Poverty In Rural India Research Articles

Satellite data and machine learning tools for predicting poverty in rural India

Increased availability of satellite imageries and rapid development in algorithms to process imagery data has spurred interest amongst economist to use high frequency imagery data for meaningful economic interpretations. One such application is to use satellite night light data as an indicator of poverty. As poverty statistics in India is released once in five years, high frequency night lights data can be used to predict poverty in the years where official poverty statistics is not available. In this paper, we explored use of satellite night light data and machine learning algorithms (Artificial Neural Network) to predict rural poverty at sub-national level, i.e. state. We compared night light data with per capita domestic product as a predictor for the model. We find night light data as a better predictor of poverty than of per capita domestic product. Such predictions using satellite data can be used as a complement to the existing data-sets. This will facilitate economist for modelling the economic relationships in understanding poverty and provide more frequent and local estimates for policy makers.

Challenges for countryside entrepreneurs and efforts to solve them in Indian scenario

The monetary development of our country mainly depends on the development of rural areas and the living standard of people. Therefore, countryside entrepreneur is one of the main inputs in the economic development of a country. It helps in removal of rural poverty in India. For that reason, there ought to be more stress on involved rural development programmes. Rural youth should be confident to take up entrepreneurship as a career, with training and sustaining support systems along with necessary assistance. There is also needs to have a wellorganized keeping up market and government’s support in this ambience.

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme: A Policy Solution to Rural Poverty in India?

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was developed by the Indian government to reduce rural poverty through 100 days of guaranteed employment per year. Using focus group methods, we explore whether this scheme has provided rights' based social protection through guaranteed employment for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and women in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Odisha. We found that the experiences of participating in MGNREGA varied depending on how MGNREGA wages compared to market wages in the region, as well as local implementation of the program. Although MGNREGA offered some basic employment for marginalized groups, it did not provide substantial help to the most vulnerable. However, there was some evidence of small but significant shifts in labour relations. Higher wages, more opportunities for work, better implementation and a greater recognition of the caregiving responsibilities of women will be required for this policy to fully meet its goals.

Micawber Capital: For Mission or Profit?

In July 2010 Robert Drake, senior director at Micawber Capital, one of India's largest microfinance organizations, needed to recommend a corporate structure and organization for Micawber after its scheduled IPO in August 2010.The IPO would bring to Micawber new stakeholders, primarily financial institutions. Drake was skeptical that the new investors shared Micawber's commitment to help alleviate poverty in rural India through microcredit loans; he assumed their primary interest was a good return on their investments. The two objectives–increasing ROI and meeting the financial needs of the poor–seemed at odds with each other.Drake had to consider how the interests of clients and investors would be represented in strategic decisions so that they balanced the conflicting values of the stakeholders. Balance stakeholder commitments to business objectives and social mission Understand the expectations of both commercial investors and mission-conscious investors in social enterprises Discuss the challenges and opportunities of structuring an organization and key partnerships based on a long-term values strategy Identify organizational policies and business processes that can be changed to encourage an appropriate balance of values-based and financial-based decisions

Trends in rural poverty in india during 1973–74 to 2011–12

In this paper made an attempt to examine the trends in rural poverty in India using secondary data for the time period from 1973–74 to 2011–12. The study considers all states and union territories of India as population and seven states from high per capita income states and seven states from low per capita income states are selected as sample. For assessing poverty levels of sample states, the variables like number of rural population below poverty, percentage of rural population below poverty line and rural poverty line in rupees are taken in to consideration. Growth rates, CV analysis, f-test and t-test are applied along with descriptive statistics for the analysis. Our result shows that the trend in rural absolute poverty has been declining over a time period, but not same kind in high per capita income and low per capita income states and there is significant mean deference noticed. The incidence of rural poverty in high per capita income states and low per capita income states of India was decreasing and varied considerably during the study period. Rural poverty growth rates have fallen quickly for all high per capita income states more than 10 per cent of compound annual growth, while in all low per capita income states less than 10 per cent of compound annual growth. There is significant mean difference witnessed between high per capita income and low per capita income states in declining poverty.

