Sexratios at birth rose sharply in the South Caucasus countries after 1991, but recent data indicate that this trend is turning. What caused this rise, and what can be done to accelerate its normalization? Traditional kinship systems in the region are similar to those of other settings with...

The literature is reviewed on the relationships between population, poverty, and climate change. While developed countries are largely responsible for global warming, the brunt of the fallout will be borne by the developing world, in lower agricultural output, poorer health, and more frequent...

What can other developing countries learn from Sri Lanka on achieving good health at low cost? While its well-organized medical and maternal-child health services have been documented elsewhere, this paper fills a gap in documenting how it organizes services to reduce the population's exposure...

Violent conflict, a pervasive feature of the recent global landscape, has lasting impacts on human capital, and these impacts are seldom gender neutral. Death and destruction alter the structure and dynamics of households, including their demographic profiles and traditional gender roles. To...

There is a very large but scattered literature debating the economic implications of high fertility. This paper reviews the literature on three themes: (a) Does high fertility affect low-income countries' prospects for economic growth and poverty reduction? (b) Does population growth exacerbate...

Fertility decline has fueled a sharp increase in the proportion of' missing girls' in China, so an increasing share of males will fail to marry, and will face old age without the support normally provided by wives and children. This paper shows that historically, China has had nearly-universal...

Over the period 1984 to 1987, a major liberalization of restrictive trade policies was implemented in the Moroccan manufacturing sector. The level of imports changed across different industries according to each industryamp;apos;s degree of liberalization. The paper focuses on exploring the...

The apparently inexorable rise in the proportion of quot;missing girlsquot; in much of East and South Asia has attracted much attention amongst researchers and policy-makers. An encouraging trend was suggested by the case of South Korea, where child sex ratios were the highest in Asia but peaked...

India's fast-growing cities face three key challenges in improving public health outcomes. The first is the persistence of weak links in the chain -- notably, slums badly underserved with basic civic services -- that can pose public health threats to all. Richer residents corner public...

Levels of child malnutrition in India fell only slowly during the 1990s, despite significant economic growth and large public spending on the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program, of which the major component is supplementary feeding for malnourished children. To unravel this...