Pro-poor Growth and Policies: The Asian Experience

The objective of this paper is to assemble on a systematic basis the available data on Asian countries and then analyse the relationship between growth and poverty reduction in a long-term perspective, as well as the impact of different macroeconomic variables on the intensity of this relationship. The results indicate that there is not only a strong positive relationship between growth and poverty reduction, but also that this relationship is highly variable across countries and time periods. The key macroeconomic determinants of the degree of pro-poor growth appear to be the rates of employment and agricultural growth. Inflation, at least up to a certain rate, does not impact poverty negatively, while the role of exports is essentially indirect through the contribution to the overall rate of economic growth. Examination of the change in policy stance of the Asian countries during the 1990s in relation to the 1980s demonstrates that on balance the mix of policies has not been pro-poor. The apparent sacrifice of growth in pursuit of macroeconomic stability has diminished the impact on poverty reduction. Given the relatively weak trade-off between inflation and growth with regard to the impact on poverty and the fact that inflation rates are currently low in the region, it is argued that countries can be more flexible in their policy stance with regard to the adoption of more growth-oriented as opposed to stabilisation policies. In particular, a case is made for resorting to a more expansionary counter-cyclical fiscal policy, led by higher levels of public investment, supported by appropriate monetary and exchange rate policies. The paper concludes with a detailed description of the policies designed to achieve faster agricultural development and greater employment generation.

Devolution and Fiscal Decentralisation

Fiscal decentralisation represents the transfer of resources from higher to lower levels of government usually accompanied by an enhancement in responsibilities and functions of sub- national governments and greater autonomy in their budget making and financial decisions. The rising demand generally for decentralisation in developing countries in recent years is a consequence of the broader processes of globalisation, liberalisation and deregulation. Political imperatives for decentralisation have been created by the urge for more effective democratisation and the need to bring governments closer to the people for greater accountability and better articulation of their needs and preferences. In a number of countries, including Pakistan, the failure of central or state/provincial governments to adequately capture local preferences and provide basic services have strengthened the case for use of local governments as delivery agents, such that the production and distribution of services is carried down to the lowest unit of government capable of capturing the associated costs and benefits.

Refactoring Legacy JavaScript Code to Use Classes: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

JavaScript systems are becoming increasingly complex and large. To tackle the challenges involved in implementing these systems, the language is evolving to include several constructions for programming- in-the-large. For example, although the language is prototype-based, the latest JavaScript standard, named ECMAScript 6 (ES6), provides native support for implementing classes. Even though most modern web browsers support ES6, only a very few applications use the class syntax. In this paper, we analyze the process of migrating structures that emulate classes in legacy JavaScript code to adopt the new syntax for classes introduced by ES6. We apply a set of migration rules on eight legacy JavaScript systems. In our study, we document: (a) cases that are straightforward to migrate (the good parts); (b) cases that require manual and ad-hoc migration (the bad parts); and (c) cases that cannot be migrated due to limitations and restrictions of ES6 (the ugly parts). Six out of eight systems (75%) contain instances of bad and/or ugly cases. We also collect the perceptions of JavaScript developers about migrating their code to use the new syntax for classes.Comment: Paper accepted at 16th International Conference on Software Reuse (ICSR), 2017; 16 page

Hidden Subsidies

Many governments use price subsidisation (total costs less total revenues from user charges) to meet social protection objectives in lieu of, or in addition to, direct income transfers. Such subsidies may be perceived as influencing behaviour to further other socially desirable policies. For example, the price response induced by lowering the price of schooling will both lower the cost of living for the beneficiaries and also increase the investment in education more than a similar income transfer would achieve. The incidences of benefits from a general price subsidy are proportional to purchases and can be deduced from the pattern of expenditures. Some goods are inappropriate vehicles for redistribution since subsidies on them will not only accrue mainly to the rich they will actually increase inequality in welfare. It is therefore important to ensure that commodities chosen for price subsidisation are largely consumed by the lower income groups. Also, detailed data on such commodities should be made public to make the extent of subsidy easily tractable. In the case of Pakistan, the problem of lack of transparency of federal and provincial budgets is vividly demonstrated by the inability of such budgets to readily highlight the subsidy on the various economic and social services, which are essentially in the nature of ‘private’ goods, provided by such governments. This is not only a reflection of the problem of the nature of budgeting practices whereby, first, revenues and expenditures on different heads are shown separately and no account is made either of depreciation of assets or the costs of capital used to finance the acquisition of assets which yield a stream of services. Second, to the extent that the subsidies largely benefit the upper income groups, political compulsions dictate that such subsidies largely remain hidden.

