Agricultural inputs are peculiar in nature as an asymmetry in their roles can be identified during the production process. These inputs can be grouped into a set of growth inputs or a set of facilitating inputs. The inputs affecting biological or physiological growth from the inside of the plant...

The oft-observed inverse relationship between farm size and productivity has elicited several explanations having important policy and theoretical implications. Using advances in the analysis of price risk effects on producer behavior, and a simple two-period model of an agricultural household...

Why do farm households inefficiently allocate resources across the plots they cultivate? We explore how these production inefficiencies relate to consumption decisions and information sharing within the household. In a lab-in-the-field experiment, male producers allocate too few inputs to their...

In a careful and thorough empirical study, Christopher Udry (1996) shows convincingly that, in a large sample of West African households, household resource allocations were not Pareto efficient. This paper argues that observation of the Pareto inefficiency of a household resource allocation...

In village economies, insurance networks are key to smoothing shocks, while production networks can propagate them. The interplay of these networks is crucial. We show that a significant health expenditure shock to one household propagates to other linked households via supply-chain and labor...

The purpose of this paper is to explore the notion of economic informality and its application in the rural context of developing and transitional economies, applying Keith Hart's (1987) notion of informality as a 'remedial concept'. Some remedy is needed to make sense of the many 'palpable...

Why do farm households inefficiently allocate resources across the plots they cultivate? We explore how these production inefficiencies relate to consumption decisions and information sharing within the household. In a lab-in-the-field experiment, male producers allocate too few inputs to their...

Programs that increase the economic capacity of poor women can have cascading effects on children's participation in school and work that are theoretically undetermined. We present a simple model to describe the possible channels through which these programs may affect children's activities....

Shifting cultivation is the primary means of livelihood for subsistence farmers throughout the humid forests of the tropics. They rely on the forest landscape as a source of fertile land to sustain their livelihood. Sustainable use of the resource base requires long periods of fallow and the...

We study a parent's demand for gratitude from his child. We view this demand as an intervening variable between the parent's earnings and the incidence of child labor. The demand for gratitude arises from the desire of a parent to receive care and support from his child late in life, while the...