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This study documents the long-term welfare effects of household non-traditional agricultural export (NTX) adoption. The analysis uses a unique panel dataset, which spans the period 1985-2005, and employs difference-in-differences estimation to investigate the long-term impact of non-traditional agricultural export adoption on changes in household consumption status and asset position in the Central Highlands of Guatemala. Given the heterogeneity in adoption patterns, the analysis differentiates the impact estimates based on a classification of households that takes into account the timing and duration of non-traditional agricultural export adoption. The results show that while, on average, welfare levels have improved for all households irrespective of adoption status and duration, the extent of improvement has varied across groups. Long-term adopters exhibit the smallest increase in the lapse of two decades, in spite of some early gains. Conversely, early adopters who withdrew from non-traditional agricultural export production after reaping the benefits of the boom period of the 1980s are found to have fared better and shown greater improvements in durable asset position and housing conditions than any other category.

This study is the first to document the long-term welfare effects of household non-traditional agricultural export (NTX) adoption. We use a unique panel dataset, which spans the period of 1985-2005, and employ difference-in-differences estimation to investigate the long-term impact of NTX adoption on changes in household consumption status and asset position in Santiago Sacatepéquez municipality of Guatemala. Given the heterogeneity in adoption patterns, we differentiate the impact estimates based on a classification of households that takes into account the timing and duration of NTX adoption. Our results show that while, on average, welfare levels have improved for all households irrespective of adoption status and duration, the extent of improvement varied across groups, with long-term adopters exhibiting the smallest increase in the lapse of two decades, in spite of some early gains. Conversely, early adopters who withdrew from NTX production after reaping the benefits of the boom period of the 1980s are found to have fared better and shown greater improvements in durable asset position and housing conditions than any other category.

This study uses a unique panel dataset that spans a 20-year period (1985-2005), and estimates the effect of household non-traditional agricultural export (NTX) adoption on changes in livelihood orientation and participation in non-farm employment in Santiago Sacatepéquez municipality of Guatemala. Given the heterogeneity in adoption patterns, it provides differential impact estimates based on a classification of households that takes into account the timing and duration of NTX adoption. Our findings suggest that over time, household reliance on off-farm income and access to non-farm employment, particularly self-employment and blue collar work, increased in the surveyed communities, irrespective of snow pea adoption. However, the extent of change varied across groups. Although the magnitudes of increase in the aforementioned outcomes among early long-term adopters and late adopters were not statistically significant with respect to the trends among non-adopters, early adopters who withdrew from NTX production in the medium-term exhibited greater and statistically significant increases in the same livelihood outcomes with respect to any other category.

In 1993, in response to persistent unemployment, and rising poverty and social unrest, the government of Albania introduced an anti-poverty program, namely Ndihma Ekonomike; in 1995 it was extended to all poor households. This paper estimates the separate effects of participation in this income support program and the old-age pension program on objective and subjective measures of household poverty. The analysis uses the nationally representative Albanian Living Standards Measurement Surveys carried out in 2002 and 2005. Using propensity score matching methods, the paper finds that Ndihma Ekonomike households, particularly urban residents, have lower per capita consumption and are more likely to be discontented with their lives, financial situation, and consumption levels than their matched comparators. In contrast, households receiving pensions are not significantly different from their matched comparators in reference to the same set of outcomes. The paper finds that the negative impact of Ndihma Ekonomike participation on welfare is driven by a negative labor supply response among work-eligible individuals. This negative labor response is larger among women and urban residents. In contrast to Ndihma Ekonomike, the receipt of old-age pension income transfers does not significantly impact the labor supply of prime-age individuals living in pension households

In view of its increasing importance, and the dearth of information on return migration and its impacts on source households, this study uses data from the 2005 Albania Living Standards Measurement Study survey and assesses the impact of past migration experience of Albanian households on non-farm business ownership through instrumental variables regression techniques. Moreover, considering the differences in earning potentials and opportunities for skill acquisition in different destination countries, the impact of household past migration experience is differentiated by main migrant destinations, namely Greece, and Italy. The study also tests for the hypothesis of the existence of migration cycles, by differentiating the time spent abroad based on the year of return. The empirical results indicate that household past migration experience exerts a positive impact on the probability of owning a non-farm business. While one additional year in Greece increases the probability of household business ownership by roughly 7 percent, a similar experience in Italy or further destinations raises the probability by over 30 percent. Although past migration experience for the period of 1990-2000 is positively associated with the likelihood of owning a household enterprise, a similar impact does not materialize for the period of 2001-2004. The latter finding seems suggestive of the fact that more recent migrants are yet to attain a target level of required savings and skills in order to successfully establish a new business upon return., FAO Document Repository: http://www.fao.org/3/a-ai460e.pdf

Stylized facts set agendas and shape debates. In rapidly changing and data scarce environments, they also risk being ill-informed, outdated and misleading. So, following higher food prices since the 2008 world food crisis, robust economic growth and rapid urbanization, and climatic change, is conventional wisdom about African agriculture and rural livelihoods still accurate? Or is it more akin to myth than fact? The essays in “Agriculture in Africa – Telling Myths from Facts” aim to set the record straight. They exploit newly gathered, nationally representative, geo-referenced information at the household and plot level, from six African countries. In these new Living Standard Measurement Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture, every aspect of farming and non-farming life is queried—from the plots farmers cultivate, the crops they grow, the harvest that is achieved, and the inputs they use, to all the other sources of income they rely on and the risks they face. Together the surveys cover more than 40 percent of the Sub-Saharan African population. In all, sixteen conventional wisdoms are examined, relating to four themes: the extent of farmer’s engagement in input, factor and product markets; the role of off-farm activities; the technology and farming systems used; and the risk environment farmers face. Some striking surprises, in true myth-busting fashion, emerge. And a number of new issues are also thrown up. The studies bring a more refined, empirically grounded understanding of the complex reality of African agriculture. They also confirm that investing in regular, nationally representative data collection yields high social returns.