Seasonal Migration and Moving Out of Poverty in Rural India: Insights from Statistical Analysis

Rural households in many countries have used temporary or seasonal migration as a strategy to cope with natural shocks such as drought, means of employment and income generation during lean season, and to move out of poverty. This paper studies the linkages between migration, employment in economic activities, asset accumulation, and poverty reduction among rural households in a droughtprone village of India over the last four decades. The Dokur Village of Mahbubnagar District in Telangana State of India experienced persistent drought over a decade. To cope with this situation, many households of the village temporarily migrated to the nearby and faraway cities. ICRISAT had conducted household surveys in Dokur under the Village Level Studies (VLS) and Village Dynamics Studies (VDS) program since 1975. The present study has used the VLS-VDS dataset (1975–2012) and reorganized sample households into 46 dynasty households. Based on their participation in migration, sample households were grouped into two categories: migrant and non-migrant households. Household income was computed by sources for all households for all the study years. Contribution of migratory income and remittances to the total household income was quantified. To identify the factors responsible for migration decision, probit analysis was carried out. For each year, sample households were grouped into poor and non-poor category using both lower (USD 1.25 ppp per day per person) and upper (USD 2.00 ppp per day per person) poverty line. The study revealed that seasonal out-migration helped many households to come out of poverty even though they had experienced a decade of drought. In-depth analysis of asset accumulation behaviour of the households over time revealed important insights regarding their coping mechanism and the process of moving out of poverty.

Estimating carbon sequestration potential of existing agroforestry systems in India

India launched National Agroforestry Policy on 10th February, 2014 which has the potential to substantially reduce poverty in rural India and revive wood based industry, besides integrating food production with environmental services. The policy is not only crucial to India’s ambitious goal of achieving 33 per cent forest and tree cover but also to mitigate GHG emissions from agriculture sector. Dynamic CO2FIX-v3.1 model has been used to estimate the carbon sequestration potential (CSP) of existing agroforestry systems (AFS) for simulation period of 30 years in twenty six districts from ten selected states of India. The observed number of trees on farmers’ field in these districts varied from 1.81 to 204 per hectare with an average value of 19.44 trees per hectare. The biomass in the tree component varied from 0.58 to 48.50 Mg DM ha−1, whereas, the total biomass (tree and crop) ranged from 4.96 to 58.96 Mg DM ha−1. The soil organic carbon ranged from 4.28 to 24.13 Mg C ha−1. The average estimated carbon sequestration potential of the AFS, representing varying edapho-climatic conditions, on farmers field at country level was 0.21 Mg C ha−1yr−1. At national level, existing AFS are estimated to mitigate 109.34 million tons CO2 annually, which may offsets one-third (33 %) of the total GHG emissions from agriculture sector.

Impact of Socio-Economic factors on Consumption Expenditure through Public Distribution System in rural India

Impact of public distribution system (PDS) on poverty in rural India is established; however, how the households from different socio-economic backgrounds are procuring through PDS, relatively, needs study. With this objective, influence of factors like poverty status, family size, social group, religion, gender and occupation on probability of household incurring consumption expenditure through PDS has been studied by using unit level data of consumer expenditure survey of National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) and multinomial logistic regression technique. The study is restricted to food grains rice and wheat and reveals that probability of consumption, through PDS, of minorities, economically and socially backward classes are higher, in general.

Direct Cost of Critical Illness Associated Healthcare Expenditures among Children Admitted in Pediatric Intensive Care Unit in Rural India.

To assess the direct costs involved in treatment of children receiving intensive care in a university-affiliated teaching hospital and its associated implications on the children's families, in rural India. It was a prospective observational study for cost-analysis using questionnaire based interviews and billing records data collection for admissions to the PICU over 27 consecutive months (January 2010 through March 2012). A total of 784 children were admitted to the unit during the assessment period. Full details of 633 children were included for analysis. The average length of stay was 6.16 d, average hospital expenditure was US$185.67, average hospital expenses per day was US$44.00, average pharmacy expenditure was US$109.67 and average pharmacy expenditure per day was US$20.62 per patient. Children who were ventilated had approximately 61% more expense per day as compared to non-ventilated ones. Boys and those with health insurance reported higher length of stay. Linear hierarchical regression with backward LR model showed that mechanical ventilation, multiple organ dysfunction, length of stay and insurance cover were the variables significantly affecting the final expenses. There is a high direct expenditure incurred by families of children receiving intensive care when seen in perspective of high rates of extreme poverty in rural India. These high expenditures make critical care unaffordable to majority of the population lacking insurance cover in resource limited regions with limited universal health coverage, which ultimately leads to suboptimal care and high childhood mortality. It is highly imperative for the governments and global health organizations to be sensitive towards this issue and to plan strategies for the same across different nations.

