Suchergebnisse

This report presents selected data generated from the migrant worker and household surveys carried out within the project Research and Policy Dialogue Initiative on Migration and Remittances in Nepal, implemented by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), Mission in Nepal, and financed by IOM Development Fund. Stakeholder workshops and review of secondary literature/data complemented this primary data. Where relevant, it provides a comparative analysis with the results of similar surveys conducted in other South-Eastern and Eastern European (SEEE) countries since 2006. This comprehensive and multistage approach was carried out by adapting concepts and methodologies developed by the International Agency for Source Country Information Migration (IASCI), in collaboration with the Center for Sociological, Political and Psychological Analysis and Investigations (CIVIS), to Nepali context in close coordination with IOM, IIDS and the Project Steering Committee. The aim of the project Research and Policy Dialogue Initiative on Migration and Remittances in Nepal is to assist the Government of Nepal in developing evidence based policies to harness effectively the link between migration and development. To achieve this, it is necessary to increase awareness among key stakeholders on the nature, use and impact of remittances entering Nepal, to describe migrant workers' and their households' overall financial behaviour, including savings and consumption, as well as to assess the overall impact of migration on the country's socio-economic development.

Internal migration and labour mobility is now increasingly being studied through the lens of human security. Global estimates suggest that 740 million people around the world are internal migrants (UNOCHA 2010). Given its large number, especially within developing countries, internal migration has the economic potential to contribute positively towards greater human security and development objectives falling under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) framework.' As compared to international migration, internal migration involves a workforce four times larger (Qin et al. 2014) that hails from poorer backgrounds and remits money to a wider number of poor families (Deshingkar and Grimm 2004). It also provides migrant households opportunities to advance human security outcomes by moving to a location that promises improved access to education, health and employment opportunities.

Drawing on fieldwork data and preliminary material from the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute GIS project, this article analyzes one such "road to Tawau." First, it offers a brief history of two different cross-border flows to Sabah, with special reference to the routes of ethnically Bugis Indonesians who constitute the vast majority of Indonesian migrants in the state. Second, it highlights one widely-known clandestine route on Sebatik Island, where Indonesia and Malaysia share a land border that divides the island cleanly in half. Finally, it describes how a proposal to build a wall intended to disrupt clandestine movement along this route is unrealistic, and fails to take into account certain realities about migrant movement and Sabah's porous borders. It also suggests how emerging efforts to police this particular "road to Tawau" reflect broader transnational concerns about ongoing developments in the southern Philippines.

Baroness Valerie Amos, the former Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator at UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, and Ms. Janet Lim, the previous Assistant High Commissioner (Operations) of UN High Commissioner for Refugees, referenced Europe's reduced human security ambitions at seminars here at RSIS last month. Comparing the EU's response to the ongoing crisis in Rakhine state, Myanmar, with its actions during the refugee crisis on its door-step, demonstrate what this means in practice.

The Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction (JFPR) Annual Report 2014 is the 14th such report and covers the period 1 January–31 December 2014. It presents JFPR's background and rationale, implementation progress, and achievements. Established in May 2000, JFPR provides direct grant assistance to the poorest and most vulnerable groups in developing members of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) while fostering long-term social and economic development. The grants target poverty reduction initiatives with the direct participation of nongovernment organizations, community groups, and civil society. In 2009, the Government of Japan and ADB expanded the scope of JFPR to include provision of support to developing members through capacity development, policy and advisory, research and development, and project preparatory technical assistance.

The Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction (JFPR) Annual Report 2014 is the 14th such report and covers the period 1 January–31 December 2014. It presents JFPR's background and rationale, implementation progress, and achievements. Established in May 2000, JFPR provides direct grant assistance to the poorest and most vulnerable groups in developing members of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) while fostering long-term social and economic development. The grants target poverty reduction initiatives with the direct participation of nongovernment organizations, community groups, and civil society. In 2009, the Government of Japan and ADB expanded the scope of JFPR to include provision of support to developing members through capacity development, policy and advisory, research and development, and project preparatory technical assistance.

Migrant remittances, money sent by migrants overseas back to their family and friends, have emerged as an important source of development finance. Remittances surpassed Official Development Assistance (ODA) in 2002 and the amount of remittances is now twice as large as ODA (Figure 1). In 2014, officially recorded remittances to developing countries reached US$ 362 billion while ODA amounts to only about US$ 180 billion. As a source of development finance, remittances are known to be effective. Remittances directly augment household income and studies show that household spending in education and healthcare increase as a result. Both micro-level and aggregate data show that remittances largely reduced poverty. Although whether and how these development effects can be scaled up remains to be seen, development experts and policy makers are paying greater attention to remittances. Remittances have a noticeable impact on development but carry significant transaction costs. This led to a growing interest in reducing remittance prices in the international development community. For example, G20 has set a goal to reduce the global average costs to 5 percent and called for action to promote financial inclusion including access to payments, savings, credit and other services related to remittances.

