This study examines the implications of gender differences in wealth transfers—farmland and education—on the lifetime incomes of men and women in the rural areas of Ghana, the Philippines, and Sumatra. Based on household surveys of three generations, we tested the hypothesis that parents bequeath their wealth to their sons and daughters in accordance with their comparative advantages in lowland and upland farming and in nonfarm jobs.

To promote development, there is increasing need for activities and policies which generate and diversify income in rural areas. The starch industry in Viet Nam provides a good example of rural industrialization whereby low-value agricultural commodities such as cassava and canna are processed into high-value commodities such as starch to be used in a variety of food and non-food industries. Though this sector is relatively small, it has a high potential in terms of demand growth, poverty reduction, and income diversification in rural areas, particularly the less favored ones.

This paper examines how a changing climate may affect rice production and how Vietnamese farmers are likely to adapt to various climatic conditions using an innovative yield function approach, taking into account sample selection bias and endogeneity of inputs. Model results suggest that although climate change can potentially reduce rice production, farmers will respond mainly by adjusting the production portfolio and levels of input use.

The devolution of natural resource management responsibility from the state to communities or local user groups has become a widespread trend that cuts across countries and resource sectors. Unlike claims to the contrary in policy narratives, devolution of control over resources from the state to local organizations does not necessarily lead to greater participation and empowerment of all stakeholders (Cleaver 1999).

Mexico’s Programa Nacional de Educación, Salud y Alimentación (PROGRESA) is a major government program aimed at developing the human capital of poor households. Targeting its benefits directly to the population in extreme poverty in rural areas, it seeks to alleviate current poverty through monetary and in-kind benefits, as well as to reduce future levels of poverty by encouraging investments in education, health, and nutrition.

ecent food-price and economic shocks have further jeopardized the food security of developing countries and poor people, pushing the estimated number of undernourished people over one billion. Known and unknown food-security risks appear to be on the rise. Increasing uncertainties raise critical questions about how to quickly, viably, and sustainably manage familiar risks and emerging new ones.

Years of continuous cultivation with little or no use of external inputs to restore soil nutrients has resulted in a situation in which crop production in a number of African countries is now limited by nutrient deficiencies – nitrogen, in particular, which is crucial to healthy plant growth. This widespread problem has been described as a “nitrogen drought”. Attempts to remedy this situation using only organic inputs have largely failed to keep up with the rate of nutrient loss.

This study explores the impact of changes in environmental conditions on household labor allocation to the collection of environmental goods such as fuelwood and leaf fodder for a sample of rural Nepali hill households. Households in rural areas of most developing countries often rely heavily on the surrounding environment for goods such as water, wood, and livestock fodder. Frequently these and other environmental products are collected from local common forestland, a task that in many areas is predominantly carried out by women.

This study explores the impact of changes in land tenure institutions on women’s land rights and the efficiency of tree resource management in western Ghana, where cocoa is the dominant crop. Although communal land tenure aims to provide equitable access to land for all households, women’s land rights in the region are weaker than those of men, as is often the case under customary land tenure systems (Lastarria-Cornhiel 1997).

In rural areas of Bangladesh, poverty is pervasive and associated with high rates of malnutrition, especially among preschool children and women. Apart from low levels of energy intakes, it is increasingly recognized that rice-dominated diets such as those consumed by most poor in the countryside may not supply all micronutrients required for a healthy life and productive activities. Children and women are particularly vulnerable to these micronutrient deficiencies because they face relatively higher requirements for growth and reproduction.

With increasing urbanization, the percentage of women participating in the labor force and the percentage of households headed by single mothers have increased. Reliable and affordable child-care alternatives are thus becoming increasingly important in urban areas. The Hogares Comunitarios Program (HCP) was established in Guatemala City in 1991 as a direct response to the increasing need of poor urban dwellers for substitute childcare.

Before 1994 the policy of apartheid in South Africa had systematically denied the majority of the population access to resources through legal restrictions on mobility, property rights, and residential location (Thompson 1990). South African industry fulfilled labor requirements in key industries largely using migrant laborers—mostly men—who worked in one place while their families resided elsewhere.