Prestasi Belajar Siswa yang Bekerja sebagai Tukang Semir di Kota Bukittingi

Penelitian ini mengungkap tentang prestasi belajar siswa yang bekerja sebagai tukang semir di Kota Bukittinggi. Pekerjaan sebagai tukang semir dilakukan siswa tersebut di sekitaran masjid-masjid dan pasar-pasar. Belajar merupakan tugas utama yang mesti dikerjakan oleh para siswa baik di sekolah maupun di rumah dengan tanpa adanya kewajiban bekerja membantu orang tua mengais pundi-pundi untuk kebutuhan sekolah dan kebutuhan sehari-hari. Hal inilah yang dilakukan oleh beberapa siswa guna membantu kedua orang tuanya yang notabene kurang mampu sehingga mereka diberi izin untuk bekerja dan mengahsilkan uang bagi mereka sendiri

Pengembangan Buku Ajar Berbasis Alquran dan Hadis

IndonesiaPendahuluan: Pengembangan buku ajar berbasis Alquran dan Hadis di Madrasah Ibtidaiyah ini didasarkan pada Kenyataan bahwa belum tersedianya bahan ajar yang terintegrasi dengan Alquran dan Hadis. Pengembangan ini dimaksudkan untuk dapat memenuhi tersedianya buku ajar yang dapat meningkatkan hasil belajar peserta didik.Metode:Penelitian ini menggunakan jenis penelitian pengembangan Research and Development (R & D), dengan model Dick & Carey yang memiliki sepuluh langkah dalam prosedur pengembangannya. Hasil penelitian: Penelitian ini telah menghasilkan buku ajar tema “Tempat Tinggalku” berbasis Alquran dan Hadis. Kesimpulan: Buku ajar yang dihasilkan termasuk dalam kategori layak digunakan untuk sistem pembelajaran tematik terpadu berbasis Alquran dan Hadis. EnglishIntroduction: The reality of Islamic Elementary School textbooks which consist of Al-Quran and Hadist is not provide yet. This research aims to develop Islamic Elementary School textbooks which consist of Al-Quran and Hadist to improve students\u27 achievement in Islamic Elementary School. Method: Research and Development (R & D) with ten steps of development procedure by Dick and Carey Model was used in this research. Result: This research had produced textbook based on Alquran and Hadist which have theme “Tempat Tinggalku”. Conclusion: The textbook which consist of Alquran and Hadist is being developed and having good qualification achievement, so that it is good to use in the thematic learning

Sejarah dan Perkembangan Pendidikan Inklusif di Indonesia

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengungkapkan tentang sejarah Pendidikan Inklusif dan sampai sejauh mana perkembangan pendidikan inklusif ini diterapkan oleh setiap daerah di masing-masing provinsi di Indonesia. Pendidikan inklusif menjadi alternatif pendidikan bagi anak berkebutuhan khusus yang mengalami keterbatasan fisik namun masih dapat mengikuti materi yang diajarkan di sekolah-sekolah umum. Banyak diantara mereka yang bersekolah di sekolah umum dapat mengikuti pembelajaran dan bahkan mampu mengalahkan anak-anak yang tumbuh dengan fisik yang utuh dari materi yang diujikan kepada mereka. Dengan bergabungnya mereka di sekolah umum memberikan kesempatan bagi mereka untuk dapat bersosialisasi dengan anak yang tumbuh dengan normal untuk membantu perkembangan emosional anak tersebut agar tidak menjadi anak yang minder, dan bahkan menganggap diri mereka sama dengan anak yang lain. Hal inilah yang mendasari pendidikan inklusif diselenggarakan

Preparation and characterisation of inexpensive porous kaolin hollow fibre as ceramic membrane supports for gas separation application

Low-cost, porous ceramic kaolin-based hollow fibre membrane support (HFMS) for gas separation application was developed via phase inversion technique. The ceramic suspensions with various ratios of kaolin to polyethersulfone (PESf) binder (5:1 to 9:1) were extruded and then sintered at 1200 to 1500 °C. The HFMSs were characterised by several analyses to investigate the effects of kaolin/PESf ratio and sintering temperature on the sample properties. The results showed that the kaolin/PES ratio and sintering temperature affected the considerable structure and physical properties of the kaolin membrane. It is observed that with increasing sintering temperature, the porosity and gas permeation of the HFMS decreased, while the bending strength and density of the HFMS increased. As a result, a porous HFMS with sufficient mechanical strength and high gas permeation characteristics is achievable if the appropriate kaolin/PESf ratio and sintering temperature are chosen