MPAs and Aspatial Policies in Artisanal Fisheries

Submitted by Daniel Hernandez on

Using a spatially explicit framework with low/middle-income country coastal characteristics, we explore whether aspatial policies augment the impact of marine protected areas(MPAs)and identify when MPAs create income burdens on communities. When MPAs are small and budget-constrained, they cannot resolve all of the marinescape’s open-access issues, but they can create win-win opportunities for ecological and economic goals at lower levels of enforcement.

Conservation, Fisheries

Training Manual on Climate Smart Agriculture Practices for Belize: Animal Management

Submitted by Daniel Hernandez on
EfD Authors:

The Training Manual on Climate Smart Agriculture Practices for Belize is intended to be used by technicians and teams working within the Extension Office of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, Fisheries, the Environment, Sustainable Development and Immigration (MAFFESDI) of Belize, as well as personnel from both Agriculture and Cooperative Departments. Additionally, the manual can be used by technicians linked to producer organizations or agriculture research and development centers. 

Agriculture, Climate Change, Land

Comparing farmers’ willingness to pay with costs of clean sweet potato seed multiplication in Kenya

Submitted by Jane Nyawira Maina on
EfD Authors:

The production of sweet potato has the potential to address food insecurity and malnutrition in the context of climate change. However, sustainable production of sweet potato is hampered by poor access to quality seed. We assess the level and determinants of farmers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for clean seed among smallholder sweet potato farmers and compare the estimated WTP with the cost of seed multiplication. Data for the paper were collected from 383 sweet potato farmers and 30 sweet potato seed multipliers in Kenya.

Agriculture

Drivers of organic farming: Lab-in-the-field evidence of the role of social comparison and information nudge in networks in Vietnam

Submitted by Luat Do on
EfD Authors:

This study examines factors determining farmers’ investment in organic farming using a contextualized lab-in-the-field experiment with 220 small household farmers in Northern Vietnam. We focus on the role of network structure, information nudge, and social comparison between farmers using three types of networks: circle, star and complete. Our results suggest that, on average, around 64% of the land is invested in organic farming in the complete network in which each farmer is connected to all of the others, while only about 57% of the land is invested in the circle and star network.

Agriculture, Experiments, Policy Design

Grid electrification should be combined with complementary infrastructure for greater social and economic benefits

Submitted by Petra Hansson on

Key findings:

While electricity is a key to economic development, nearly 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa live without electricity.

This study analyses the socioeconomic benefits of electrification in Uganda.

The findings show that grid connectivity increases the number of work hours, female employment, household expenditure (meaning that the household is able to buy more of the goods that it needs), and key educational outcomes. 

Furthermore, the benefits from grid connectivity increase with time.

Energy, Gender

Does access to electricity accelerate home-based business creation in rural Ethiopia?

Submitted by Petra Hansson on

KEY MESSAGES

Most of the businesses in rural areas are home-based, i.e., the household runs businesses such as food sales, restaurants, mobile, and electronics shops, barbering, etc., within their residence. Rural households’ business ownership increased from 17.5% in 2011 to 28.5% in 2016. We found that:

Energy, Policy Design