impacts of three common interventions aimed at combatting seasonal food insecurity. We find the most promising interventions to be those that increase agricultural productivity of the secondary food crops such as cassava, other roots and tubers, and maize.     

Household Behavior with Imperfect Labor Markets

A household model with differential asset endowments and idiosyncratic transactions costs in accessing labor markets is developed to (1) explain membership of farm households to alternative labor regimes (sellers, employers, or self-sufficient in labor), (2) test for recursivity between production and consumption decisions selectively by labor regime, and (3) identify the determinants of differential labor productivity across labor regimes. The model is applied to a 1994 household survey of the Mexican land reform sector.     

Differences in food insecurity between adults and children in Zimbabwe

Food insecurity is a serious challenge facing millions of households across Africa. Within these households, distinguishing the incidence of food insecurity between adults and children is often difficult because most surveys rely on the reports of adults. In this paper, we address this shortcoming of previous work by using a survey from over 6000 households in Zimbabwe where interviews were conducted with both an adult caregiver and a child. Using two measures of food insecurity, we find that reports of adults and children differ within households with lower reports of food insecurity among children, with children in the youngest age groups particularly being protected from food shortages. An exception to this general rule, though, is in better-off households where children are often more likely to be food insecure than adults. Findings also demonstrate the need for multiple measures to comprehensively capture the full picture of food insecurity in the household.     

How much of the labor in African agriculture is provided by women?

The contribution of women to labor in African agriculture is regularly quoted in the range of 60–80%. Using individual, plot-level labor input data from nationally representative household surveys across six Sub-Saharan African countries, this study estimates the average female labor share in crop production at 40%. It is slightly above 50% in Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda, and substantially lower in Nigeria (37%), Ethiopia (29%), and Niger (24%). There are no systematic differences across crops and activities, but female labor shares tend to be higher in households where women own a larger share of the land and when they are more educated. Controlling for the gender and knowledge profile of the respondents does not meaningfully change the predicted female labor shares. The findings question prevailing assertions regarding substantial gains in aggregate crop output as a result of increasing female agricultural productivity.     

Can food safety shortfalls disrupt ‘Ag for Nutrition’ gains? Evidence from Eid al-Adha

The international health community has stressed the need to raise consumption levels of animal-source foods in developing countries. Development programs based on so-called ‘agriculture for nutrition’ strategies emphasize the importance of smallholder livestock production to achieve these goals. While much of the literature has highlighted the high nutritional potential of such foods, little attention has been paid to infrastructural deficiencies for handling and processing animal-source foods, particularly meat. Such shortfalls in food safety have the potential to counteract some health gains, especially if renewed efforts to increase animal consumption are not combined with improved processing capacity. The spike in meat consumption among Muslims worldwide on Eid al-Adha provides a natural experiment to test the extent to which such food safety concerns are justified. Meat processing on this holiday often exceeds the capacity of formal slaughter and processing infrastructure, and thus provides an excellent opportunity to observe the implications of a rapid intensification of meat production and consumption across several countries. Using Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data from countries in Africa and Asia, we estimate the impact of this holiday on the incidence of diarrheal illness among children. Eid al-Adha provides a plausibly exogenous source of variation in home or informally sourced meat consumption among Muslims, a natural comparison group (Non-Muslims) and independence from seasonal influences (the holiday follows the lunar Islamic calendar). We find that relative to non-Muslims, diarrhea morbidity increases for Muslim children following Eid al-Adha by 18 percent. No such similar increase is found on Eid al-Fitr, a similarly important Muslim holiday without extensive home slaughter. These findings reinforce the importance of food safety concerns in livestock sector interventions.     

