A War in a Pandemic: Implications of the Ukraine crisis and COVID-19 on global governance of migration and remittance flows

This Migration and Development Brief (number 36 in the series) discusses the anticipated effects of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on migration and remittance flows. And ahead of the International Migration Review Forum to be held in May 2022, the brief indicates how the global governance of migration can be strengthened and cross-border remittance flows facilitated. Developments concerning migration-related Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicators for which the World Bank is a custodian--increasing the volume of remittances as a percentage of gross domestic product (SDG indicator 17.3.2) and reducing remittance costs (SDG indicator 10.c.1)--are also discussed

Remittances, Consumption Insurance and Family Labour Supply

This thesis presents three substantive chapters on the economics of households. The objectives are to quantitatively examine if remittances are a source of insurance for recipient households, and to explore how remittance income alters family time allocation between market and home production activities. The first substantive chapter presents stylized facts on the properties and distribution of remittance flows to developing economies. Here, I document the nature and increasing share of remittances relative to other forms of international capital flows to developing countries. This chapter also studies the dynamics of household earnings, consumption and income from home production using monthly household-level panel data from the Townsend Thai survey. The second substantive chapter examines remittances as a source of insurance for recipient households. I specify a fairly standard model that incorporates households' labour supply and consumption decisions, and derived analytical expressions for consumption and earnings as a function of wage and remittance income shocks. These expressions are empirically estimated to explore whether the presence of remittances alters the degree of household consumption smoothing. Our model predicts that households have higher access to smooth consumption against transitory wage shocks than against permanent shocks. In particular, I find that 72% of family consumption smoothing is explain by households' self-insurance behaviour through asset accumulation. On the other hand, remittances only explain 11% of consumption smoothing against wage shocks. Interestingly, households with low educational attainment rely more on remittances as a source of insurance while those with higher education levels have higher access to smooth consumption via asset accumulation. The final chapter builds on the model developed in the previous chapter to examine the effect of remittances on households' time allocation between market and home production activities. This model was modified by giving households the opportunity to involve in home production, either for home consumption or for the market. The derived expressions are also estimated using data from the Townsend Thai survey to examine whether the presence of remittances affects family time allocation. By decomposing the response of labour hours to wage and remittance shocks, I find no support that increased remittance income leads to lower labour effort among Thai households. On the contrary, increased remittance income induces Thai households to reallocate labour hours from market to home production activities

Human candidate gene polymorphisms and risk of severe malaria in children in Kilifi, Kenya: a case-control association study

Background: Human genetic factors are important determinants of malaria risk. We investigated associations between multiple candidate polymorphisms—many related to the structure or function of red blood cells—and risk for severe Plasmodium falciparum malaria and its specific phenotypes, including cerebral malaria, severe malaria anaemia, and respiratory distress. Methods: We did a case-control study in Kilifi County, Kenya. We recruited as cases children presenting with severe malaria to the high-dependency ward of Kilifi County Hospital. We included as controls infants born in the local community between Aug 1, 2006, and Sept 30, 2010, who were part of a genetics study. We tested for associations between a range of candidate malaria-protective genes and risk for severe malaria and its specific phenotypes. We used a permutation approach to account for multiple comparisons between polymorphisms and severe malaria. We judged p values less than 0·005 significant for the primary analysis of the association between candidate genes and severe malaria. Findings: Between June 11, 1995, and June 12, 2008, 2244 children with severe malaria were recruited to the study, and 3949 infants were included as controls. Overall, 263 (12%) of 2244 children with severe malaria died in hospital, including 196 (16%) of 1233 with cerebral malaria. We investigated 121 polymorphisms in 70 candidate severe malaria-associated genes. We found significant associations between risk for severe malaria overall and polymorphisms in 15 genes or locations, of which most were related to red blood cells: ABO, ATP2B4, ARL14, CD40LG, FREM3, INPP4B, G6PD, HBA (both HBA1 and HBA2), HBB, IL10, LPHN2 (also known as ADGRL2), LOC727982, RPS6KL1, CAND1, and GNAS. Combined, these genetic associations accounted for 5·2% of the variance in risk for developing severe malaria among individuals in the general population. We confirmed established associations between severe malaria and sickle-cell trait (odds ratio [OR] 0·15, 95% CI 0·11–0·20; p=2·61 × 10−58), blood group O (0·74, 0·66–0·82; p=6·26 × 10−8), and –α3·7-thalassaemia (0·83, 0·76–0·90; p=2·06 × 10−6). We also found strong associations between overall risk of severe malaria and polymorphisms in both ATP2B4 (OR 0·76, 95% CI 0·63–0·92; p=0·001) and FREM3 (0·64, 0·53–0·79; p=3·18 × 10−14). The association with FREM3 could be accounted for by linkage disequilibrium with a complex structural mutation within the glycophorin gene region (comprising GYPA, GYPB, and GYPE) that encodes for the rare Dantu blood group antigen. Heterozygosity for Dantu was associated with risk for severe malaria (OR 0·57, 95% CI 0·49–0·68; p=3·22 × 10−11), as was homozygosity (0·26, 0·11–0·62; p=0·002). Interpretation: Both ATP2B4 and the Dantu blood group antigen are associated with the structure and function of red blood cells. ATP2B4 codes for plasma membrane calcium-transporting ATPase 4 (the major calcium pump on red blood cells) and the glycophorins are ligands for parasites to invade red blood cells. Future work should aim at uncovering the mechanisms by which these polymorphisms can result in severe malaria protection and investigate the implications of these associations for wider health. Funding: Wellcome Trust, UK Medical Research Council, European Union, and Foundation for the National Institutes of Health as part of the Bill & Melinda Gates Grand Challenges in Global Health Initiative