Journal articles published externally

2,088 items available

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https://hdl.handle.net/10986/4401

These are journal articles by World Bank authors published externally.

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Making ends meet in refugee camps: Food distribution cycles, consumption and undernutrition
(Elsevier, 2024-11-15) Aubery, Frederic; Buisson, Marie-Charlotte
Years after the initial settlement, food aid remains an essential component of humanitarian assistance for protracted refugees in managed camps. From data collected among refugee households in three camps in southern Chad and an exogenous variation of time between the latest food distribution and households’ interviews, we draw the time path of household’s consumption. Consistent with the literature on intertemporal choices in high-income countries, refugee households experience an average decline of 1.1 to 1.5 percent per day in their daily caloric intake between distributions. The short-term nutritional status of children under five also responds to the distance from food aid distribution and confirms the existence of food distribution cycles. Our results suggest that households don’t smooth consumption during the interval of time between two distributions, and face regular and frequent cycles of food shortage resulting in detrimental consequences on children’s health.
Lessons Learned in Using Mathematical Modeling for Priority Setting in Health
(Taylor and Francis, 2024-11-15) Wilson, David; Gorgens, Marelize
The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for priority setting in health financing and resource allocation, spotlighting the limitations of traditional health financing strategies. This commentary explores the relevance of mathematical modeling in enhancing allocative efficiency within the health sector, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic. We draw from the World Bank’s experiences in supporting over 20 countries to employ mathematical optimization models for priority setting, aiming to achieve optimal health outcomes within constrained budgets. The pandemic’s impact on economic growth, revenue collection, debt stress, and the overall fiscal space available for health financing has necessitated a paradigm shift toward prioritizing efficiency improvements in health service delivery. We outline lessons learned from such modeling and chart future directions to enhance efficiency gains, including for integrated, patient-centered approaches to health service delivery. We advocate for flexible and effective localized priority-setting, leveraging data-driven insights to navigate the complexities of health financing in a post-COVID era.
COVID-19 increased existing gender mortality gaps in high-income more than middle-income countries
(Elsevier, 2024-11-14) Beegle, Kathleen; Demombynes, Gabriel; de Walque, Damien; Gubbins, Paul; Veillard, Jeremy
Objective: To analyze how patterns of excess mortality varied by sex and age groups across countries during the COVID-19 pandemic and their association with country income level. Methods: We used World Health Organization excess mortality estimates by sex and age groups for 75 countries in 2020 and 62 countries in 2021, restricting the sample to estimates based on recorded all-cause mortality data. We examined patterns across countries using country-specific Poisson regressions with observations consisting of the number of excess deaths by groups defined by sex and age. Findings: Men die at higher rates in nearly all places and at all ages beyond age 45. In 2020, the pandemic amplified this gender mortality gap for the world, but with variation across countries and by country income level. In high-income countries, rates of excess mortality were much higher for men than women. In contrast, in middle-income countries, the sex ratio of excess mortality was similar to the sex ratio of expected all-cause mortality. The exacerbation of the sex ratio of excess mortality observed in 2020 in high-income countries, however, declined in 2021. Conclusion: The COVID-19 pandemic has killed men at much higher rates than women, as has been well documented, but these gender differences have varied by country income. These differences were the result of some combination of variation in gender patterns of infection rates and infection fatality rates across countries. The gender gap in mortality declined in high-income countries in 2021, likely as a result of the faster rollout of vaccination against COVID-19.