Assessing nutritional status and nutrition-related knowledge,attitudes and practices of Albanian schoolchildren to support school food and nutrition policies and programmes

In Albania, many children exhibit poor nutritional status, have unhealthy diets and inadequate physical activity. Yet, comprehensive studies on the nutritional status, food and nutrition knowledge, attitudes and practices (KAP) are largely non-existent for Albanian school-age children.To fill these important gaps, a nationwide survey was conducted in Albania in 2017–2018 to assess the nutritional status and the nutrition-related KAP of Albanian school-aged children.The study consisted of a nationally representative sample of 7578 Albanian schoolchildren from all regions of the country. In addition, 6810 parent questionnaires were collected, along with interviews with the directors of all involved schools, 311 teachers and 53 key informants representing local authorities in all districts of Albania. Data collection consisted of anthropometric measurements of children and structured questionnaires administered to children, their parents, teachers, school directors, and key informants.The survey is unique in both the scope of the respondents involved, and in the breadth of content area covered, and as such, makes an important contribution not only to Albania, but also to the field of research in food, health and nutrition for school-age children.This paper presents the preliminary findings from the KAP survey that will help influence policies for actionable advancement on the commitments and priorities of Albania to improve food security and nutrition. In particular, the study findings will support the development of a national school food and nutrition programme in Albania embedded into the local food system and the design of food and nutrition educational materials and campaigns to promote healthy diets and practices among both school-age children and the Albanian population.     

Does a Mandatory Reduction of Standard Working Hours Improve Employees' Health Status?

Most of the empirical evidence regarding the impact of reductions of standard working hours analyzes its effects on employment outcomes, family life balance, and social networks, but there is no empirical evidence of its effects on health outcomes. This study uses panel data for France and Portugal and exploits the exogenous variation of working hours coming from labor regulation and estimates its impact on health outcomes (from 39 to 35 hours a week and from 44 to 40 hours a week, respectively). Results suggest that the mandatory reduction of standard working hours decreased the working hours of treated individuals (and not the hours of individuals in the control group). Results also suggest that the fact of being treated generated a negative (positive) effect on young males’ (females’) health in France. No effects on health outcomes were found for Portugal.     

Impact of commuting by workers on household dietary diversity in rural India

Drawing insights from the literature on transformation of rural non-farm employment, pathways from agriculture to nutrition, and linkages between migration and nutritional status of household, we seek to understand differences in dietary diversity across three mutually exclusive types of rural Indian households: where all members work in rural areas, at least one member commutes to urban areas, at least one member has no fixed place of work. Our analysis is based on a nationally representative data set from India for the year 2009–10 and we use propensity score matching methods. We find that as compared to households with no commuters, households with rural–urban commuters have higher dietary diversity; whereas households with no fixed place workers have lower dietary diversity. We also find differences in dietary diversity across households which differ by their primary source of income.     

Labor productivity and employment gaps in Sub-Saharan Africa

Drawing on a new set of nationally representative, internationally comparable household surveys, this paper provides an overview of key features of structural transformation – labor allocation and labor productivity – in four African economies. New, micro-based measures of sector labor allocation and cross-sector productivity differentials describe the incentives households face when allocating their labor. These measures are similar to national accounts-based measures that are typically used to characterize structural change. However, because agricultural workers supply far fewer hours of labor per year than do workers in other sectors in all of the countries analyzed, productivity gaps shrink by half, on average, when expressed on a per-hour basis. Underlying the productivity gaps that are prominently reflected in national accounts data are large employment gaps, which call into question the productivity gains that laborers can achieve through structural transformation. Furthermore, agriculture’s continued relevance to structural change in Sub-Saharan Africa is highlighted by the strong linkages observed between rural non-farm activities and primary agricultural production.     

Indigenous Shawi communities and national food security support: Right direction,but not enough

