Economic exclusion and poverty in Asia: The example of castes in India

Poverty reduction, Hunger, Poverty, Inclusive policies, Economic exclusion, Market access, Castes, Social and economic conditions, Women and children,

Investment, subsidies, and pro-poor growth in rural India:

"This paper reviews the trends in government subsidies and investments in and for Indian agriculture; develops a conceptual framework and model to assess the impact of various subsidies and investments on agricultural growth and poverty reduction; and, presents several reform options with regard to re-prioritizing government spending and improving institutions and governance. There are three major findings. First, initial subsidies in credit, fertilizer, and irrigation have been crucial for small farmers to adopt new technologies. Small farms are often losers in the initial adoption stage of a new technology since prices of the agricultural products are typically being pushed down by greater supply of products from large farms, which adopted the new technology. But as more and more farmers have adopted HYV, continued subsidies have led to inefficiency of the overall economy. Second, agricultural research, education, and rural roads are the three most effective public spending items in promoting agricultural growth and poverty reduction during all periods. Finally, the trade-off between agricultural growth and poverty reduction is generally small among different types of investments. As for agricultural research, education, and infrastructure development, they have large growth impact and a large poverty reduction impact. Several policy lessons can be drawn. Agricultural input and output subsidies have proved to be unproductive, financially unsustainable, environmentally unfriendly in recent years, and contributed to increased inequality among rural Indian states. To sustain long-term growth in agricultural production, and therefore provide a long-term solution to poverty reduction, the government should cut subsidies of fertilizer, irrigation, power, and credit and increase investments in agricultural research and development, rural infrastructure, and education. Promoting nonfarm opportunities is also important. However, simply reallocating public resources is not the full solution. Reforming institutions can have an equal, if not larger, impact on future agricultural and rural growth and rural poverty reduction." from Authors' AbstractRural poverty, Agricultural growth, Public investments, subsidies, Pro-poor growth,

Government spending, growth and poverty: an analysis of interlinkages in rural India

Poverty in rural India has declined substantially in recent decades. This steady decline in poverty was strongly associated with agricultural growth, particularly the green revolution, which in turn was a response to massive public investments in agriculture and rural infrastructure. Public investment in rural areas has also benefitted the poor through its impact on the growth of the rural non-farm economy, and government expenditure on rural poverty and employment programs,which has grown rapidly, has directly benefitted the rural poor. The primary purpose of this study is to investigate the causes of the decline in rural poverty in India, and particularly to disentangle the specific role that government investments have played. We seek to quantify the effectiveness of different types of government expenditures in contributing to poverty alleviation. The study uses state level data for 1970 to 1993 to estimate an econometric model that permits calculation of the number of poor people raised above the poverty line for each additional million rupees spent on different expenditure items. The model is also structured to enable identification of the different channels through which different types of government expenditures impact on the poor. But targeting government expenditures simply to reduce poverty is not sufficient. Government expenditures also need to stimulate economic growth. The model is therefore formulated so as to measure the growth as well as the poverty impact of different items of government expenditure. The results from our model show that government spending on productivity enhancing investments, such as agricultural R&D and irrigation, rural infrastructure (including roads and electricity), and rural development targeted directly on the rural poor, have all contributed to reductions in rural poverty, and most have also contributed to growth in agricultural productivity.Employment (Economic theory) India., Poverty., Rural poor India., Public investment., Agricultural development.,

Discrimination and Children's Nutritional Status in India

This article explores the differing health status of lower caste social groups in India, analyses the reasons for the differences and discusses some of the implications for policy. National Family Planning and Health Survey (NFH?3) data shows that children belonging to lower castes have worse nutrition, health and mortality indicators and poorer access to health services and nutrition schemes than children from higher castes, even after other socioeconomic factors are considered. The article suggests that this points towards the possible role of discrimination and exclusion associated with caste and ‘untouchability’ and outlines some policy recommendations that are proactively inclusive, specifically in the nutrition domain

Institutions and economic policies for pro-poor agricultural growth

"This paper draws together findings from different elements of a research project examining critical components of pro-poor agricultural growth and of policies that can promote such growth in poor rural economies in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Agricultural growth, a critical driver in poverty reducing growth in many poor agrarian economies in the past, faces many difficulties in today's poor rural areas in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Some of these difficulties are endogenous to these areas while others result from broader processes of global change. Active state interventions in 'kick starting' markets in 20th century green revolutions suggest that another major difficulty may be current policies which emphasize the benefits of liberalization and state withdrawal but fail to address critical institutional constraints to market and economic development in poor rural areas. This broad hypothesis was tested in an analysis of the returns (in agricultural growth and poverty reduction) to different government spending in India over the last forty years. The results reject the alternate hypothesis underlying much current policy, that fertilizer and credit subsidies, for example, depressed agricultural growth and poverty reduction in the early stages of agricultural transformation. The results show initially high but then declining impacts from fertilizer subsidies; high benefits from investment in roads, education and agricultural R&D during all periods and varying benefits from credit subsidies over four decades; low impacts from power subsidies; and intermediate impacts from irrigation investments. These findings demand a fundamental reassessment of policies espousing state withdrawal from markets in poor agrarian economies. Given widespread state failure in many poor agrarian economies today, particularly in Africa, new thinking is urgently needed to find alternative ways of 'kick starting' markets ways which reduce rent seeking opportunities, promote rather than crowd-out private sector investment, and allow the state to withdraw as economic growth proceeds. Authors' AbstractAgricultural growth ,Poverty, Rural ,South Asia Rural poor ,Africa, Sub-Saharan ,Agrarian economies ,Globalization ,Green Revolution ,Poverty alleviation ,Government spending policy India ,