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Agricultural credit is an important tool that can improve farm production, ensure food security, increase household income, and ultimately catalyse rural development. This study examined the factors affecting the credit constraints on farm households in Punjab, Pakistan. A questionnaire was administered, and 519 farm households were recruited from five randomly selected districts of Punjab province. The data were analyzed using a two-step methodology. In the first step, direct elicitation was used to identify the credit constraints of farm households. In the second step, the Probit model was employed to analyze the factors that affect the likelihood of farm households facing credit constraints. The results showed that household head education, farm size, and farm capital had significant negative effects on the presence of credit constraints. The dependency ratio and household consumption expenditures had significant positive effects on farm households' likelihood of being credit constrained. These findings may help to mitigate the removal of farm household credit constraints and improve access to institutional credit, as well as reducing food insecurity and income inequality. The Central Bank of Pakistan should strictly monitor the lending procedures of commercial banks and introduce relaxed policies for new applicants and small landholders. Driving down the interest rate for agricultural businesses and offering loans for improved farm technologies at subsidized rates could be another important policy option. Awareness sessions about lending and repayment procedures should be conducted at the village level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extensive use of pesticides in agricultural production results in increased health risks and health costs, productivity loss, and degradation of the environment. Farmers' risk perceptions of pesticide residues can help mitigate these issues. This paper applies an ordered probit model to analyze farmers' perceptions of pesticide residues using a cross-sectional dataset of 209 vegetable cultivators in Punjab, Pakistan. Important determinants of farmers' perceptions include their educational level, family labor, ratio of self-consumed foodstuffs, health effects, integrated pest management (IPM) training, knowledge, and awareness. Among these determinants, farmers' awareness and IPM training programs are the principle indicators of risk perception. These results have significant implications for policymakers because farmers' perceptions including overuse of pesticides tend to worsen if supported by the internalization of social norms, which, in turn, is restricted by farmers' awareness and knowledge. The study findings suggest that special attention should be given to farmers who are limited to receiving information directly from agricultural extension officers. Moreover, intensive IPM training programs should be designed with the aim of conveying precautionary measures for human health and a sustainable agro-ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To achieve sustainable future for all, United Nations' (UNs') Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs-2030) reinforced the formulation of social, economic and human development policies. Pakistan is a country with high population growth rate, among top ten recipients of foreign remittances but facing an acute problem of stagnant human development outcomes over the years. Of note, Pakistan's economic growth is considered as growth without human face (see Easterly in The political economy of growth without development: A case study of Pakistan, 2001). It is, therefore, important from public policy point of view to understand the short-and long-run dynamics of the relationships between important social, demographic and economic factors. Accordingly, this paper investigates the short-and long-run relationships between population growth, government social spending, foreign remittances inflow and aggregate level of human development in Pakistan using Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach of cointegration and error correction models. The cointegration test results showed that there is cointegration among the variables to proceed with the estimations of long-run relationships. Our empirical results confirm the existence of short-and long-run relationships between population growth, remittances inflow and human development in Pakistan. Population growth inversely while remittances inflow positively influenced Pakistan's human development status both in the short-and long-run. The empirical findings of our study call for designing and implementing robust development policies—that result in effective and sustainable human development—mainly towards viewing population from a more humanitarian and equitable perspective in Pakistan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]