Forschung zur Entwicklungsökonomie und -politik / Research in development economics and policy

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hohpublica.uni-hohenheim.de/handle/123456789/15821

Browse

Now showing 1 - 5 of 5

Debt position of developing countries and new initiatives for debt reduction: a panel data fixed effects estimation of the impacts of the HIPC initiatives
(2005) Houssou, Nazaire; Heidhues, Franz
In September 1996, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund launched the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC). This initiative was endorsed by 180 governments around the world as an effective and welcome approach to help poor, severely indebted countries reduce debt as a part of the overall poverty reduction strategy. Three years later, the initiative was enhanced to provide for faster, broader and deeper debt relief. Using a panel data fixed effect estimation, this study assesses the achievements of the first and second HIPC initiatives and explores further areas of intervention that might help the HIPCs graduate from debt rescheduling and achieve sustainable growth and poverty alleviation. Despite moderate achievements of the HIPC measures so far, this paper argues in favour of a HIPC III initiative. Much more relief is needed to link debt reduction to poverty alleviation if the expectations raised by the HIPC initiatives are to become reality.
Payments for environmental services : incentives through carbon sequestration compensation for cocoa-based agroforestry systems in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia
(2008) Zeller, Manfred; Seeberg-Elverfeldt, Christina; Schwarze, Stefan
Up to 25 percent of all anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are caused by deforestation, and Indonesia is the third largest greenhouse gas emitter worldwide due to land use change and deforestation. On the island of Sulawesi in the vicinity of the Lore Lindu National Park (LLNP), many smallholders contribute to conversion processes at the forest margin as a result of their agricultural practices. Specifically the area dedicated to cocoa plantations has increased from zero (1979) to nearly 18,000 hectares (2001). Some of these plots have been established inside the 220,000 hectares of the LLNP. An intensification process is observed with a consequent reduction of the shade tree density. This study assesses which impact carbon sequestration payments for forest management systems have on the prevailing land use systems. Additionally, the level of incentives is determined which motivates farmers to desist from further deforestation and land use intensification activities. Household behaviour and resource allocation is analysed with a comparative static linear programming model. As these models prove to be a reliable tool for policy analysis, the output can indicate the adjustments in resource allocation and land use shifts when introducing compensation payments. The data was collected in a household survey in six villages around the LLNP. Four household categories are identified according to their dominant agroforestry systems. These range from low intensity management with a high degree of shading to highly intensified shade free systems. At the plot level, the payments from carbon sequestration are the highest for the full shade cocoa agroforestry system, but with low carbon prices of ? 5 tCO2e-1 these constitute 5 percent of the cocoa gross margin. Focusing on the household level, however, an increase of up to 18 percent of the total gross margin can be realised. Furthermore, for differentiated carbon prices up to ? 32 tCO2e-1 the majority of the households have an incentive to adopt the more sustainable shade intensive agroforestry system. A win-win situation seems to appear, whereby, when targeting only the shade intensive agroforestry systems with carbon payments, the poorest households economically benefit the most and land use systems with high environmental benefits are promoted.
Targeting of and outreach to the poor by rural development nonprofit organizations in Cameroon
(2010) Balgah, Azibo Roland; Buchenrieder, Gertrud
The importance of nonprofit organizations such as rural development organizations, farmers associations and common initiative groups as drivers of change in rural areas has been generally recognized in the economics of nonprofit organizations. While the economic theories attempt to explain the formation and functioning of nonprofit organizations, the targeting and outreach performance of these organizations has received little attention and at best is empirically divergent. Using the example of a nonprofit rural development organization in North West Cameroon, this paper analyzes the relative poverty of beneficiaries and non beneficiaries of its small scale fish farming program as a proxy for targeting efficiency. Poverty is measured through multiple indicators as well as household incomes. The results show that the nonprofit organization did a commendable job in serving poor communities, although its self targeting approach led to a disproportionately higher share of beneficiaries from the moderately poor and better-off terciles than from the poorest. Beneficiaries also had higher asset values and incomes than nonbeneficiaries, although the contribution of the fish farming activity to these was insignificant. This means that these households were already better-off prior to the program and not necessarily as a consequence of service delivery. The paper concludes with the need for relative poverty assessments prior to service delivery for improved targeting and outreach performance, while considering the additional costs involved.
Targeting the poor and smallholder farmers : empirical evidence from Malawi
(2009) Houssou, Nazaire; Zeller, Manfred
This paper develops low cost, reasonably accurate, and simple models for improving the targeting efficiency of development policies in Malawi. Using a stepwise logistic regression (weighted) along with other techniques applied in credit scoring, the research identifies a set of easily observable and verifiable indicators for correctly predicting whether a household is poor or not, based on the 2004-05 Malawi Integrated Household Survey data. The predictive power of the models is assessed using out-of-sample validation tests and receiver operating characteristic curves, whereas the model?s robustness is evaluated by bootstrap simulation methods. Finally, sensitivity analyses are performed using the international and extreme poverty lines. The models developed have proven their validity in an independent sample derived from the same population. Findings suggest that the rural model calibrated to the national poverty line correctly predicts the status of about 69% of poor households when applied to an independent subset of surveyed households, whereas the urban model correctly identifies 64% of poor households. Increasing the poverty line improves the model?s targeting performances, while reducing the poverty line does the opposite. In terms of robustness, the rural model yields a more robust result with a prediction margin ±10% points compared to the urban model. While the best indicator sets can potentially yield a sizable impact on poverty if used in combination with a direct transfer program, some non-poor households would also be targeted as the result of model?s leakage. One major feature of the models is that household score can be easily and quickly computed in the field. Overall, the models developed can be potential policy tools for Malawi.
Use of household food insecurity scales for assessing poverty in Bangladesh and Uganda
(2008) Alcarez V., Gabriela; Zeller, Manfred
An important dimension of poverty is access to food. Household food security implies access to the food needed for a healthy and productive life. Lack of access to and/or impaired utilization of food contribute to household food insecurity. This study compares the usefulness of a standardized food insecurity scale for determining the food insecurity status of rural and urban households in Bangladesh and Uganda, and for predicting poverty status. The analysis uses data from the IRIS Composite Survey Household Questionnaire (2004), which consists of 1,587 households (approximately 800 households in each country). The coping mechanisms adopted in the presence of food shortages represent the building blocks for the development of the scale (7 items). In order to assess the suitability of the scale as an estimator of the households? poverty status, the benchmark indicator ?daily expenditures per capita? and its relation to the corresponding poverty line serves as the basis for evaluation for each country. The scale provides the means for classifying the households into 3 main groups: Non Food Insecure, Moderately Food Insecure, and Severely Food Insecure. The reliability of the scale is measured via the Cronbach?s Alpha statistic. In addition, the scale is used in regression analysis in order to predict per capita daily expenditures and the poverty incidence. The results show that food insecurity does not always reflect (income) poverty. However, the use of the scale as a predictor of poverty status produces rough estimates of poverty incidence that could be useful as background information. The differentiation of households according to their food security status may be valuable for focusing and developing improved food insecurity mitigation strategies.

Browse

Browsing Forschung zur Entwicklungsökonomie und -politik / Research in development economics and policy by Subject "Armut"