Results readiness in social protection and labor operations : technical guidance notes for labor markets task teams

Labor allocation to its most efficient use, promoting employment and human capital investment as well as functioning labor markets can contribute to long?term economic growth, poverty reduction and to help workers manage their risks. A labor market policy framework includes both regulations and programs. However, the optimal framework is not standard and universal but varies country by country depending on the level of economic and financial development, culture and other structural characteristics. Labor market projects are equally concentrated in Latin America and the Caribbean and Eastern Europe and Central Asia regions and one is China. Interestingly, the number of projects having'improving labor market'as the primary component has increased over time. All project development objectives in the cohort of projects reviewed focus on promoting higher employment and increasing economic opportunities as the main objective especially via training programs. About half of the projects also seek to reach specific vulnerable groups by improving targeting mechanisms and to improve the quality of social assistance services by reducing the cost of job search through access to enhanced employment services and by improving employability.Safety Nets and Transfers,Labor Markets,Labor Policies,Housing&Human Habitats,Poverty Monitoring&Analysis

Informality among formal firms : firm-level, cross-country evidence on tax compliance and access to credit

The authors use firm-level, cross-county data from Investment Climate surveys in 49 developing countries to investigate an important channel through which informality can affect productivity: access to credit and external finance. Informality is measured as self-reported lack of tax compliance in a sample of registered firms that also answered questions on a large set of other characteristics. The authors find that more tax compliance is significantly associated with more access to credit both in OLS and in country fixed effects estimates. In particular, the link between credit and formality is stronger in high-formality countries. This suggests that firms'balance sheets are relatively more informative for financial institutions in environments where signal extraction is a less noisy process. The authors'results are robust to the inclusion of a wide array of correlates and to two-stage estimation.Access to Finance,,Banks&Banking Reform,Debt Markets,Bankruptcy and Resolution of Financial Distress

Corruption, business environment, and small business fixed investment in India

This paper estimates a structural dynamic business investment equation and an error correction model of fixed assets growth on a sample of predominantly small and mid-size manufacturers in India. The results suggest that excessive labor regulation, power shortages, and problems of access to finance are all significant factors in industrial growth in the country. The estimated effects of labor regulation, power shortages and access to finance on the rate of business investment all vary by states'levels of industrial development and. Perhaps more importantly, they also depend on a fourth institutional factor, namely, corruption. The rate of fixed investment is significantly lower where power shortages are more severe and labor regulation is stronger over the full sample, but each of these impacts is also greater for businesses self-reportedly affected by corruption. Although access to finance does not seem to influence the rate of investment for most firms, there is evidence that investment decisions are constrained by cash flow in enterprises that are unaffected by corruption or power shortages. There are nuances to this story as we take into account regional specificity, but the key result always holds that labor regulation, power shortages and access to finance influence the rate of fixed investment in ways that depend on the incidence of corruption. In interpreting this finding, we would like to think of corruption as a proxy for the quality of property rights institutions in the sense of Acemoglu and Johnson (2005). On the other hand, we regard labor regulation and the financial environment of small businesses in India as instances of what Acemoglu and Johnson (2005) call'contracting institutions'. The analysis finds that the interaction between corruption and other aspects of the institutional environment of fixed investment decisions could be seen consistent with the Acemoglu-Johnson view that the quality of property rights institutions exerts more abiding influence on economic outcomes than the quality of contracting institutions.Access to Finance,Economic Theory&Research,Labor Policies,Emerging Markets,Labor Markets

