Luca Tasciotti

Crop diversification, dietary diversity and agricultural income: empirical evidence from eight developing countries

Abstract This study sheds light on the dilemma between food crop specialisation and diversification. We use data from household surveys to estimate the effects of crop diversification on nutrition (dietary diversity) and on income (crops sold) of rural households from eight developing and transition economies. We find that the vast majority of households grow crops despite the modest contribution of agriculture to income. Most agricultural land is devoted to staple food production; high-value commodities such as fruits and vegetables are also produced, but in limited quantities. Both descriptive statistics and regression results show a positive correlation between the number of crops cultivated, household income from crops and the two indicators we use for dietary diversity, also after controlling for household characteristics.

Does Electrification Spur the Fertility Transition? Evidence From Indonesia

We analyze various pathways through which access to electricity affects fertility in Indonesia, using a district difference-in-difference approach. The electrification rate increased by 65 % over the study period, and our results suggest that the subsequent effects on fertility account for about 18 % to 24 % of the overall decline in fertility. A key channel is increased exposure to television. Using in addition several waves of Demographic and Health Surveys, we find suggestive evidence that increased exposure to TV affects, in particular, fertility preferences and increases the effective use of contraception. Reduced child mortality seems to be another important pathway.

Foot-and-mouth disease and its effect on milk yield: an economic analysis on livestock holders in Pakistan.

A longitudinal study has been conducted in the provinces of Sindh, Punjab and Islamabad Capital Territory area, Pakistan, to evaluate the impact of foot-and-mouth disease on milk yield in a sample of farmers owning cattle and buffaloes. The sample consisted of 50 farms where the presence of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) virus was initially suspected on the basis of clinical signs and subsequently confirmed through either a field test or laboratory confirmation. In each farm, the total number of clinical cases was registered, and clinically diseased milking cattle and buffaloes were followed up for the next 60 days from the onset of clinical signs and the amount of milk yield measured. The average milk yield, estimated to be around 10 l per animal before the onset of FMD, decreased significantly in the 2 months following the onset of acute clinical disease. The loss of milk production in the 60 days following the onset of clinical signs was estimated to be around 220 and 201 l for cattle and buffaloes, respectively. Under the assumption that the administration of a good-quality vaccine matching circulating FMD strains could protect against clinical disease, the benefit/cost ratio for having all animals vaccinated in all 50 farms was estimated to be 5.7.

Oil industry and road traffic fatalities in contemporary Colombia

This paper studies the effects that oil extraction activities in Colombia have on the number of dead/injured people as a consequence of road-related accidents. Starting in 2004, the increasing exploitation of oil wells in some Colombian departments has worsened the traffic conditions due to the increased presence of trucks transporting crude oil from the wells to the refineries; this phenomenon has not been accompanied by an improvement in the road system with dramatic consequences in terms of road viability. The descriptive and empirical analysis presented here focuses on the period 2004–2011; results from descriptive statistics indicate a positive relationship between the presence of oil extraction activities and the number of either dead/injured people. Panel regressions for the period 2004–2011 confirm that, among other factors, the presence of oil-extraction activities did play a positive and statistical significant role in increasing the number of dead/injured people.

Quality of life and social exclusion in rural Southern, Central and Eastern Europe and the CIS

This article will focus on household access to essential social services provision (in particular examining access to public utilities) in countries of Southern, Central and Eastern Europe (SEE/CEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The article uses original household data from two rounds of the Life in Transition Survey (LiTS) of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank, conducted in 2006 and 2010, and from the Social Exclusion Survey, which the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) conducted in late 2009. We will focus our analysis on differentiation according to the locality where households were residing, in rural and urban areas. Large differences in access to essential public utilities (such as piped tap water, sewerage systems, telephone and internet) are shown between urban and rural areas, combined with marked inequality within rural areas. In addition, issues of social exclusion (including access to social services) and life satisfaction are investigated. While objective gaps in access are wide, subjective satisfaction with the quality of life is still higher in rural areas, including among those who are found to be socially excluded, indicating greater resilience of the rural population.

