Since I’ve had three emails in one week asking me about this issue, I figured I might as well blog about it and have something to refer people to instead. The questions have all been variants of:
· Are women better remitters than men?
· Does having mothers migrate result in worse outcomes for kids than having their fathers migrate?
From almost every point of view, Rwanda’s performance over the past decade has been an unambiguous success story.
Between 2001 and 2011, Rwanda’s economy grew by 8.2 percent per annum, earning the country a spot on the list of the ten fastest growing countries in the world. Poverty rates fell by 14 percentage points, effectively lifting more than one million Rwandans out of poverty. Social indicators followed the general trend: Net enrolment in primary school increased to almost 100 percent, completion rates tripled, and child mortality decreased more than threefold, hitting the mark oftwo-thirds reduction as targeted by the Millennium Development Goals.
Yet buried under all this good news lays another maybe even more important evolution. After a decade-and-a-half stall, total fertility rates in Rwanda dropped from 6.1 in 2005 to 4.6 in 2010. This means that during a period of five years, the average number of children a woman of childbearing age can expect to have, has declined by 1.5.
Auteurs: Richard Akresh, Damien de Walque et Harounan Kazianga
Dans une récente étude, nous présentons les impacts sur l’éducation d’un projet-pilote de transferts monétaires au Burkina Faso1, dans la Province du Nahouri. Ce projet-pilote est accompagné d’une évaluation d’impact expérimentale randomisée pour mesurer et comparer, dans le même contexte en zone rurale au Burkina Faso, l’efficacité de transferts monétaires conditionnels et non-conditionnels qui ciblent les ménages pauvres. Les programmes de transferts monétaires conditionnels (TMC), comme les transferts monétaires non-conditionnels (TMNC), transfèrent des ressources monétaires aux ménages pauvres à intervalles réguliers. Mais la différence principale c’est que les TMC imposent des conditions aux ménages, telles que l’inscription et la fréquentation scolaire pour les enfants d’âge scolaire.
Avec les TMC, si les conditions ne sont pas respectées pour une période donnée, les transferts ne sont pas payés pour cette période. Au contraire, avec les TMNC, il n’y pas de conditions à respecter.
So I have blogged in the past about the potential and the use of gender disaggregated data, but my work this past week in Ghana made me realize (again and in new ways) how complicated it can get in practice.
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The Montes de María, between the departments of Sucre and Bolivar in the north of Colombia, has been the stage for violent conflict for a long time. In this region, people can't trust their neighbors, poverty is common and opportunities scarce.
In 2004 , the program “Paz y Desarrollo” (Peace and Development) of the Colombian government, co-financed by the World Bank, began to support civil society initiatives to achieve local development and build peace.
Association La Voûte Nubienne (AVN) was awarded a DM grant in 2009 to test an innovative strategy for scaling up and accelerating the recruitment and training of Nubian Vault (NV) apprentices and the growth of a self-sustaining market in NV houses in Burkina Faso. The Nubian Vault is an ancient Egyptian technique of building vaulted roofs made from local bricks without using any wood, instead of typical tin roofs that are more expensive and use scarce wood during construction. AVN is transforming traditional housing available in the harsh climate of the Sahel region by providing a sustainable housing alternative and helping to avoid further deforestation.
AVN has won one of the Dubai International Award for Best Practice (DIABP) to Improve the Living Environment. The Award, co-sponsored by UN-Habitat, specifically recognised the program in Burkina Faso for 'best practice transfer'.
The DIABP was established under the directives of late Sheikh Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, during the United Nations International Conference in Dubai in November, 1995 with 914 participants from 95 countries, to recognize the best practices with positive impact on improving the living environment.
For nearly a month, I have not read a single newspaper without an article on the harassment of women in the public space and transport. In newspaper articles across the world, there is a brewing sentiment echoing the story of violence that a woman recently faced on a bus in Delhi.
Find a good longread on development? Tweet it to @worldbank with the hashtag #longreads.
