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42. Performance-Based Incentives for Health: A Way to Improve Tuberculosis Detection and Treatment Completion?
- Author:
- Rena Eichler, Diana Weil, and Alexandra Beith
- Publication Date:
- 04-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- Tuberculosis is a public health emergency in Africa, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia. Of the estimated 1.7 million deaths from TB, 98 percent are in the developing world, the majority being among the poor. In order to reach the MDG and the Stop TB partnership targets for 2015, TB detection rates need to double, treatment success rates must increase to more than 7075 percent, and strategies to address HIV-associated TB and multi-drug resistant TB must be aggressively expanded. DOTS, the internationally-recommended TB control strategy is the foundation of TB control efforts worldwide. A standard recording and monitoring system built on routine service-based data allows nearly all countries in the world to track progress in case detection and treatment completion through routine monitoring. This provides a good base for measuring the impact of different strategies for improving TB control outcomes.
- Topic:
- Health, International Organization, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- Africa, Europe, and Asia
43. Information, Incentives and Institutions: Experimenting with Private-Public Partnerships to Link the Poor with Modern Supply Chains
- Author:
- Jikun Huang, Johan Swinnen, Marcel Fafchamps, Tom Reardon, Bart Minten, and Scott Rozelle
- Publication Date:
- 03-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
- Abstract:
- To lift more than 10,000 farmers directly out of poverty by developing new Best-Practice Models for linking the poor to modern supply chains and after scaling up by our private and public partners to lift more than 1 million farmers out of poverty.
- Topic:
- Agriculture, Development, Non-Governmental Organization, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- Africa, China, India, Asia, Senegal, and Madagascar
44. Sovereignties, the World Conference against Racism 2001 and the Formation of a Dalit Human Rights Campaign
- Author:
- Dag Erik Berg
- Publication Date:
- 04-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
- Abstract:
- This paper examines how the World Conference against Racism in Durban 2001 intensified an old debate in India about caste and race. The controversy arose after the 'National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights' wanted to present caste discrimination in Durban as equivalent to racial discrimination. The Indian government protested, and distinguished sociologists entered the fray by claiming that race is a western concept which cannot be compared to caste, strengthening the official position. Conceptual logic became central to the debate. First, the position represents conventional knowledge, which reflects the anti-colonial attempt to define race as being irrelevant to India. But, secondly, the scholarly discourse acted to exclude oppression from the debate in clear contrast to the Durban agenda on racism and intolerance. The debate showed, broadly, how Durban represented a transformative potential by connecting global racism discourse to the moral status of an embedded postcolonial state. Further, the paper argues that the dominating conceptual focus reflects a paradigmatic individualism, which informs the scholarly approach to modern caste formations. While individualist approaches exclude Dalit rhetoric as subjective, they do not sufficiently acknowledge that the exclusionary logics inflicted on Dalits in modern bureaucratic institutions is a racial dynamic. To shed light on the Durban controversy, the paper outlines the larger background to caste in India and provides examples of Dalit discourse. It also presents the formation of the hum an rights network and controversial issues regarding the way they define themselves as NGOs, Dalits and Christians. These attributed properties were fundamental for the debate(s). Durban cannot be seen as an episode with tangible empirical impact. Rather, the debate was an intense moment in an ongoing historical argument about hierarchical practices and equality in India as well as about its moral status in the global community. In December 2006, however, at an international conference in New Delhi, the Prime Minister of India compared the Dalit situation to apartheid.
- Topic:
- Human Rights, Poverty, and Race
- Political Geography:
- India, East Asia, Asia, New Delhi, Kurdistan, and Durban
45. Income Inequality, Poverty and Social Spending in Japan
- Author:
- Randall S. Jones
- Publication Date:
- 06-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
- Abstract:
- Income inequality and relative poverty among the working-age population in Japan have risen to levels above the OECD average. This trend is partially explained by labour market dualism, with an increasing proportion of non-regular workers who are paid significantly less than regular workers, as well as by other factors, including the ageing of the workforce. Social spending as a share of GDP has been expanding in the context of population ageing, although it remains below the OECD average and the proportion received by low-income households is small. Consequently, the impact of social spending on inequality and poverty is weak compared to other OECD countries and inadequate to offset the deterioration in market income. The scope for increasing social spending is constrained by the fiscal situation. Instead, reversing the upward trend in inequality and poverty requires reforms to reduce labour market dualism and better target social spending on low-income households, particularly single parents.
