Migration, Policy and Welfare in the Context of Developing Economies : A Simple Extended Family Approach

After giving an overview of the state of migration policy in developing countries with special reference to Pakistan this paper essentially revisits the issue of policy and its effect on rural to urban migration under an extended family theoretical framework. This specific approach is motivated by empirical literature on migration in the context of developing countries which suggests the emergence of spatially separated but economically linked rural and urban households - expanded or extended families. The extended family in this paper consists of two households, the rural-origin and its urban-migrant offshoot. The migrant after leaving the countryside joins relatives in the city who through the assumption of income sharing within households sustain the migrant in case of unemployment. The economic tie linking the two households is remittances flowing from the migrants to the family members left behind. All decisions, migration and remittance, are based on altruism rather then self-interest. Thus in the model both migration and remittances are endogenously determined. This extended family framework is then employed to analyze the effect of the standard policy prescriptions, i.e., urban employment subsidy and a rural income subsidy on migration and urban employment. Also, the welfare effect of a subsidy transfer from urban to rural sector is analyzed. The results, especially in the case of the rural subsidy provision, are qualitatively different from those in the standard Harris-Todaro type literature on migration suggesting the sensitivity of predicted policy effects on the type of methodology employed.migration policy, Pakistan, extended family framework, Harris-Todaro

Rural to Urban Migration and Network Effects in an Extended Family Framework

Literature on migration and network effects suggests that the rate of migration is positively related to the extent or degree of personal and community level networks potential migrants have at the destination. However in this particular paper it is shown that when the decision making unit is the extended family and there is a minimum wage induced Harris-Todaro type job rationing in the urban sector having greater numbers of previous migrants at the urban end does not necessarily lead to more migration from the hinterland. This counter intuitive result is generated as a consequence of juxtaposing an extended family framework with urban equilibrium unemployment in the model. A larger stock of previous migrants at the urban end has a positive effect on new migration which comes specifically through a greater flow of remittance income from the migrants to their rural counterparts - the two households comprising the extended family. The increased remittance income provides a positive stimulus to migration as it relaxes the migration cost constraints facing the extended family. On the other hand limited jobs in the urban sector and the resultant job rationing implies that a greater number of previous migrants also crowds out job opportunities for the new ones thus simultaneously reducing incentives to migrate. The direction of the net effect however depends on the economic characteristics of the extended family and the initial employment conditions in the urban sector.Harris-Todaro, Migration, extended family framework

Services Trade Negotiations in the Doha Round : Opportunities and Risks for Pakistan

This paper seeks to examine how locking-in of Pakistans unilateral liberalization at the WTO/GATS and further liberalization of services trade would affect Pakistans competitiveness. Focusing on the opportunities and risks of such liberalization the paper discusses possible options regarding the corollary regulatory reforms and other flanking measures that may be needed to achieve these goals. The sectors studied in this paper are (a) construction and related engineering services; (b) architecture, engineering and integrated engineering services; (c) energy services; and (d) environmental services.liberalization, Services, regulation, Pakistan

The pinealocytes of the human pineal gland: a light and electron microscopic study

The pinealocytes of the pineal gland of children and adults were studied at both light and electron microscopic levels. The pinealocytes were classified into light and dark pinealocytes on the basis of their shape, nuclear infolding, cytoplasmic contents and staining density. The light pinealocytes outnumber the dark pinealocytes and both of them have thin processes. The light pinealocytes have round or oval cell bodies and nuclei and have vesicles and ribbons. The dark pinealocytes showed more variations in their shape. The nuclear membrane of the dark cells showed numerous infoldings with deep invagination of parts of the cytoplasm within the nuclear folds, giving the appearance of nuclear pellets. The dark pinealocytes contain pigment in their cytoplasm. In addition to the light and dark pinealocytes a very small cell type with an extremely thin and elongated cell body and nucleus was found. The cells of this type were almost always associated with vacuoles filled with flocculent material and accumulations of presumptive secretion in the extracellular compartment. The findings of this study were discussed in the light of the published data about the pinealocytes of human and non-human species

Prospects of Wheat and Sugar Trade between India and Pakistan : A Simple Welfare Analysis

This paper asks how opening up of wheat and sugar trade between two nuclear neighbours, India and Pakistan, would affect welfare in the two countries. We conduct a partial equilibrium analysis to simulate welfare implications of trade between the two countries under three alternative trade regimes : a) under an FTA between India and Pakistan, b) under SAFTA, and c) under a grant of mostfavoured nation (MFN) to India by Pakistan. We conduct simple welfare analysis for wheat, on the basis of real world data of FY2005, and for sugar, based on data for FY 2000-01. In both these years, India had a net surplus and Pakistan had a net deficit for both wheat and sugar. We show that among other things, favourable weather conditions play a critical role in generating these surpluses, which are most likely to get reversed in years when weather conditions become more favourable to Pakistan. While we find there would be net gains to both countries, in case trade happens, the highest welfare gains accrue to both countries under free trade agreement. Further analysis reveals that if subsidies to Indian wheat farmers are removed, their competitive edge disappears in favour of wheat farmers in Pakistan.wheat, sugar, trade, weather conditions, Pakistan, India, subsidies

