A critical survey of approaches to the role of credit in smallholder development

Recent literature on farm credit in the context of rural development displays an exciting variety of conflicting opinions. The argument that farm credit is essential to smallholder development is often couched in terms of the "need" for credit, a concept which is frequently undefined and essentially undefinable. The complexity of the subject is often lost sight of behind such semantic and conceptual shortcuts, and the discussion of farm credit's role and potential role in rural development is too often carried on without very much examination of the validity of implicit underlying assumptions, These errors may result in an inefficient use of resources in the agricultural, financial and public sectors, compromising the welfare of borrowers and of the community as a whole. Examples relating to Kenya and nearby countries are incorporated into this critique

Microenterprise Credit Programs: Déjà Vu

Many recent microenterprise credit programs in low income countries resemble earlier small farmer credit efforts that failed. Authors argue that lessons learned from these small farmer credit programs may provide insights on how to avoid problems in programs that extend loans to operators of small businesses

The political economy of farm credit in Kenya

Introduction available : p.1-1

What determines women's participation in collective action? Evidence from a western Ugandan coffee cooperative

Women smallholders face greater constraints than men in accessing capital and commodity markets in Sub-Saharan Africa. Collective action has been promoted to remedy those disadvantages. Using survey data of 421 women members and 210 nonmembers of a coffee producer cooperative in Western Uganda, this study investigates the determinants of women's participation in cooperatives and women's intensity of participation. The results highlight the importance of access to and control over land for women to join the cooperative in the first place. Participation intensity is measured through women's participation in collective coffee marketing and share capital contributions. It is found that duration of membership, access to extension services, more equal intrahousehold power relations, and joint land ownership positively influence women's ability to commit to collective action. These findings demonstrate the embeddedness of collective action in gender relations and the positive value of women's active participation for agricultural-marketing cooperatives

Estimating Marginal Healthcare Costs Using Genetic Variants as Instrumental Variables: Mendelian Randomization in Economic Evaluation

Accurate measurement of the marginal healthcare costs associated with different diseases and health conditions is important, especially for increasingly prevalent conditions such as obesity. However, existing observational study designs cannot identify the causal impact of disease on healthcare costs. This paper explores the possibilities for causal inference offered by Mendelian Randomization, a form of instrumental variable analysis that uses genetic variation as a proxy for modifiable risk exposures, to estimate the effect of health conditions on cost. Well-conducted genome-wide association studies provide robust evidence of the associations of genetic variants with health conditions or disease risk factors. The subsequent causal effects of these health conditions on cost can be estimated by using genetic variants as instruments for the health conditions. This is because the approximately random allocation of genotypes at conception means that many genetic variants are orthogonal to observable and unobservable confounders. Datasets with linked genotypic and resource use information obtained from electronic medical records or from routinely collected administrative data are now becoming available, and will facilitate this form of analysis. We describe some of the methodological issues that arise in this type of analysis, which we illustrate by considering how Mendelian Randomization could be used to estimate the causal impact of obesity, a complex trait, on healthcare costs. We describe some of the data sources that could be used for this type of analysis. We conclude by considering the challenges and opportunities offered by Mendelian Randomization for economic evaluation