Corruption, the business environment, and small business growth in India

This paper estimates a dynamic business growth equation on a sample of small-scale manufacturers. The results suggest that excessive labor regulation, power shortages, and problems of access to finance are significant influences on industrial growth in India. The expected annual sales growth rate of an enterprise is lower where labor regulation is greater, power shortages are more severe, and cash flow constraints are stronger. The effects of each of the three factors on business growth seem also to depend on a fourth element, namely, corruption. Specifically, labor regulation affects the growth only of enterprises for which corruption is not a factor in business decisions. By contrast, power shortages seem to be a drag on the growth only of enterprises self-reportedly held back by corruption. Lastly, sales growth is constrained by cash flow only in businesses that are not affected by labor regulation, power shortages, or corruption. The analysis uses corruption as a proxy for the quality of"property rights institutions"and considers labor regulation and small business financing as instances of"contracting institutions."The findings on the interaction between corruption and other aspects of business environment then seems to indicate that the quality of property rights institutions exerts more abiding influence on economic outcomes than the quality of contracting institutions. Moreover, there might also be a hierarchy among contracting institutions in their effect on manufacturing growth.Labor Markets,Labor Policies,Economic Growth,Access to Finance,Achieving Shared Growth

The Influence of Weather on Mortality in Rural Tanzania: A Time-Series Analysis 1999�-2010

Weather and climate changes are associated with a number of immediate and long-term impacts on human health that occur directly or indirectly, through mediating variables. Few studies to date have established the empirical relationship between monthly weather and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa. The objectives of this study were to assess the association between monthly weather (temperature and rainfall) on all-cause mortality by age in Rufiji, Tanzania, and to determine the differential susceptibility by age groups. We used mortality data from Rufiji Health and Demographic Surveillance System (RHDSS) for\ud the period 1999 to 2010. Time-series Poisson regression models were used to estimate the association between monthly weather and mortality adjusted for long-term trends. We used a distributed lag model to estimate the delayed association of monthly weather on mortality. We stratified the analyses per age group to assess susceptibility. In general, rainfall was found to have a stronger association in the age group 0_4 years (RR_1.001, 95% CI_0.961_1.041) in both short and long lag times, with an overall increase of 1.4% in mortality risk for a 10 mm rise in rainfall. On the other hand, monthly average temperature had a stronger association with death in all ages while mortality increased with falling monthly temperature. The association per age group was estimated as: age group 0_4 (RR_0.934, 95% CI_0.894_0.974), age group 5_59 (RR_0.956, 95% CI_ 0.928_0.985) and age group over 60 (RR_0.946, 95% CI_0.912_0.979). The age group 5_59 experienced more delayed lag associations. This suggests that children and older adults are most sensitive to weather related mortality. These results suggest that an early alert system based on monthly weather information may be useful for disease control management, to reduce and prevent fatal effects related to weather and monthly weather.\u

The Effect of Distance to Formal Health Facility on Childhood Mortality in Rural Tanzania, 2005-2007.

Major improvements are required in the coverage and quality of essential childhood interventions to achieve Millennium Development Goal Four (MDG 4). Long distance to health facilities is one of the known barriers to access. We investigated the effect of networked and Euclidean distances from home to formal health facilities on childhood mortality in rural Tanzania between 2005 and 2007. A secondary analysis of data from a cohort of 28,823 children younger than age 5 between 2005 and 2007 from Ifakara Health and Demographic Surveillance System was carried out. Both Euclidean and networked distances from the household to the nearest health facility were calculated using geographical information system methods. Cox proportional hazard regression models were used to investigate the effect of distance from home to the nearest health facility on child mortality. Children who lived in homes with networked distance>5 km experienced approximately 17% increased mortality risk (HR=1.17; 95% CI 1.02-1.38) compared to those who lived <5 km networked distance to the nearest health facility. Death of a mother (HR=5.87; 95% CI 4.11-8.40), death of preceding sibling (HR=1.9; 95% CI 1.37-2.65), and twin birth (HR=2.9; 95% CI 2.27-3.74) were the strongest independent predictors of child mortality. Physical access to health facilities is a determinant of child mortality in rural Tanzania. Innovations to improve access to health facilities coupled with birth spacing and care at birth are needed to reduce child deaths in rural Tanzania

Evaluation of the Implementation of Health Interventions and their Impact on Child Survival in Tanzania