Multi-scale lidar measurements suggest miombo woodlands contain substantially more carbon than thought
(Springer Nature, 2024-07-10) Demol, Miro; Aguilar-Amuchastegui, Naikoa; Bernotaite, Gabija; Disney, Mathias; Duncanson, Laura; Elmendorp, Elise; Espejo, Andres; Furey, Allister; Hancock, Steven; Hansen, Johannes; Horsley, Harold; Langa, Sara; Liang, Mengyu; Locke, Annabel; Manjate, Virgílio; Mapanga, Francisco; Omidvar, Hamidreza; Parsons, Ashleigh; Peneva-Reed, Elitsa; Perry, Thomas; Puma Vilca, Beisit L.; Rodríguez-Veiga, Pedro; Sutcliffe, Chloe; Upham, Robin; de Walque, Benoît; Burt, Andrew
Miombo woodlands are integral to livelihoods across southern Africa, biodiversity in the region, and the global carbon cycle, making accurate and precise monitoring of their state and change essential. Here, we assembled a terrestrial and airborne lidar dataset covering 50 kha of intact and degraded miombo woodlands, and generated aboveground biomass estimates with low uncertainty via direct 3D measurements of forest structure. We found 1.71 ± 0.09 TgC was stored in aboveground biomass across this landscape, between 1.5 and 2.2 times more than the 0.79–1.14 TgC estimated by conventional methods. This difference is in part owing to the systematic underestimation of large trees by allometry. If these results were extrapolated across Africa’s miombo woodlands, their carbon stock would potentially require an upward revision of approximately 3.7 PgC, implying we currently underestimate their carbon sequestration and emissions potential, and disincentivise their protection and restoration.
How does the weather and climate change affect firm performance in low-income countries? Evidence from Uganda
(Elsevier, 2024-06) Mawejje, Joseph
This study examines the impacts of weather and climate shocks on firm performance in Uganda, a low-income country that shares many characteristics with countries at similar levels of development. The analysis exploits panel methods on novel quarterly business climate data. The results are threefold. First, weather and climate shocks are negatively associated with business performance. Second, these effects are stronger among micro and small enterprises, and among firms in the agricultural and industrial sectors. Third, poor business environments characterized by excruciating constraints exacerbate the impact of climate shocks on business performance. The results are robust to alternative econometric model specifications.
Harnessing digital innovations for climate action and market access: Opportunities and constraints in the CWANA region
(Elsevier, 2024-06) Tabe-Ojong, Martin Paul Jr.; Salama, Yousra; Abay, Kibrom A.; Abdelaziz, Fatma; Zaccari, Claudia; Akramkhanov, Akmal; Menza, Gianpiero; Anarbekov, Oyture
There is growing optimism about the potential of digital innovations to support climate action and transform agricultural markets. We review and characterize the landscape of digital innovations in the Central and West Asia and North Africa (CWANA) region. We highlight major success stories associated with the potential of digital innovations to facilitate rural market transformation and support climate action, including adaptation and mitigation. Our desk and landscape review identifies various digital innovations used in Egypt, Morocco, and Uzbekistan. We then create a typology of digital innovations based on seven broad service categorizations: weather and climate; agricultural finance; energy and early warning systems; data and crowdsourcing; market information and market place; extension and advisory information; and supply chain coordination. Three technical and validation workshops supplement this review. Our review shows that digital innovations have the potential to build resilience to climate change and increase market access, but their adoption remains low and varying across contexts. Significant heterogeneity and differences exist across these countries, possibly due to different institutional and regulatory frameworks that guide demand and capacity. We identify several supply and demand-side constraints facing the digital ecosystem in the region. There is the existence of a significant digital divide fueled by gender, literacy gaps, and related socioeconomic and psychosocial constraints. A seeming disconnect also exists between pilots and scale-ups, as most existing digital applications are unsuccessful in expanding beyond the pilot phase.
Food security and poverty reduction effects of agricultural technologies adoption − a multinomial endogenous switching regression application in rural Zimbabwe
(Elsevier, 2024-05) Amankwah, Akuffo; Gwatidzo, Tendai
Using nationally representative household survey data and the multinomial endogenous switching regression (MESR) procedure, this study examines the productivity, food security, and poverty reduction effects of adopting improved seed and inorganic fertilizer in rural Zimbabwe. The results show that the joint adoption of improved seed and inorganic fertilizer is facilitated by household ownership of farm mechanization, years of education of the household heads, presence of a wage worker in the household, access to irrigation facilities, and government extension services. The MESR results show that the adoption of improved seed and inorganic fertilizer, as well as their joint usage, have productivity and welfare-enhancing effects on farming households in rural Zimbabwe. More importantly, we find that while the technologies appear to impact food consumption negatively, households using the technologies jointly in production are more food secure and eat more diverse foods. This implies government efforts to promote the joint adoption of the two technologies in rural Zimbabwe are encouraged.