Labour Migration to the Construction Sector in India and its Impact on Rural Poverty

The present article studies the impact of migration to the construction sector on rural poverty in India based on field survey. The survey has been carried out in two phases, the first phase involving the survey of construction workers in National Capital Region and the second phase comparing the well-being of migrant households with non migrant households in selected source villages. The study finds that at destination, workers have poor living and working conditions, lack citizenship rights, entitlements and voice. However, at the cost of hardship, low consumption levels, and possibly a smaller working life span, they manage to save a good portion of their income which they remit or take back home. At origin, migrant households report higher expenditure on consumption, residential housing, and children’s education, as well as some other assets. These differences are a result of higher employment and wage incomes among migrants. However, we were not able to control for differences in initial conditions, and life cycle and other issues, which influence both participation in migration, as well as long-term impacts.

What Makes Rural Households Use Traditional Fuel? Empirical Evidence from India

This paper investigates the effects of different types of cooking fuels on the technical efficiency of household meal production in rural India. Rural households in India use for cooking either traditional fuels like firewood, dung, crop residue, and coal or modern fuels like liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and kerosene, or a combination of both traditional and modern fuels. Using the stochastic frontier method, this paper estimates the influence of different types of cooking fuel and other household level characteristics on the technical efficiency of household meal production. We use a representative sample of 3880 rural households from the India Human Development Survey, 2008. Our results indicate that efficiency of meal preparation is significantly higher when households use either a traditional or a combination of both traditional and modern fuels than if they use modern fuels alone. Thus, results of this paper shed light on reasons other than cost behind the overwhelming popularity of traditional fuels in spite of their adverse health and environmental effects. This result is likely to be driven by the capacity constraint imposed by LPG and kerosene burners in cooking a large quantity of food at a time. Our study identifies use of traditional fuel as a viable option for reducing energy poverty in rural India, and recommends extensive policy for supplying improved wood burning cook stoves and afforestation to reduce the harmful pollution effects of open fire. The policy makers should also emphasize on provision of biogas plant and biomass gasifier along with afforestation. Further, our study recognizes the need for developing and supplying more efficient cooking stoves for modern fuels to promote higher use of clean energy sources. Our results also suggest policy intervention in improving women’s education, household income, provision of ration card, and providing government support in acquiring improved cooking stoves for increasing efficiency of meal production at the household level.

Solar Energy Entrepreneurship to Promote Universal Electricity Access in Rural India: Challenges and Opportunities

The aim of this article is to motivate young Indian engineers to shun the craze and glamour for salaried employment in the metropolitan cities and instead, opt for the establishment and operation of micro and small, solar based, standalone micro-grid e nterprises in villages to enhance rural electricity access in the country. The young engineers should volunteer active contribution to enhance rural electricity access and become job providers in their own enterprises instead of aspiring for jobs in metropolitan cities. The task of enhancing electricity access in rural India should become the top priority and a mass movement in India. The country should strive for universal access to electricity which should be realized through greater involvement of young engineering fraternity rather than letting it remain the cosmetic responsibility of Government machinery in the typical Indian style as is the scenario today. This paper, after introducing readers with the burning problem of energy poverty in rural India emphasizes development of standalone solar based micro-grid infrastructure for mitigation of the immediate electricity problem in rural India with future provision for its augmentation into a smart grid, ICT-enabled system introducing automation and additional user friendly features. An overview of energy entrepreneurship and facilitator agencies providing finance and solar skill training to the prospective engineer entrepreneurs is given along with brief information on subsidies, tax concessions and tax holidays under the National Solar Mission and MSME S cheme. The prospective young engineer entrepreneurs are urged to verify and supplement information provided in the text of this paper from the authentic information published by the facilitator agencies in order that the engineer entrepreneurs can optimize their profits. Given their resolve to eradicate energy poverty and sincere involvement in infrastructure development the universal access to energy in India shall not be a distant dream to realize. These endeavors are bound to bestow the youth engineer entrepreneur with career growth and financial prosperity besides simultaneously bringing economic development and prosperity to the country.