It is widely accepted that achieving the highest and most equitable levels of health of populations through the most rational use of resources is the ultimate goal of national and international policymakers, public health officials and health professionals at large. However, doing this depends upon understanding the burden of disease, its distribution and causes in a given population and the effectiveness of different preventive, curative and palliative interventions that can reduce these burdens. Demand for comparable cause-specific mortality data of high quality has grown due to increased pressure to meet ambitious short-term goals and targets set by the international donor community. Robust data are urgently needed to assist policy makers and health planners in setting intervention priorities, the allocation of resources, and the analysis of the equity and effectiveness of health interventions and systems. The counting of births, deaths by age and sex, and documentation of causes of death is the norm for all routine vital registration systems implemented throughout the developed world. But in most developing countries, routine empirical data on population burden of disease are usually missing, or at best, grossly incomplete due to the lack of systems and resources to support their collection and documentation. Mortality surveillance systems or surveys using verbal autopsy have the potential to provide invaluable data for informing the health system on the burden of disease, and for monitoring and evaluating of the impact of different health and health system interventions as they are being implemented. The sentinel surveillance platform that includes the Ifakara, Rufiji and AMMP Demographic Surveillance System sites in Tanzania offers a great opportunity to examine this potential. The goal of this thesis was to explore a variety of innovative approaches to evaluating the implementation of health interventions and their impact on child survival in Tanzania. Ths was pursued by analyzing the burden of disease for the period from 2000-2002 in the rural areas of Kilombero and Ulanga district in which a population of approximately 65,000 people is under continuous surveillance. I also examined health systems access for pregnant women and children younger than five in a rural area in Rufiji district by combining demographic surveillance systems with geographic information systems in a population of approximately 70,000 people in 12,000 households. Using a sentinel surveillance platform in a non-randomised "plausibility" design across the four districts of Kilombero, Ulanga, Morogoro Rural and Rufiji, the thesis also examines the child survival effectiveness, cost and impact of the integrated management of childhood illness (IMCI). The main findings were: - 42% of mortality in children younger than five years of age occurred due to conditions that are well known and for which Districts have the technology to prevent or treat. - Spatial access to health care by children and pregnant women in Rufiji District was similar with an average travel time to a health facility of less than 1 hour. - Facility based IMCI improved quality of care and was associated with a 13% reduction in mortality in children younger than five in intervention districts. - The costs of child health care in districts implementing IMCI was similar to or lower than those in comparison districts. - Introduction of IMCI led to improvements in child health that did not occur at the expense of equity. - Changes in the programmatic delivery strategy of vitamin A supplementation improved coverage in Tanzania and has been sustained for more than three years. - Delivery of high dose of vitamin A supplementation in mothers and children less than six months of age was well tolerated, but did not confer any important absolute effect on morbidity. Experience gained from the studies documented in this work can contribute to the body of knowledge on the estimation of causes of death, inform future evaluations, and help to shape child health policy in Tanzania and other similar settings. The need for robust, representative routine demographic and health statistics is critical for the monitoring and evaluation of health interventions and systems. The model recently proposed by the Health Metrics Network provides this opportunity for more countries. Investing in the strengthening of health systems, including health information sub-systems such as sentinel surveillance, is necessary if strategies like IMCI are to be prioritized and implemented effectively. IMCI implementation was successful in Tanzania because of the strong health system support that existed. Although results from the DHS 2004 and from sentinel surveillance indicate dramatic improvements, overall, infant and under five mortality rates are still unacceptably high. Achieving the Millennium Development Goal of reducing the 1990 level of child mortality by two-thirds by 2015 will require infensified efforts and new interventions to prevent deaths from major killers of children in Tanzania which include malaria, pneumonia, diarrhoea, under nutrition and perinatal causes. Wider and more equitable coverage is required, especially for the districts that are still lagging behind in the implementation. This thesis shows that important progress can be made with a practical mix of population based evidence used in a health systems approach