Food insecurity is a major challenge facing Peru’s Indigenous Shawi communities, who receive food support through national level programs. There is limited research, however, on how national food and social programming support is perceived, received and used among Indigenous communities. We address this research gap by characterizing the preferred diet and coping mechanisms among Shawi Indigenous households, and investigating community perspectives on the national food program and national social supports. We used a mixed methods approach, including a quantitative survey among eleven Shawi communities in the Peruvian Amazon (n = 177 households), and semi-structured interviews with key informants (n = 24). We found that national food programs in Peru rarely provide foods that are desired and preferred among the Shawi, particularly familiar and locally-sourced protein sources such as bushmeat and fish. Food and social programming requirements do not integrate consideration of the remoteness of many vulnerable households, and are considered culturally or linguistically inaccessible to many families. In some cases, foods supplied by national programs are not consumed as they are perceived as unfamiliar. Key opportunities to improve food and social programing include: monitoring and revising eligibility requirements for remote and highly vulnerable households; increasing provision of locally-preferred protein food and familiar food types; avoiding use of written Spanish as a sole source of information to support programming; extending food provision outside of school months; developing contingency plans during education sector strikes; considering hiring of staff with working knowledge of local languages for community distributions; using visual or oral communication rather than written communication to increase accessibility of programs; increasing knowledge on the use and nutritional value of external food; and considering exemptions to school and health eligibility requirements during the rainy season and during sector strikes. Nationally-developed programming that does not consider Indigenous and cultural contexts risks inefficiency, limited improvement of health outcomes, and the potential to increase inequities in Indigenous health.     

Housing Tenure Transitions of Older Households: What is the Role of Child Proximity?

This study examines the role of proximity of children to their parents and recent moves of children within a proximate distance in housing tenure transitions of older households. This study is the first to investigate the interplay between health status of older households, moves of their children and a household's decision to make housing tenure transitions. In doing so, we rely on longitudinal household data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics with residential location information at the census tract level. The results demonstrate that after controlling for the financial and demographic characteristics of children, living near children reduces the likelihood of making a housing tenure transition for older households, but that the impact of distance is not monotonic with respect to the degree of geographic distances. The results also demonstrate that if a child enters or moves closer to her or his parents’ home, it increases the probability that older households exit homeownership. Finally, we find no evidence that children's moves mitigate the likelihood that their older parents whose health deteriorates become renters.     

Agricultural inputs and nutrition in South Asia

There are a number of potential pathways leading from agricultural input decisions to nutrition outcomes of farm households. These have special resonance in less developed areas of South Asia given widespread undernutrition problems, market failures and restricted access to land and other key assets and inputs, as well as ongoing debates around the implications that the green revolution has held for nutritional outcomes. A number of initiatives, including the Leveraging Agriculture for Nutrition in South Asia (LANSA) project have been undertaking research that addresses these linkages. The objectives of this paper are to systematically review the recent evidence on linkages between agricultural inputs and diet and nutrition outcomes of farm households in South Asia, place relevant LANSA research within the context of this review, and draw implications for policy, practice and the future research agenda. We focus on land and livestock assets and the set of productivity enhancing inputs in the form of irrigation, seed and agrochemicals. We report on a systematic review of recent evidence based on observational data on the links between these agricultural inputs and assets and diet and nutrition outcomes of farm households in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Nepal. We find that the literature has slowly but steadily grown since previous reviews conducted in the early 2010s, but that there is still a long way to go. Review results suggest that while there is no indication that land ownership or size by themselves have clear associations with farm household dietary or nutrition outcomes, land productivity is more clearly associated with improved outcomes. Yet the literature linking specific inputs such as improved seeds or irrigation with nutrition remains very thin. The literature appears strongest for the case of links between livestock keeping and dietary and nutrition outcomes. This is particularly the case with animals reared for milk, with the evidence indicating milch animal ownership improves household milk intakes and thereby influences the growth of children. Priorities for future research include the formulation and testing of more specific hypotheses relating to input-nutrition linkages and more strenuous efforts to improve causal identification in this literature.     

Food price seasonality in Africa: Measurement and extent

Everyone knows about seasonality. But what exactly do we know? This study systematically measures seasonal price gaps at 193 markets for 13 food commodities in seven African countries. It shows that the commonly used dummy variable or moving average deviation methods to estimate the seasonal gap can yield substantial upward bias. This can be partially circumvented using trigonometric and sawtooth models, which are more parsimonious. Among staple crops, seasonality is highest for maize (33 percent on average) and lowest for rice (16½ percent). This is two and a half to three times larger than in the international reference markets. Seasonality varies substantially across market places but maize is the only crop in which there are important systematic country effects. Malawi, where maize is the main staple, emerges as exhibiting the most acute seasonal differences. Reaching the Sustainable Development Goal of Zero Hunger requires renewed policy attention to seasonality in food prices and consumption.     

