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Begin New Search Topic Poverty Content Type Working Paper Publishing Institution United Nations University Publication Year within 25 Years

11. Sensitivity of Loan Size to Lending Rates

Author:
Samuel Kobina Annim
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper examines the combined effect of interest rates and poverty levels of microfinance clients on loan size. Cross section data on 2,691 clients and non-clients households from Ghana is used to test the hypothesis of loan price inelasticity. Quantile regression and variants of least squares methods that explore endogeneity are employed. We find the expected inverse relationship only for the 20th to 40th quantile range. The semi-elasticity of loan amount responsiveness to a unit change in interest rate is more than proportionate and significant for the poorest group only. Market segmentation based on poverty level is suggested in targeting and sustaining microfinance clients.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Markets, Poverty, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:
Africa

12. Latin American Urban Development into the 21st Century

Author:
Ravi Kanbur, Dennis Rodgers, and Jo Beall
Publication Date:
01-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper argues for a more systemic engagement with Latin American cities, contending it is necessary to reconsider their unity in order to nuance the 'fractured cities' perspective that has widely come to epitomise the contemporary urban moment in the region. It begins by offering an overview of regional urban development trends, before exploring how the underlying imaginary of the city has critically shifted over the past half century. Focusing in particular on the way that slums and shantytowns have been conceived, it traces how the predominant conception of the Latin American city moved from a notion of unity to a perception of fragmentation, highlighting how this had critically negative ramifications for urban development agendas, and concludes with a call for a renewed vision of Latin American urban life.
Topic:
Development, Poverty, and Urbanization
Political Geography:
Latin America

13. Significance of Public Space in the Fragmented City: Designing Strategies for Urban Opportunities in Informal Settlements of Buenos Aires City

Author:
Flavio Janches
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This article surveys the problem of urban marginalization by one of its more critical expressions in the contemporary city: the slums. The aim is to define an urban design strategy for the integration of those settlements as part of the city context, which enables to find solutions for the conflict improving these communities quality of life.
Topic:
Poverty, Sociology, and Urbanization

14. Irregular Urbanization as a Catalyst for Radical Social Mobilization: The Case of the Housing Movements of São Paulo

Author:
Lucy Earle
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This study focuses on the city of São Paulo, Brazil and examines the ways in which irregular and illegal growth have influenced the collective action of social movements of the urban poor. The study describes how São Paulo grew as a socially segregated city during the twentieth century due to calculated neglect on the part of the municipal authorities. Highlighting the city's sociospatial inequality, degradation of the central districts and widespread irregularity, it illustrates how these factors have both negatively affected the urban poor and provided a catalyst for social mobilization.
Topic:
Poverty, Social Stratification, Social Movement, and Urbanization
Political Geography:
South America and Latin America

15. Explaining Poverty Evolution: The Case of Mozambique

Author:
Channing Arndt, M. Azhar Hussain, E. Samuel Jones, Virgulino Nhate, Finn Tarp1, and James Thurlow
Publication Date:
03-2011
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
Measuring poverty remains a complex and contentious issue. This is particularly true in sub-Saharan Africa where poverty rates are higher, information bases typically weaker, and the underlying determinants of welfare relatively volatile. This paper employs recently collected data on household consumption in Mozambique to examine the evolution of consumption poverty with focus on the period 2002/03 to 2008/09. The paper contributes in four areas. First, the period in question was characterized by major movements in international commodity prices. Mozambique provides an illuminating case study of the implications of these world commodity price changes for living standards of poor people. Second, a novel 'backcasting' approach using a computable general equilibrium model of Mozambique, linked to a poverty module.
Topic:
Human Welfare and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa

16. Asset-Based Poverty in Rural Tajikistan: Who Climbs out and Who Falls in?

Author:
Oleksiy Ivaschenko and Cem Mete
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
Tajikistan's rural sector has witnessed substantial development since the country began to emerge from civil conflict in 1999. Gross agricultural output increased 64 per cent from 1999 to 2003, and there were significant developments in the agricultural reform agenda. This paper uses the panel component of two surveys conducted in Tajikistan at one-year interval (2003 and 2004) to explore the major determinants of the transition out of/into poverty of rural households. Poverty status is measured in the asset space, thus indicating structural rather than transitory poverty movements. The empirical analysis reveals several interesting findings that are also important from a policy perspective: first, cotton farming seems to have no positive impact on poverty levels, nor on mobility out of poverty. Second, the rate of increase in the share of private farming at the district level had little impact on poverty levels and poverty mobility.
Topic:
Demographics, Development, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Asia and Tajikistan