Recent benthic ostracoda in the mullipallam creek, near muthupet, tamil nadu, India

Ostracods are one of the best documented groups within the whole of the animal kingdom, due to the most characteristic features of their bodies and a well calcified, tiny, bivalved carapace which fossilizes easily. They are known to inhabit a wide variety of aquatic environments such as marine, brackish, freshwater, even terrestrial, and also dwell as parasites in the intestines of fishes. The studies on Recent ostracod fauna from the seas and other marine marginal water bodies of India, especially along the east coast, are still not known fully. For the first time a study on the systematics of Recent Ostracoda from the Mullipallam creek, India. The present work on morphological studies of Recent Ostracoda from the Mullipallam creek, (Lat.l0°18'093" - 10°20710" N and Long. 078°30,840" - 79°34'876" E) has been undertaken to enhance the existing knowledge on ostracods of east coast of India. The Mullipallam creek area is located near Muthupet, belonging to Nagapattinam and Thiruvarur Districts of Tamil Nadu. The area of investigation is a marshy mangrove wetland located in the southernmost end of the Cauvery delta along the coastal zone of Bay of Bengal and Palk Straits, India. Mangrove wetlands found along the coastal zones and often dominate in estuarine and the inter-tidal zones which act as a barrier against cyclones and tsunamis protect coastal erosion and provide good nursery ground for a number of commercially important aquatic organisms. A mangrove species Avicennia marina is the dominant in the creek followed by Acanthus ilicifolius, Egiceras corniculatum, Excoecaria agallocha and Rhizopora mucronata. The Muthupet mangrove wetland area is drained by the distrbutaries of the Cauvery viz., Paminiyar, Koraiyar, Kandankurichanar, Kilathangiyar and Marakkakoraiyar and forms a large lagoon before reaching the sea. A fieldwork has been carried out twice in a year representing Pre monsoon (June, 2006) and Post monsoon (Jan, 2007). The depth of sample collection ranges from 1.0 mts to 3.5 mts. A total of forty-eight sediment samples were collected with the help of Van veen grab and by using motor boat from the selected sites of the study area. The classification proposed by Hartmann and Puri (1974) has been followed in the present study, through which 35 ostracod taxa belonging to 24 genera, 17 families, 2 superfamilies and 2 suborder of the order Podocopida have been identifed. Bass lerites liebaui, Jankeijcythere mckenziei, Kalingella mckenziei, Neomonoceratina jaini are endemic to Indian waters only. Neomonoceratina iniqua is recorded in all the samples collected and studied. It outnumbered the entire ostracod population and represented by above 90% of the total population in few samples. Hemicytheridea paiki is represented second to N. iniqua in the study area. Some ostracod species characteristic of brackish water such as Hemicytheridea and Neosinocythere dekrooni occur in the creek. The occurrence of Cytherelloidea leroyi, Keijella reticulate and Neocytheretta murilineata, may be due to the tidal influence. All the species are well preserved. In general, the recorded ostracod assemblage is strongly of tropical, shallow and brackish water habitat in nature

ICT Technologies, Standards and Protocols for Active Distribution Network Automation and Management

The concept of active distribution network (ADN) is evolved to address the high penetration of renewables in the distribution network. To leverage the benefits of ADN, effective communication and information technology is required. Various communication standards to facilitate standard-based communication in distribution network have been proposed in literature. This chapter presents various communication standards and technologies that can be employed in ADN. Among various communication standards, IEC 61850 standard has emerged as the de facto standard for power utility automation. IEC 61850-based information modeling for ADN entities has also been presented in this chapter. To evaluate the performance of ADN communication architecture, performance metrics and performance evaluation tools have also been presented in this chapter

The employment impact of microcredit program participation in Bangladesh: Evidence from a longitudinal household survey

Microcredit program, originating in Bangladesh in the late 1970s, has played an important role to meet the financing needs of the impoverished communities around the world. While the successes and failures of microcredit in lifting the poor out of poverty have been recorded in a wide array of literature, the employment outcome of participating in a microcredit program as a pathway to poverty reduction has been studied much less. Using two waves of longitudinal data on over 2000 households, we examine the employment impact of microcredit program in Bangladesh during 1998-2004. The longitudinal nature of data allows us fixed effects estimation of the effect of microcredit program participation on self-employment hours and household labor income isolating the biases that may result from non-random program placement, censoring in self-employment work hours and income data, and non-random sample selection of households or individuals as participants who already have entrepreneurial skills or pre-existing household conditions favourable to self-employment activities. The fixed effects estimate shows that households that participate in microcredit program work on average 245 hours longer in self-employment activities and earn 9.4% higher labor income than non-participant households. These extra hours are equivalent to around 7 weeks of employment for a person. The income effect of microcredit program participation is more discernible on household labor income than on total household income due to lack of direct link of microcredit program with non-labor income sources such as remittance. The participating households at the bottom of the income distribution appear to have gained more than those at the upper end suggesting equalizing effect of microcredit program participation over and above the positive effect on employment and income growth. Thus microcredit program in Bangladesh has succeeded in providing employment generating capacities to participants and raised the potential for income growth that contributed to poverty reduction