How Much Should We Trust Micro-data? A Comparison of the Socio-demographic Profile of Malawian Households Using Census, LSMS and DHS data

This paper assesses the empirical representativeness of micro-data by comparing the Malawi 2008 census to two representative household surveys – ‘the Living Standard Measurement Survey’ and the ‘Demographic and Health Survey’ – both implemented in Malawi in 2010. The comparison of descriptive statistics – demographics, asset ownership, and living conditions – shows considerable similarities despite statistically identifiable differences due to the large samples. Differences mainly occur when wording, scope, and pre-defined answer categories diverge across surveys. Multivariate analyses are considerably less representative due to loss of observations with composite indicators yielding higher comparability as individual ones. Household-level fixed-effect specifications produce more similar results, yet are not suited for policy conclusions. Comparability of micro-data should not be assumed but checked on a case-by-case basis. Still, micro-data constitute reliable grounds for factually informed conclusions if design and context are appropriately considered.Ce papier évalue la représentativité empirique des micro-données en comparant le recensement du Malawi de 2008 avec deux enquêtes représentatives des ménages – ‘l’Enquête de la Mesure des Niveaux de Vie’ (EMNV) et ‘l’Enquête sur la Démographie et la Santé’ (EDS) - qui ont chacune été mises en œuvre au Malawi en 2010. La comparaison des statistiques descriptives – la démographie, la propriété des biens et les conditions de vie - présente des similarités considérables malgré des différences statistiquement identifiables en raison des grands échantillons. Les différences se produisent principalement quand les formulations, la portée et les catégories de réponses prédéfinies divergent selon les enquêtes. Les analyses multivariées sont considérablement moins représentatives en raison de la perte d’observations ayant des indicateurs composites. Les spécifications à effets fixes au niveau des ménages produisent des résultats plus similaires, mais ne sont pas adaptées aux conclusions des politiques. La comparabilité des micro-données ne doit pas être présumée mais vérifiée au cas par cas. Néanmoins, les micro-données constituent des motifs fiables pour produire des conclusions factuelles si la conception et le contexte sont pris en considération.

Bhutan: Between Happiness and Horror

In 1988, the Government began stripping thousands of Nepali speakers of their citizenship. The newly formed Bhutanese People’s Party responded in 1990 with violent demonstrations, prompting a crackdown on the Nepali population. Over 100,000 Southern Bhutanese fled or were expelled to Nepal in the 1990s. Since this time, the King has actively sought to restrict the migration of the vast majority of these refugees back into the country. Moreover, starting in 1998 the Government initiated a program of resettling northern Buddhists on the land vacated by Hindu refugees [...] Severe human rights abuses have been attributed to the government’s efforts to quell ethnoreligious challenges to Ngalong political primacy [....] Human rights observers have argued that the new constitution does not adequately protect the rights of the Nepali-speakers in Bhutan.

Indonesia's Domestic Biogas Programme – Household panel survey data

The data presented in this article are related to the research paper titled, “The impact of a household biogas programme on energy use and expenditure in East Java” (A.S. Bedi, R. Sparrow, L. Tasciotti, 2017) [1]. This Data in Brief article presents two rounds of survey data conducted in 2011 and 2012 for a panel of 677 dairy farm households in the province of East Java, Indonesia. The survey relied on structured questionnaires to collect data on the production and use of biogas, the use of other non-renewable energy sources, farm characteristics, and socioeconomic and demographic characteristics of households. The panel data set in STATA format and do files are made publicly available to promote replicability and extended analyses of a sustainable energy initiative.

Urban agriculture, dietary diversity and child health in a sample of Tanzanian town folk

ABSTRACT Undernutrition and micronutrient deficiency continue to be two of the major health burdens in less developed economies. In this study, we explore the link between urban agriculture, dietary diversity and child health, using weight-for-age and height-for-age Z-scores. The study makes use of two rounds of observational data for urban Tanzania and employs an instrumental variables estimation approach. We show that practising urban agriculture leads to the consumption of a greater variety of food items and the health status of urban children living in households practising urban agriculture significantly improves in the short and, more importantly, long term.