Solar products for poor rural communities as a business: lessons from a successful project in Uttar Pradesh, India

Can sales of solar products and services be a commercially viable business in poor rural communities? Although enthusiasm for off-grid electrification among researchers and practitioners is widespread, the determinants of commercial success in this domain remain poorly understood. This article reports results and lessons from a successful field project in Uttar Pradesh, India. In collaboration with a local social enterprise, Boond Engineering and Development, a small investment of USD 5000 was made to establish an energy center in the Unnao district of the state. The energy center became profitable immediately and generated seven dollars of business in solar home systems for every dollar invested during the 6-month evaluation period. Factors contributing to the success of the project included robust marketing, a strong banking partnership, the high quality of products, and continuous evaluation of staff performance. Challenges to sales of solar products included a bias in sales toward large solar home systems, the limited access to finance for poor households, and access to working capital. Overall, the energy center model holds considerable promise for alleviating energy poverty in rural India on a large scale.

Impact of remittances on poverty at origin: a study on rural households in India using Covariate Balancing Propensity Score Matching

In India, migration research has chiefly concentrated upon determining the causes rather than the effects of migration. A review of the extant literature reveals a near absence of studies exploring the linkages between remittances and poverty in India. This paper attempts to partly fill that void by assessing the effect of remittances on rural development. The National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), which carried out a nationwide survey on migration in 2007–2008, reported that out-migrants from rural India have a much higher propensity to remit compared to their urban counterparts. As rural poverty in India continues to pose the most fundamental development challenge, this paper explores on the basis of unit level data obtained from the NSSO survey whether transfer income in the form of remittances help to alleviate/de-intensify poverty among recipient rural households. Using the nascent technique of covariate balancing propensity score, rural households receiving remittances are matched with households that have similar background characteristics but do not receive remittances, and the impact of remittance income on their poverty status is subsequently ascertained. After correcting for self-selection, the study finds that remittance income from both internal as well as international sources do serve to lower the incidence of poverty among rural households although, expectedly, international remittances seem to have a stronger poverty alleviating effect.

Micro-finance: A tool for fight against poverty in rural India through self-help group formation

Prosperity of India lies in the prosperity of its villages. In spite of being an agrarian economy, the rural scenario of our country projects a rather despondent picture. A large chunk of the rural population still remains in abject misery and poverty. Economic independence and empowerment of rural poor are major challenges faced by the government. Since 1991, the government has intensified its efforts for inclusive growth with its outreach programs. Banks and financial institutions are engaged in massive financial inclusion programs. Although, the percentage of rural population living below the poverty line declined significantly from 27.09% in 1999-2000 to 22.7 in 2004-2005, but still the millions of rural people are living in perpetual bondage write down the specific source. For alleviating rural poverty and freeing the rural people from the vicious cycle of poverty, credit has long been identified as one of the most crucial inputs as access to credit can generate economic activity, growth and development. During the year 2005-2006, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) has re-designated Micro-Finance Development Fund (MFDF) as Micro-Finance Development and Equity Fund (MFDEF) and enhanced the fund size from Indian Rupees (Rs.) 100 to 200 crore. An amount of Rs. 113.50 million from MFDEF was utilized during the year towards up-scaling of SHG-Bank Linkage Programme. Under the SHG-Bank linkage programme, over 103 million rural households now have access to regular savings through 7.96 million SHGs linked to banks. About 27% of these SHGs are savings linked, the Swarnajayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana (SGSY) programme–the rural poverty alleviation programme of the Government of India where predominantly households below the poverty line are admitted as members. Microfinance in India is characterized by a high advancement and has brought a number of people above the poverty line. But the coverage is uneven with high numbers of people in rural hinterland still remaining out of the ambit of the outreach programs. Southern region accounts for more than 2/3rd of the total microfinance through SHGs in the country. Key words: Microfinance, poverty, self-help groups, income, employment generation.

