Rural Poverty and Income Dynamics in Asia and Africa

Although there is much interest in poverty reduction, there are few agreed upon strategies to effectively reduce poverty. In this new book, the editors have gathered together various evidences on poverty dynamics, based on panel data from the last few decades in the Philippines, Thailand, Bangladesh and Tamil Nadu in India, compared with more recent data from sub-Saharan Africa. The major finding of this research project is that rural households in sub-Saharan African are beginning to experience the same pattern of structural change in income composition and poverty reduction that Asian households have experienced in the past 20-25 years. The chapters in the book explore how the spread of Green Revolution has triggered the subsequent transformation of rural economies. Many rural households in Asia have been able to move out of poverty in the presence of increasing scarcity of farmland initially by increasing rice income through the adoption of modern rice technology and gradually diversifying their income sources away from farm to non-farm activities. Increased participation in non-farm employment has been more pronounced among the more educated children, whose education is facilitated by an increase in farm income brought about by the Green Revolution.This book identifies the importance of Green Revolution and non-farm employment for poverty reduction in Asia, which provides valuable lessons for sub-Saharan Africa.

1. Introduction: An Overview and Conceptual Framework Yasuyuki Sawada, Jonna P. Estudillo and Keijiro Otsuka 2. Income Dynamics, Schooling Investment, and Poverty Reduction in Philippine Villages, 1985–2004 Jonna P. Estudillo, Yasuyuki Sawada and Keijiro Otsuka 3. Human Capital Investment and Poverty Reduction over Generations: A Case from the Rural Philippines, 1979–2003 Kazushi Takahashi and Keijiro Otsuka 4. Income Dynamics, Schooling Investment, and Poverty Reduction in Thai Villages, 1987–2004 Supattra Cherdchuchai, Keijiro Otsuka and Jonna P. Estudillo 5. Income Dynamics, Schooling Investments, and Poverty Reduction in Bangladesh, 1988–2004, Mahabub Hossain A.N.M. Mahfuzur Rahman and Jonna P. Estudillo 6. Income Dynamics and Schooling Investments in Tamil Nadu, India, from 1971 to 2003: Changing Roles of Land and Human Capital Kei Kajisa and N. Venkatesa Palanichamy 7. Role of Nonfarm Income and Education in Reducing Poverty: Evidence from Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda Tomoya Matsumoto, Yoko Kijima and Takashi Yamano 8. Determinants of Household Income and Schooling Investments in Rice-Growing Provinces in Mozambique, 2002–5 Benedito Cunguara and Kei Kajisa 9. Toward a New Paradigm of Farm and Nonfarm Linkages in Economic Development Keijiro Otsuka, Jonna P. Estudillo and Yasuyuki Sawada

Keijiro Otsuka is Professorial Fellow of the Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development (FASID) and Professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) in Tokyo, Jonna P. Estudillo is Faculty Fellow of FASID and Associate Professor at the GRIPS, and Yasuyuki Sawada is Associate Professor at the University of Tokyo.