Identifying the poor – Accounting for household economies of scale in global poverty estimates
(Elsevier, 2024-03-30) Jolliffe, Dean; Tetteh-Baah, Samuel Kofi
Estimates of the number of people living in extreme poverty, as reported by the World Bank, figure prominently in international development dialogue and policy. An assumption underpinning these poverty counts is that there are no economies of scale in household size – a family of six needs three times as much as a family of two. This paper examines the sensitivity of global estimates of extreme poverty to changing this assumption. The analysis rests on nationally representative household surveys from 162 countries covering 97.5 percent of the population estimated to be in extreme poverty in 2019. We compare current-method estimates with a constant-elasticity scale adjustment that divides total household consumption or income not by household size but by the square-root of household size. While the regional profile of extreme poverty is robust to this change, the determination of who is poor changes substantially – the poverty status of 264 million people changes. We then discuss evidence suggesting that the assumption of economies of scale more closely aligns with non-consumption measures of poverty. Specifically, we draw from existing literature of subjective assessments of poverty and wellbeing, along with new empirical evidence from examining the partial correlation (conditional on household size) between the two measures of poverty and a set of presumed poverty covariates (i.e., years of schooling, literacy, asset index, working in agriculture, access to electricity, piped drinking water, improved sanitation).
Cooperative Membership and Exposure to Role Models: Implications for Income and Asset Aspirations
(Elsevier, 2023-12-01) Tabe-Ojong, Martin Paul Jr.; Heckelei, Thomas; Baylis, Kathy; Rasch, Sebastian
Although it is increasingly recognized that aspirations drive economic behavior and outcomes, it is not fully understood how aspirations are formed (or eroded). However, it has been theoretically established that aspirations are socially constructed and formed under an aspiration window. An aspiration window refers to a cognitive zone of similar individuals based on age, gender, caste, geography, religion, ethnicity, and other social (self-help) groups. In these groups, individuals learn from each other through interaction and experimentation. We examine the relationship between group membership and aspirations. As a proxy for group membership, we use agricultural cooperatives that abound in many developing countries and have been associated with productivity and welfare gains. Given that farmers interact and are exposed to role models in these cooperatives, we also investigate the relationship between exposure to role models and aspirations. We show a positive association between cooperative membership and aspirations as well as between exposure to role models and aspirations. Interacting cooperative membership with exposure to role models, we find a larger association between cooperative membership and aspirations, highlighting the relevance of exposure to role models in these cooperatives. Given the growing evidence regarding the relevance of aspirations in achieving various developmental outcomes, our study highlights some entry points in improving aspirations.
Scaling Education Innovations in Complex Emergencies: A Meta-Evaluation of Five Process and Three Impact Evaluations (Published online: 30 Sep 2022)
(Taylor and Francis, 2023-10-12) De Hoop, Thomas; Coombes, Andrea; Ring, Hannah; Hunt, Kelsey; Rothbard, Victoria; Holla, Chinmaya
The papers in this special issue describe evaluations of the scaling journey of five different education programmes operating in humanitarian crises. This introduction first presents the research context for these evaluations followed by a synthesis of the overarching barriers and facilitators to scaling across three domains: (1) context, (2) business model, and (3) advocacy and ownership based on a qualitative synthesis. The synthesis showed that implementers often started multiple pilot projects in different contexts rather than scaling-up in one context. We also present a summary of impacts on learning outcomes from impact evaluations of three of the five education programmes.