Strategies and Policies for Alleviation of Rural Poverty in India: Experience of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme

Strategies and Policies for Alleviation of Rural Poverty in India: Experience of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme

Challenges and Opportunities in Entrepreneurship

Drucker's Views on Entrepreneur An entrepreneur is the one who always searches for change, responds to it and exploits it as an opportunity. innovation is the specific tool of entrepreneurs, the means by which they exploit changes as an opportunity for a different business or different service the entrepreneur in an advanced economy is an individual who introduce something new in the economy- a method of production not yet tested by experience in the branch of manufacturing, a product with which consumers are not yet familiar, a new source of raw material or of new markets and the like. In spite of various entrepreneurship development programmers launched by the govt. and non-government agencies, the entrepreneurs are encountering a number of problems for establishing economically viable small- scale units. Contribute significantly to the running of family businesses mostly in the form of unpaid effort and skills. Programmers meant to reach women entrepreneurs can succeed only if they take note of this paradox as well as of the familial and social conditioning that reduces the confidence, independence and mobility of women. Therefore, instead of just schemes as the carrot for entrepreneurship development an intensive training needs to be provided to the women and youth in rural India and create an entrepreneurship training system as per integrated rural development program. Rural entrepreneurship is the answer to removal of rural poverty in India.

Vulnerability as Expected Poverty in Rural India

Using a unique panel data for rural India for the periods 1999 and 2006 this paper models vulnerability to poverty. We quantify household vulnerability in rural India in 1999 and 2006, investigate the determinants of ex post poverty as well as ex ante vulnerability, assess the role of ex ante vulnerability on poverty shift during the sample periods (i.e. movement into/out of poverty) and finally, examine how the effects of the determinants of vulnerability vary at different points across the vulnerability distribution. We conclude that over time economic growth has reduced the incidence of poverty. Although chronic poverty is relatively small the high incidence of transient poverty underscores the importance of covariate and idiosyncratic shocks. Household vulnerability across the distribution of such vulnerability is also investigated. A number of factors affect such vulnerability across this distribution. Thus the paper isolates a number of characteristics of households and policy variables which can be targeted to reduce the incidence of vulnerability in rural India. JEL Classification Code: C23, C25, C31, I32

POVERTY IN RURAL INDIA: VARIATIONS IN FACTORS INFLUENCING DYNAMICS OF CHRONIC POVERTY

AbstractThe article studies the dynamics of chronic poverty in rural India. The article attempts to analyse the factors influencing the incidence and mobility of poverty and the changes in the influence of these factors over time. This article uses the household panel survey data collected by NCAER. It examines whether there has been change in the influence of factors such as village level infrastructure, household size and composition, and economic growth on poverty dynamics in different periods of time. The impact of a number of factors changes over time implying that the strategies for poverty reduction would have to take into account the changing economic environment. The article further presents an analysis of growth rate of per capita expenditure for the same set households to analyse the extent of consumption growth, which is also an indicator of poverty reduction for rural India. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Gender-specific effects of caste and salt on hypertension in poverty: a population-based study

Little is known about the risk of developing hypertension in those living in poverty in rural India. We examined gender and caste influences on risk factors for hypertension in a disadvantaged rural community. In 1479 adults living in 12 hamlets in rural Andhra Pradesh, we measured blood pressure, height, weight, waist and hip girth, and used point-of-care devices to measure blood glucose, cholesterol, triglyceride and haemoglobin levels. Information about lifestyle habits was obtained by questionnaire. Multivariable backward stepwise logistic regression was used to determine factors associated with hypertension (blood pressure ≥ 140/90 mmHg). The mean age was 39.7 years; 46.2% were men, 11.4% were hypertensive, 0.8% were obese and 44.4% were underweight (BMI <18.5 kg/m). Dietary salt intake was more than 40 g/day. Belonging to a forward caste was associated with a greater risk of hypertension in both men and women. The association of caste was eliminated after adjustment for BMI in women [odds ratio (OR) 1.12; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.61-2.06], but not in men (OR 2.93, 95% CI 1.77-4.86). Similar results were found for educational status. High salt intake was not associated with hypertension in women (OR 0.85, 95% CI 0.44-1.65), but was in men (OR 2.26, 95% CI 1.27-4.02). In this disadvantaged rural community, men are particularly prone to the effects of relative socioeconomic advantage and salt intake on the risk of hypertension. Traditional risk factors may play a greater role in the development of hypertension in men living in poverty than in women.