The First Born Burden

Being the first born of a family entails inherent responsibilities. Sociologists, psychologists and economists have long argued that the first born's receive differentiated treatment within the household. This paper tests and quantifies the existence of a disproportionate workload over the oldest child in poor households: we call it the first born burden. We are concerned with the determinants of such work burden, and we analyze how access to basic infrastructure could release children from work. The empirical results for rural areas in Ghana confirm a systematic selection of first born's to work. Although access to infrastructure may not reallocate evenly the workload among siblings, it indeed relaxes the children's time constraints. --child labor,time allocation,birth order,infrastructure,water

Equitable Access to Basic Utilities: Public versus Private Provision and Beyond

Providing universal access to basic utilities is justified on human rights grounds and also because of the positive externalities involved. Adequate provision of water, sanitation and electricity contributes to the achievement of the other Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Access to these services, however, is still unequal in the developing world. Services do not adequately reach the poor. This Poverty in Focus brings together a mix of policy issues and some country experiences. Degol Hailu and Raquel Tsukada provide an overview of the broad challenges involved in making access to basic services equitable and universal. Hulya Dagdeviren and Simon A. Robertson point out the difficulties of expanding utility networks in slum areas, which include technical barriers and a lack of land and housing tenure. They make a case for stronger public interventions. Kate Bayliss argues that the allocation of demand and investment risks during privatisation in Sub-Sahara Africa is distorted. This is because the risks are borne by governments and end users instead of the private contractors. David Hall and Emanuele Lobina provide a critique of both the investment potential of the private sector and cost recovery schemes in the provision of sanitation services. Ashley C. Brown discusses the externalities involved in supplying basic infrastructure to those who can least afford it. He argues that, contrary to established views, cross-subsidy schemes actually benefit all users and not only the targeted population. Alison Post emphasises the benefits of water metering but highlights problems of implementation and poor design in Argentina. Degol Hailu, Rafael Osorio and Raquel Tsukada examine the reasons for the privatisation and then renationalisation of the water supply in urban Bolivia. Andre Rossi de Oliveira explores water privatisation in Brazil. He argues that the expansion of coverage has stemmed mainly from high levels of investment by private operators. Suani Teixeira Coelho, Patricia Guardabassi, Beatriz A. Lora and José Goldemberg note that geographically isolated communities without access to electricity grids, such as those in the Amazon, can be served by renewable energy sources. Luc Savard, Dorothée Boccanfuso and Antonio Estache present the findings of a general equilibrium model that assesses the impact of electricity price changes on the poor in Mali and Senegal. Joana Costa, Degol Hailu, Elydia Silva and Raquel Tsukada empirically show that water provision reduces the total work burden on women in rural Ghana. Nitish Jha conducts a sociological analysis of access to water and sanitation in India, emphasising the challenges encountered in community-based schemes. Julia Kercher explains why and how a human rights framework must guide the design and implementation of private utility provision. We hope that this collection of articles will contribute to the discussion of how to provide vital infrastructure services more equitably. This Poverty in Focus is the result of an International Workshop on Equitable Access to Basic Services held on 5 December 2008 in São Paulo, Brazil. IPC-IG and the David Rockefeller Centre for Latin American Studies at Harvard University (DRCLAS) jointly organised the workshop. We gratefully acknowledge DRCLAS? contribution. (...)Equitable Access to Basic Utilities: Public versus Private Provision and Beyond

The First Born Burden

Being the first born of a family entails inherent responsibilities. Sociologists, psychologists and economists have long argued that the first born's receive differentiated treatment within the household. This paper tests and quantifies the existence of a disproportionate workload over the oldest child in poor households: we call it the first born burden. We are concerned with the determinants of such work burden, and we analyze how access to basic infrastructure could release children from work. The empirical results for rural areas in Ghana confirm a systematic selection of first born's to work. Although access to infrastructure may not reallocate evenly the workload among siblings, it indeed relaxes the children's time constraints

Water Privatisation and Renationalisation in Bolivia: Are the Poor Better Off?

Water Privatisation, Bolivia, Poor

Achieving the Millennium Development Goals: A measure of progress

This paper introduces a methodology that measures the effort made by countries in achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The methodology compares the rate of progress on MDG indicators in the period before and after the adoption of the MDGs. We correct for two biases ignored in previous methodologies: non-linearity in the rate of change, and effort appreciation. By correcting for the first, we recognise that the rate of progress in MDG indicators is not linear across time. As for the second bias, we note that natural constraints hinder countries from achieving the targets as they approach their upper or lower bound limits. These two corrections allow us to identify countries that are making respectable progress on MDG acceleration, despite their likely failure in achieving the Goals by 2015

Water Supply in Rural Ghana: Do Women Benefit?

Women?s income poverty in developing countries is usually associated with time poverty. The time that women spend on domestic chores represents significant forgone income. Infrastructure provision potentially reduces women?s time burden. The saving includes time spent on collecting, loading and purifying water. That saving would enable women to engage in remunerated activities, dedicate more time to pursuing education, or have a little leisure. In this One Pager, we investigate the impact of water provision on women?s time allocation in rural Ghana.Water Supply in Rural Ghana: Do Women Benefit?

Prejuicios de Edad y Género en los Volúmenes de Trabajo Durante el Ciclo de Vida: Evidencia Proveniente de las Zonas Rurales de Ghana

Prejuicios de Edad y Género en los Volúmenes de Trabajo Durante el Ciclo de Vida: Evidencia Proveniente de las Zonas Rurales de Ghana

Viés de Idade e de Gênero em Cargas de Trabalho Durante o Ciclo Vital: Indícios do Meio Rural de Gana

Viés de Idade e de Gênero em Cargas de Trabalho Durante o Ciclo Vital: Indícios do Meio Rural de Gana

Privatisation and renationalisation: What went wrong in Bolivia's water sector?

This paper investigates the concentration of access to safe water across income levels in Bolivia. In particular, it focuses on how privatisation has changed coverage, affordability and the concentration of access to water on the part of the poor. We compare the performance of cities in which the service was privatised (La Paz and El Alto) with a city in which it is managed as a cooperative (Santa Cruz de la Sierra) and one where the service is publicly provided (Cochabamba). We examine the pre- and post-privatisation periods. Close inspection of the household surveys reveals that access to water by low-income consumers increased in the periods when the service was provided under private concessions. Coverage has expanded significantly in the bottom quintiles of the population in the cities where water was privatised, and thus access to water is more equitable. The state, however, renationalised the water utility. What went wrong, then, in Bolivia’s water sector? The answer is that the private concessionaire failed to meet the targets stipulated in the concession contract. The tariff increases required for full cost recovery eventually led to public outrage that forced the government to terminate the contract