Recognition of the potentially deleterious implications of inequality in opportunity originating in a skewed asset distribution has spawned considerable interest in land reforms. However, little attention has been devoted to fact that, in the longer term, the measures used to implement land reforms could negatively affect productivity. Use of state level data on rental restrictions, together with a nationally representative survey from India, suggests that, contrary to original intentions, rental restrictions negatively affect productivity and equity.

Recognition of the importance of institutions that provide security of property rights and relatively equal access to economic resources to a broad cross-section of society has renewed interest in the potential of asset redistribution, including land reforms. Empirical analysis of the impact of such policies is, however, scant and often contradictory. This paper uses panel household data from India, together with state-level variation in the implementation of land reform, to address some of the deficiencies of earlier studies.

Although a large theoretical literature discusses the possible inefficiency of sharecropping contracts, the empirical evidence on this phenomenon has been ambiguous at best. Household-level fixed-effect estimates from about 8,500 plots operated by households that own and sharecrop land in the Ethiopian highlands provide support for the hypothesis of Marshallian inefficiency. At the same time, a factor adjustment model suggests that the extent to which rental markets allow households to attain their desired operational holding size is extremely limited.

Although economic reform has brought remarkable progress in poverty reduction in Vietnam, the scale and depth of ethnic minority poverty in Vietnam presents one of the major challenges to achieving the targets for poverty reduction set out in the Socio-Economic Development Plan, as well as the millennium development goals. The authors first review a series of monetary and non-monetary indicators which show the living standards of the ethnic minorities are improving but still lag seriously behind those of the majority Kinh-Hoa.

This review of public expenditures on Social Protection (SP) in Nicaragua is based on the analytical framework of Social Risk Management (SRM) developed by the World Bank. The concept of managing social risk comes from the notion that certain groups in society are vulnerable to unexpected shocks which threaten their livelihood and/or survival. Social protection focuses on the poor since they are more vulnerable to the risks and normally do not have the instruments to handle these risks.

This social assessment (SA) was conducted under the Fergana Valley Water Resources Management Project (FVWRMP), which is providing assistance to the Government of Tajikistan to address irrigation and drainage deficiencies in Eastern Sughd. The main SA objectives were to understand how prevailing structures of water provision, land reforms, and gender relations impact rural livelihoods; to analyze experiences in establishing inclusive Water Users Associations (WUAs); and to provide recommendations to FVWRMP with the aim of enhancing its programs.

The Country Environmental Analysis (CEA) for Timor-Leste identifies environmental priorities through a systematic review of environmental issues in natural resources management and environmental health in the context of the country's economic development and environmental institutions. Lack of data has been the main limitation in presenting a more rigorous analysis. Nevertheless, the report builds on the best available secondary data, presents new data on the country's wealth composition, and derives new results on the costs of water and air pollution.

This paper explores how a 'conflict and violence sensitive' framework in project assessment, design and implementation facilitates early identification and mitigation of negative consequences of competition and dispute, and promotes sustainable development over the longer term. It discusses the role of renewable resources in perpetuating conflict and violence, and distills lessons from selected development programming experiences in managing conflict risks associated with these dynamics.

The report seeks to analyze what has been learned about how agricultural interventions influence nutrition outcomes in low-and middle-income countries, focusing on the target populations of the millennium development goals-people living on less than a dollar a day. It also sets out to synthesize lessons from past efforts to improve the synergies between agriculture and nutrition outcomes. The report identifies a number of developments in agriculture and nutrition that have transformed the context in which nutrition is affected by agriculture.

The operations policy on Development Policy Lending (DPL), approved by the Board in August 2004, requires that the Bank systematically analyze whether specific country policies supported by an operation are likely to have "significant effects" on the country's environment, forests, and other natural resources. The implicit objective behind this requirement is to ensure that there is adequate capacity in the country to deal with adverse effects on the environment, forests, and other natural resources that the policies could trigger, even at the program design stage.

This report seizes the opportunity to learn from existing evidence by analyzing lessons derived from impact evaluations produced between 2000 and January 2009 to begin to discern what has been effective in agriculture. It is part of a broader effort being undertaken by the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) of the World Bank to understand how impact evaluations can help improve performance and broadly disseminate those lessons.

A well-functioning land administration and management system is crucial for Madagascar's economic and social future. Land is implicated in Madagascar's ongoing economic development and social transformation in many important ways, as key a factor in its quest for economic growth, urbanization, transparent decision-making on land-related foreign investments, environment protection, vibrant and sustainable rural communities, political stability, and social cohesion.