This dissertation comprises four chapters, which mainly deal with female's participation in household decision-making, a very important aspect of female's bargaining power within the household and closely linked to female's empowerment. The first three chapters, which all deal with female's participation in household decision-making, are two sides of the same coin, in that while the first one delves into the determinants of female's participation in household decision-making, the second and third chapters deal with its beneficial consequences. The fourth chapter is linked with Chapter 1. As a matter of fact, the data used in Chapter 1 has been collected in Rural Burundi, in the framework of the FNRS/FRFC-funded project “Microfinance Services, Intra-household Behavior and Welfare in Developing Countries: A Longitudinal and Experimental Approach”, which funded my PhD scholarship. In 2012, the project funded data collection in Rural Burundi. In respect to the experimental component of the project, these are baseline data. The 2012 household survey targeted a sample of rural households that have been interviewed in 1998 and 2007. This is where the longitudinal design of the project comes into play. Independently from the experimental research, the longitudinal nature of the data, that is to say three waves of data (1998, 2007 and 2012), had the advantage of allowing panel analysis of interesting and relevant issues in development, including for example the long-term welfare effects of shocks at either individual or household levels.In Chapter 1, entitled “The Power of The Family: kinship and Intra-household Decision-making in Rural Burundi” and co-authored with Bram De Rock and Philip Verwimp, we delve into the determinants of female's participation in household decision-making, by laying a particular emphasis on the role of female's kinship. We show that in rural Burundi the characteristics of the female's kinship are highly correlated with her decision-making power. First, a female whose own immediate family is at least as rich as her husband's counterpart enjoys a greater say over children- and asset-related decision-making. Second, the size, relative wealth and proximity of the extended family also matter. Third, kinship characteristics prove to be more important than (standard) individual and household characteristics. Finally, we also show that the female's say over asset-related decision-making is positively associated with males' education, more than with female's education per se. All these correlation patterns can inform policies aiming at empowering women or targeting children through women's empowerment.In Chapter 2, entitled “The Returns of I Do: Multifaceted Female Decision-making and Agricultural Yields in Tanzania?”, I use the third round of the Tanzanian National Panel Survey to investigate the effect of multifaceted female's empowerment in agriculture on agricultural yields. The classic approach in the empirical literature on gender gap in agriculture includes the gender of the plot's owner/manager as the covariate of interest and interprets the associated coefficient estimate as the gender gap in agricultural productivity. Unlike this classic approach in the analysis of productivity differentials, my approach lays emphasis on the overlapping and interaction effects of manifold aspects of female's empowerment in agriculture, including female plot's ownership, female plot's management and female output's control. I find significant productivity gaps, which the classic empirical approach does not bring out in the same context. As compared to plots (solely) owned, managed and controlled by male, (i) plots merely owned by female and (ii) those owned & managed (but not controlled) by female are less productive, but those owned, managed & controlled by female are not. Furthermore, the latter are the more productive among plots at least owned by female. All these productivity gaps are predominantly explained by the structural effect, that is differences in productivity returns to observable production factors. Our findings are robust along a number of dimensions and suggest that female's management and control rights are of prime importance. Therefore, female plot's owners should be entitled the rights to manage their plot and, subsequently and most importantly, the rights to control the (agricultural) output of their work, for their productivity to be enhanced and the gender gap in agriculture to be closed. In Chapter 3, entitled “Say On Income and Children's Outcomes: Evidence from Nigeria”, I delve into the effect of female bargaining power on child education and labor outcomes in Nigeria. Female bargaining power is proxied by “female say on labor income”, rather than by her income per se. This is motivated by the fact the female labor force participation might be low in some contexts, while control over income is by all means what matters the most. The empirical methodology accounts for a number of empirical issues, including endogeneity and sample selection issues of female say on labor income, the multi-equation and mixed process features of the child outcomes, as well as the fact that hours of work are left-censored. My findings are consistent with the overall idea that female say on income leads to better child outcomes, rather than female income earning per se. Nevertheless, the type of income under female control, child gender and child outcome matter. Chapter 4, entitled “Violence Exposure and Welfare Over Time: Evidence From The Burundi Civil War” and co-authored with Marion Mercier and Philip Verwimp, investigates the relationship between exposure to conflict and poverty dynamics over time. We use a three-wave panel data from Burundi, which tracked individuals and reported local-level violence exposure in 1998, 2007 and 2012. Firstly, the data reveal that headcount poverty has not changed since 1998 while we observe multiple transitions into and out of poverty. Moreover, households exposed to the war exhibit a lower level of welfare than non-exposed households, with the difference between the two groups predicted to remain significant at least until 2017, i.e. twelve years after the conflict termination. The correlation between violence exposure and deprivation over time is confirmed in a household-level panel setting. Secondly, our empirical investigation shows how violence exposure over different time spans interacts with households' subsequent welfare. Our analysis of the determinants of households' likelihood to switch poverty status (i.e. to fall into poverty or escape poverty) combined with quintile regressions suggest that, (i) exposure during the first phase of the conflict has affected the entire distribution, and (ii) exposure during the second phase of the conflict has mostly affected the upper tail of the distribution: initially non-poor households have a higher propensity to fall into poverty while initially poor households see their propensity to pull through only slightly decrease with recent exposure to violence. Although not directly testable with the data at hand, these results are consistent with the changing nature of violence in the course of the Burundi civil war, from relatively more labor-destructive to relatively more capital-destructive., Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestion, info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished