Person:
Jolliffe, Dean

Development Economics Data Group, The World Bank
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Fields of Specialization
Food security, Education economics, Health economics, Data collection methods, Measuring Poverty
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Development Economics Data Group, The World Bank
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Last updated: August 29, 2023
Biography
Dean Jolliffe is a lead economist in the Development Data Group at the World Bank. He is a member of the Living Standards Measurement Study team and co-lead of the team that works on global poverty measurement (PovcalNet). Previously, he worked in the Research Group and the South Asia region of the World Bank. Prior to joining the World Bank, he was a research economist with the Economic Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, an assistant professor at Charles University Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education in Prague, an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Public Policy Institute, and a postdoctoral fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute. Dean holds appointments as a research fellow with the Institute for the Study of Labor, as a co-opted council member of the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, and as a fellow of the Global Labor Organization. He received his PhD in economics from Princeton University.
Citations 344 Scopus

Publication Search Results

Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
  • Publication
    Land Productivity and Plot Size: Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-07) Desiere, Sam; Jolliffe, Dean
    This paper revisits the decades-old puzzle of the inverse plot-size productivity relationship, which states that land productivity decreases as plot size increases. Existing empirical studies on the inverse plot-size productivity relationship define land productivity or yields as self-reported production divided by plot size. This paper considers an alternative approach to estimating yields based on crop cuts. The crop-cut method entails measuring and harvesting randomly selected subplots by trained technicians, and is recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization for the accurate measurement of crop production. Using data representative of rural Ethiopia, the analysis indicates that the inverse relationship is strong when based on self-reported production, but disappears when based on crop-cut estimates. The inference from these findings is that the inverse relationship is an artifact of systematic overreporting of production by farmers on small plots, and underreporting on larger plots. The paper also discusses how rejecting the inverse plot-size productivity relationship has significant implications for the inverse farm-size productivity relationship.
  • Publication
    Land Productivity and Plot Size: Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
    (Elsevier, 2018-01) Desiere, Sam; Jolliffe, Dean
    This paper revisits the decades-old puzzle of the inverse plot-size productivity relationship (IR), which states that land productivity decreases as plot size increases. While existing studies define land productivity or yields as self-reported production divided by plot size, we consider an alternative approach to estimating yields based on crop cuts. The crop-cut method entails measuring and harvesting randomly selected subplots by trained technicians, and is recommended by the Food and Agricultural Organization for the accurate measurement of crop production. Using data of rural Ethiopia, our analysis indicates that the IR is strong when based on self-reported production, but disappears when based on crop-cut estimates. Our inference from these findings is that the IR is an artifact of systematic over-reporting of production by farmers on small plots, and under-reporting on larger plots. We also discuss how rejecting the inverse plot-size productivity relationship has significant implications for the inverse farm-size productivity relationship.