This paper studies how rural non-farm employment conditions the relationship between agricultural diversification and fish production efficiency. Competition for scarce productive resources typically implies a compromise between agricultural diversification and efficiency. Yet, the potential for non-farm income to resolve this tradeoff remains understudied. Cash from non-farm sources may support productivity-enhancing input purchase, thereby improving efficiency. On the other hand, by diversifying both on- and off-farm, household resources such as labor may be stretched too thin, lowering fish production efficiency. Using micro-level data on fish farming households in Southern Bangladesh, we show that at higher levels of the non-farm income share, diversification into crops results in significant allocative inefficiencies. Results are inconclusive for the technical efficiency measure.

Value chain research increasingly seeks to assess the inclusiveness of value chains to better understand how to promote equitable and pro-poor development. This trend is especially relevant for small-scale fisheries value chains, which provide livelihoods, food security, and a social safety net for rural poor in many countries. Despite recent efforts to assess value chain inclusiveness, substantial knowledge gaps persist in small-scale fisheries value chains with respect to distribution of and access to benefits within and across different value chain nodes, particularly in the midstream (e.g. traders and processors). This study addresses this important research gap by utilizing an access mapping approach concerned with the distribution of benefits along the value chain for usipa (Engraulicypris sardella) in Malawi. Using a mixed methods approach, this analysis utilizes quantitative survey data (n = 929) at various nodes of the usipa value chain (fishers, processors, wholesalers, retailers), as well as qualitative focus group data (n = 60) and key informant interviews (n = 6), all collected in 2019. In line with the Structure-Conduct-Performance Paradigm, this study identifies value chain actors' roles (structure), analyzes processes (conduct), and assesses the distribution of and access to income and in-kind benefits for different actors both within and across value chain nodes (performance). We calculate net income (revenues - expenses) for individual actors in each node of the value chain and find that (a) access to and distribution of income benefits from usipa vary substantially at group and individual levels; and (b) actors' net income from the usipa value chain is negatively affected by unequal power distribution, price volatility and trade institutions, inadequate market infrastructure, social relations, and gender dynamics. This study advances approaches to study value chain inclusiveness, emphasizing the need to attend to variation and drivers acting at multiple scales, ranging from whole value chain structure to individual traders.

This paper examines child labor response to parental education. Prior studies present anecdotal evidence with a causal interpretation of this relationship rarely explored. Hence, conditional on a range of parental characteristics and multigenerational co-residence, I use as a set of instruments grandparents’ educational attainment to exploit plausibly exogenous variation in parents’ schooling. I generally find evidence of a negative parental education impact on child labor outcomes. The effect of maternal education on household farm work, however, is not significant. With respect to potential mechanisms, the results suggest that engagement in nonfarm employment pursuits among educated parents may mediate these effects.

The rapid globalization of seafood trade over the past few decades has triggered heightened vulnerability for fraud within the seafood supply network. Consumer perceptions of these vulnerabilities are not limited to imported seafood products, as spillover effects are likely to influence purchasing behavior for domestically produced seafood as well. Using a between-sample survey experiment with 1,272 respondents in differing informational settings, we investigate whether consumer WTP for local seafood is impacted by information regarding seafood fraud. Consistent with previous studies, our results indicate that consumers broadly derive positive utility from consuming locally sourced relatively to imported seafood. Upon further disaggregation, however, we find that for one consumer segment, which we term the price-sensitive group, localness does not command a significant positive premium. Most importantly, we demonstrate that information regarding international seafood fraud largely did not alter local seafood demand. That said, we find some evidence of a negative spillover effect of the information treatment on US-labeled seafood in one of the consumer subgroups.

The report presents analysis of data from a survey of the 37 agricultural supply businesses in Shan State, Myanmar. The patterns reported are broadly consistent with the rapid growth of agricultural machinery supply businesses in Myanmar’s Dry Zone and Delta, and with demand side surveys of agricultural machinery use in Shan. The following points stand out: The growth and spread of machinery suppliers over the past decade has been dramatic. The total number of machinery supply outlets nationally jumped 338% from 2008 to 2018, from 72 to 315, while the number of townships served by machinery dealerships increased from 36 to 88 A total of 44 machinery supply businesses are operational in Shan, accounting for 19% of the national total in 2018. Three-quarters of all machinery supply enterprises currently operating in Shan were established after 2010. Growth in business numbers accelerated particularly rapidly from 2012 to 2016, but slowed somewhat in 2017-2018. The variety of machinery supplied by these businesses has diversified rapidly since 2012. Engines, two-wheel tractors, and trawlerji are the best selling items. Total annual sales of these items remained fairly constant from 2014 to 2018. The number of businesses selling machinery jumped 76% over this period, suggesting that new entrants have secured a diminishing market share. Sales growth in recent years has been driven by larger machines. Annual sales of four-wheel tractors jumped from 53 to 463 (an increase of 773%) while annual sales of combine harvesters climbed from zero to thirty. Combine harvester sales started later in Shan than in the Delta and or Dry Zone, beginning in 2016. Access to hire purchase loans for machinery is less widespread in Shan than in the Dry Zone. Two-thirds of machinery suppliers in Shan offer some form of hire-purchase credit, as compared to 94% in the Dry Zone Banks play a smaller role in financing agricultural machinery sales in Shan than in the Dry zone. Hire-purchase finance from banks account for a smaller share of sales than hire purchase loans from machinery suppliers or sales made without finance. This is the inverse of the situation to the Dry Zone Access to finance may be less common in Shan than the Dry Zone because fewer farmers in Shan possess land-use certificates that machinery dealerships often require as a guarantee for loans.