Satellite images of Beijing’s smog have been popping up on Twitter and blogs as the city suffers shockingly high air pollution levels. Some bloggers point out Beijing’s black skies aren’t so different from pre-1960s London or Pittsburgh in their industrial heyday. Even so, a new study warns that the heat-trapping effect of “black carbon,” or soot, is second only to CO2. Yale’s Environment 360 explains why cutting it could “go a long way to slowing climate change.” Check out cities with high air pollution levels in the Guardian’s data visualization showing exposure to outdoor air pollution, mapped by city.
(Source: Guardian)
Concern over the brutal and fatal rape of a young woman in India continues to grow. Former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown highlights a global online petition that has attracted more than a million signatures in “Without frontiers, young people mobilize for change.” On Twitter, plans for a February 14 worldwide event to raise awareness about violence against women are being spread using hashtag #1billionrising, For an academic read on the issue, check out a recent study, linked below, on combating violence against women, covering 40 years and 70 countries. It finds that the “mobilization of feminists…is the critical factor accounting for policy change.” What will the world be like 17 years from now? A new report by the National Intelligence Council -- Global Trends 2030 (pdf) -- is sparking interest. Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor Joseph S. Nye offers his take on the report’s “gamechangers” and megatrends. One key trend—urbanization—is keenly felt in Nairobi. The city’s Kibera slum is a place where “government is absent,” and where the economy is booming and incomes are rising, according to the Economist, adding it “may be the most entrepreneurial place on the planet.
Let's think together: Every Sunday the World Bank in Tanzania in collaboration with The Citizen wants to stimulate your thinking by sharing data from recent official surveys in Tanzania and ask you a few questions.
Pregnancy and childbirth can be a tremendously exciting time for a family if the expectant mother and her unborn child benefit from quality medical services and the baby is delivered in a safe environment.
However, it can also be a traumatizing experience if the mother loses her life during childbirth or if the newborn is sick or dies.
In Tanzania many mothers and mothers-to-be are dying young and unnecessarily as illustrated by the following statistics:
This is the time of year when we make resolutions and you may be wondering what you can do better and more efficiently in 2013.A lot of books have been written on the topic but one of the best is 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey who died in 2012. The 7 habits are: Be proactive; Begin with the end in mind; Put first things first; Think win-win; Seek first to understand, then to be understood; Synergize; Renew yourself.
Covey’s son – also called Stephen – wrote another remarkable book called The Speed of Trust, which includes this noteworthy statement: “You need to trust yourself before you can trust others.”
Our Top Ten Blog Posts by Readership in 2012
Originally published on August 28, 2012
Donor agency X has had a long history of working in Country A. Since the 1970s, the donor agency adapted its projects to be more participatory and has never looked back. Before starting a new project in the country, a project officer from the donor agency researched into international best practices, organized consultations in the country, and put together an action plan with the indicators to measure results. The project is now ready to be launched.
The donor agency works through a national NGO to organize the first community meeting in village B to start the project. The village is selected because it is close enough to the capital city but far away enough to be considered rural. (It turns out that this village is often selected for pilot projects.) The community is invited to a meeting in one of the village’s schools. On the day of the meeting, the room is filled with some familiar faces. The party leader, a local landowner, the school head teacher and even the factory boss are in attendance. The room looks fairly full, the discussion is active for the most part, and promises are made by all to keep the momentum going for the 3-year span of the project.
People, Spaces, Deliberation bloggers present exceptional campaign art from all over the world. These examples are meant to inspire.
12-12-12 marks an auspicious day on which couples are rushing to get married. Globally, many women and men have been waiting for this day to mark as the day they got married. Those who miss it will need to wait 100 years to have another chance like this one again. But depending on where in the world they are, getting married will mean different things for these women, their career and future business opportunities.
In many economies around the world women are legally prevented from conducting basic transactions which are necessary precursors to entrepreneurship and employment. Women, particularly married women, can be barred from actions such as opening bank accounts, determining where to work or live, and having the ability to move freely. In some economies married women need their husbands’ permission to carry out such actions.