What happens to diet and child health when migration splits households? Evidence from a migration lottery program

The impact of migration on food security and child health is likely to differ depending on whether children themselves migrate or whether they remain behind while other household members migrate. However, existing studies have not been able to examine how impacts differ in these two scenarios because parallel data are required for both the sending and receiving country. Moreover, self-selection into migration makes unbiased estimation of either impact difficult. We overcome these problems by using a unique survey of Tongan households that applied to migrate to New Zealand through a migrant quota which selects households through a random ballot. This survey covers both migrant children in New Zealand and non-migrant children in Tonga, with the migration policy rules providing a source of exogenous variation for identifying impacts. Our estimates of short-run impacts show that diets diverge upon migration: children who migrate experience improvements, while diets worsen for children who remain. There is also suggestive evidence of a divergence in health outcomes, with increases in weight-for-age and height-for-age found for migrant children, and decreases found for children who remain behind while other household members migrate.     

Integrating climate change,food prices and population health

The inter-related nature of food, health and climate change requires a better understanding of the linkages and a greater alignment of policy across these issues to be able to adequately meet the pressing social and health challenges arising from climate change. Food price is one way through which climate change may affect health. The aim of this study of the global and Australian food systems is to provide a whole-of-system analysis of food price vulnerabilities, highlighting the key pressure points across the food system through which climate change could potentially have the greatest impact on consumer food prices and the implications for population health. We outline areas where there are particular vulnerabilities for food systems and food prices arising from climate change, particularly global commodity prices; agricultural productivity; short term supply shocks; and less direct factors such as input costs and government policies. We use Australia as a high-income country case study to consider these issues in more detail. The complex and dynamic nature of pricing mechanisms makes it difficult to predict precisely how prices will be impacted. Should prices rise disproportionately among healthy foodstuffs compared to less healthy foods there may be adverse health outcomes if less expensive and less healthy foods are substituted. Higher prices will also have equity implications with lower socio-economic groups most impacted given these households currently spend proportionately more of their weekly income on food. The ultimate objective of this research is to identify the pathways through the food system via which climate change may affect food prices and ultimately population health, thereby providing evidence for food policy which takes into account environmental and health considerations.     

Milking the data: Measuring milk off-take in extensive livestock systems. Experimental evidence from Niger

Milk is an important source of cash and nutrients for many households in developing countries. Yet, our understanding of the role of dairy production in livelihoods and nutritional outcomes is hindered by the lack of decent quality household survey data. Data on milk off-take for human consumption are difficult to collect in household surveys for a number of reasons which make accurate recall challenging for the respondent (continuous production and seasonality among others), introducing possibly severe biases in the computation of full household incomes and farm sales, as well as in the estimation of the contribution of livestock (specifically dairy) production to agricultural value added and the livelihoods of rural households.This paper presents results from a validation exercise implemented in Niger, where alternative survey instruments based on recall methods were administered to randomly selected households, and compared to a 12-month system of physical monitoring and recording of milk production. The results of the exercise show that reasonably accurate estimates via recall methods are possible, and provide a clear ranking of questionnaire design options that can inform future survey operations.     

Non-farm entrepreneurship in rural sub-Saharan Africa: New empirical evidence

We report on the prevalence and patterns of non-farm enterprises in six sub-Saharan African countries, and study their performance in terms of labor productivity, survival and exit, using the World Bank’s Living Standards Measurement Study - Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA). Rural households operate enterprises due to both push and pull factors and tend to do so predominantly in easy-to-enter activities, such as sales and trade, rather than in activities that require higher starting costs, such as transport services, or educational investment, such as professional services. Labor productivity differs widely: rural and female-headed enterprises, those located further away from population centers, and businesses that operate intermittently have lower levels of labor productivity compared to urban and male-owned enterprises, or enterprises that operate throughout the year. Finally, rural enterprises exit the market primarily due to a lack of profitability or finance, and due to idiosyncratic shocks.