Population and Reproductive Health: An Economic Framework for Policy Evaluation

Abstract

THIS ARTICLE PRESENTS and illustrates the use of a standard simple economic framework for the evaluation of policies on population and reproductive health services and contrasts this framework with current discussions of several issues in these fields. There is a long tradition of economic analysis in the population and reproductive health fields. Nevertheless, a number of current policy discussions could benefit from some realignment to become more consistent with the broader field of human resource policy analysis. We think that there are two gains from such a realignment. First, the use of the standard economic framework for policy analysis would facilitate communication between analysts and policymakers working in the population and reproductive health community and economists and policymakers not working in these fields who are unfamiliar with the way policy issues are conceptualized by population and reproductive health sector specialists. Improving this communication is important because of ongoing policy discussions related to the extent to which scarce public resources should be directed toward population and reproductive health versus a large number of competing claims. Such discussions are likely to take place increasingly with ministries of finance and planning in developing countries, with key staff of development banks, and with policy and program specialists in bilateral donor agencies. Absent a realignment of the kind advocated in this article (or at least the ability to adapt analyses to these audiences), such interactions run the risk of becoming increasingly frustrating. Researchers working in population and reproductive health will be more effective policy analysts, and policymakers using their work will be more effective advocates for policies promoting family planning and reproductive health services, if the standard economic framework is used more