- Topic:
- Poverty, Income Inequality, Social Services, and Housing
- Political Geography:
- Japan and Asia
46. Globalization And Military-Industrial Transformation In South Asia: An Historical Perspective
- Author:
- Emrys Chew
- Publication Date:
- 04-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
- Abstract:
- This paper attempts to demonstrate the relevance of the historical method and the importance of identifying long-term globalizing patterns in understanding the military-industrial transformation and militarization of South Asia. Out of this particular historical matrix would flow the events of 9/11, as well as ongoing developments in the global 'war on terror', fought out in the wider periphery of South Asia.
- Topic:
- Development, Globalization, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- Asia
47. Poverty, Pro-Poor Growth and Mobility: A Decomposition Framework with Application to China
- Author:
- Guanghua Wan and Yin Zhang
- Publication Date:
- 12-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United Nations University
- Abstract:
- This paper proposes a framework for incorporating longitudinal distributional changes into poverty decomposition. It is shown that changes in the Sen-Shorrocks-Thon index over time can be decomposed into two components—one component reflects the progressivity of income growth among the original poor, the other measures the extent of downward mobility experienced by the incumbent poor. The decomposition is applied to appraising poverty trends in China between 1988 and 1996. The results indicate that the proposed decomposition can complement the widely-used growthdistribution decomposition in providing insights into poverty dynamics.
- Topic:
- Development and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- China and Asia
48. Poverty Reduction in China: Trends and Causes
- Author:
- Guanghua Wan and Yin Zhang
- Publication Date:
- 12-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United Nations University
- Abstract:
- Applying the Shapley decomposition to unit-record household survey data, this paper investigates the trends and causes of poverty in China in the 1990s. The changes in poverty trends are attributed to two proximate causes; income growth and shifts in relative income distribution. The Foster-Greer-Thorbecke measures are computed and decomposed, with different datasets and alternative assumptions about poverty lines and equivalence. Among the robust results are: (i) both income growth and favourable distributional changes can explain China's remarkable achievement in combating poverty in rural areas in the first half of the 1990s; (2) in the second half of the 1990s, both rural and urban China suffered from rapidly rising inequality and stagnant income growth, leading to a slow-down in poverty reduction, even reversal of poverty trend.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- China and Asia
49. Credit Constraints as a Barrier to Technology Adoption by the Poor: Lessons from South-Indian Small-Scale Fishery
- Author:
- Xavier Giné and Stefan Klonner
- Publication Date:
- 09-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United Nations University
- Abstract:
- We study the diffusion of a capital intensive technology among a fishing community in south India and analyze the dynamics of income inequality during this process. We find that lack of asset wealth is an important predictor of delayed technology adoption. During the diffusion process, inequality follows Kuznets' well-known inverted U-shaped curve. The empirical results imply that redistributive policies favouring the poor result in accelerated economic growth and a shorter duration of sharpened inequality.
- Topic:
- Development, Poverty, and Science and Technology
- Political Geography:
- India and Asia
50. The Public Distribution Systems of Foodgrains and Implications for Food Security: A Comparison of the Experiences of India and China
- Author:
- Guanghua Wan and Zhang-Yue Zhou
- Publication Date:
- 09-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United Nations University
- Abstract:
- A comparative study of the public distribution systems of foodgrains in India and China is expected to reveal lessons and experiences that are valuable to policymakers. This is particularly important for developing countries in their endeavour to ensure food security. This paper undertakes such an exercise. The main features and developments of the two public distribution systems are first highlighted. This is followed by a comparative analysis of their similarities and differences. The role of public foodgrain distribution systems in ensuring food security is then evaluated. Finally, policy implications are drawn.
- Topic:
- Human Welfare and Poverty
- Political Geography:
- China, India, and Asia