17. Global Growth and Distribution: Are China and India Reshaping the World?

Author:
Dominique van der Mensbrugghe, Maurizio Bussolo, Rafael E. De Hoyos, and Denis Medvedev
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
Over the past 20 years, aggregate measures of global inequality have changed little even if significant structural changes have been observed. High growth rates of China and India lifted millions out of poverty, while the stagnation in many African countries caused them to fall behind. Using the World Bank's LINKAGE global general equilibrium model and the newly developed Global Income Distribution Dynamics (GIDD) tool, this paper assesses the distribution and poverty effects of a scenario where these trends continue in the future. Even by anticipating a deceleration, growth in China and India is a key force behind the expected convergence of per capita incomes at the global level. Millions of Chinese and Indian consumers will enter into a rapidly emerging global middle class—a group of people who can afford, and demand access to, the standards of living previously reserved mainly for the residents of developed countries. Notwithstanding these positive developments, fast growth is often characterized by high urbanization and growing demand for skills, both of which result in a widening of income distribution within countries. These opposing distributional effects highlight the importance of analysing global disparities by taking into account—as the GIDD does—income dynamics between and within countries.
Topic:
Development, Economics, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa, China, India, and Asia

18. Globalization, Literacy Levels, and Economic Development

Author:
Alok Bhargava
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper estimated models for GDP growth rates, poverty levels, and inequality measures for the period 1990–2000 using data on 54 developing countries at five-yearly intervals. Issues of globalization were investigated by analysing the differential effects of the countries' exports and imports and by postulating trans-logarithmic models that allow for non-linear effects of literacy levels and measures of openness. The main findings were that literacy rates affected growth rates in a quadratic manner and countries with higher literacy were more likely to benefit from globalization. Second, the model for growth rates showed non-linear and differential effects of the export/GDP and import/GDP ratios. Third, the models indicated that population health indicators such as life expectancy were important predictors of GDP growth rates. Fourth, models for poverty measures showed that poverty was not directly affected by globalization indicators. Finally, the model for Gini coefficients indicated significant effects of 'medium' and 'high' skilled labour work force, with higher proportions of high-skilled labour implying greater inequality.
Topic:
Development, Education, International Trade and Finance, and Poverty

19. Individual and Collective Resources and Health in Morocco

Author:
Marie-Claude Martin
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The interaction between available individual and collective resources in the determination of health is largely ignored in the literature on the relationship between poverty and health in developing countries. We analyse the role public resources play in the perception that rural women in Morocco have of their health. These resources are taken to contribute directly and indirectly to the improvement of individual health by, on the one hand, providing a health-promoting environment and, on the other, improving the individual's ability to produce health. The empirical results of multilevel models confirm the expected associations between socioeconomic status, individual vulnerability factors and health. Furthermore, the random part of the model suggests that variation in state of health is also associated with the presence of collective resources. However, the higher the level of women's individual wealth, the less the characteristics of the community in which they live seem to be associated with their health, and the less the potential vulnerability factors seem to constrain their ability to maintain or improve health. Our results suggest that collective investments derived from various areas of activity will be more favourable to improving health, insofar as they are adapted to the initial capacity of women to benefit from them.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Health, and Poverty
Political Geography:
Africa and Morocco

20. Measuring Vulnerability and Poverty: Estimates for Rural India

Author:
Raghav Gaiha and Katsushi Imai
Publication Date:
04-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
This paper measures the vulnerability of households in rural India, based upon the ICRISAT panel survey. We employ both ex ante and ex post measures of vulnerability. The latter are decomposed into aggregate and idiosyncratic risks and poverty components. Our decomposition shows that idiosyncratic risks account for the largest share, followed by poverty and aggregate risks. Despite some degree of risk-sharing, the landless or small farmers are vulnerable to idiosyncratic risks, forcing them to reduce consumption. Income-augmenting policies therefore must be combined with those that not only reduce aggregate and idiosyncratic risks but also build resilience against them.
Topic:
Demographics, Development, Economics, and Poverty
Political Geography:
India and Asia