The large literature on regional inequality in the People's Republic of China (PRC) is hampered by incomplete evidence on price dispersion across space, making it hard to distinguish real and nominal inequality. The two main methods used to calculate spatial deflators have been to price a national basket of goods and services across different regions in the country or else to estimate a food Engel curve and define the deflator as that needed for nominally similar households to have the same food budget shares in all regions. Neither approach is convincing with the data available. Moreover, a focus on tradable goods such as food may be misplaced because of the emerging literature on the rapid convergence of traded goods prices within the PRC that contrasts with earlier claims of fragmented internal markets. In a setting where traded goods prices converge rapidly, the main source of price dispersion across space should come from non-traded items, and especially from housing given the fixity of land. In this paper we use newly available data on dwelling sales in urban PRC to develop spatially-disaggregated indices of house prices which are then used as spatial deflators for both provinces and core urban districts. These new deflators complement existing approaches that have relied more on traded goods prices and are used to re-examine the evidence on the level of regional inequality. Around one-quarter of the apparent spatial inequality disappears once account is taken of cost-of-living differences.

This paper offers a comprehensive analysis of poverty in India. It shows that regardless of which of the two official poverty lines we use, we see a steady decline in poverty in all states and for all social and religious groups.Accelerated growth between fiscal years 2004–2005 and 2009–2010 also led to an accelerated decline in poverty rates. Moreover, the decline in poverty rates during these years has been sharper for the socially disadvantaged groups relative to upper caste groups so that we now observe a narrowing of the gap in the poverty rates between the two sets of social groups. The paper also provides a discussion of the recent controversies in India regarding the choice of poverty lines.

This paper offers a comprehensive analysis of poverty in India. It shows that regardless of which of the two official poverty lines we use, we see a steady decline in poverty in all states and for all social and religious groups.Accelerated growth between fiscal years 2004–2005 and 2009–2010 also led to an accelerated decline in poverty rates. Moreover, the decline in poverty rates during these years has been sharper for the socially disadvantaged groups relative to upper caste groups so that we now observe a narrowing of the gap in the poverty rates between the two sets of social groups. The paper also provides a discussion of the recent controversies in India regarding the choice of poverty lines.

The large literature on regional inequality in the People's Republic of China (PRC) is hampered by incomplete evidence on price dispersion across space, making it hard to distinguish real and nominal inequality. The two main methods used to calculate spatial deflators have been to price a national basket of goods and services across different regions in the country or else to estimate a food Engel curve and define the deflator as that needed for nominally similar households to have the same food budget shares in all regions. Neither approach is convincing with the data available. Moreover, a focus on tradable goods such as food may be misplaced because of the emerging literature on the rapid convergence of traded goods prices within the PRC that contrasts with earlier claims of fragmented internal markets. In a setting where traded goods prices converge rapidly, the main source of price dispersion across space should come from non-traded items, and especially from housing given the fixity of land. In this paper we use newly available data on dwelling sales in urban PRC to develop spatially-disaggregated indices of house prices which are then used as spatial deflators for both provinces and core urban districts. These new deflators complement existing approaches that have relied more on traded goods prices and are used to re-examine the evidence on the level of regional inequality. Around one-quarter of the apparent spatial inequality disappears once account is taken of cost-of-living differences.

Many economists have long held that market failures create a gap between social and private returns to Research and Development (R&D), thereby limiting private incentives to invest in R&D. However, this common belief that firms significantly underinvest in R&D is increasingly being challenged, leading the rationale behind public support for private R&D to be questioned. In this paper, we attempt to clarify the perspectives of two sources : the theoretical literature on endogenous growth, and its recent developments in integrating a geographical dimension, and the empirical literature that measures the social returns to R&D in relation to the private returns. Ultimately, we are able to clearly distinguish among different types of market failures and compare their relative impact on the gap between the private and social returns to R&D. Two main conclusions are reached. First, systematic firm underinvestment in R&D is not demonstrated. Second, even though instances of underinvestment do occur, they are mainly explained by surplus appropriability problems rather than by knowledge externalities. This suggests the need for a new policy mix that employs more demand-oriented instruments and is more concentrated on identifying efficient allocations among activities rather than merely increasing global private R&D investment.

This publication suggests solutions that can be built into the design of urban development projects undertaken by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to address the common problems and grievances of the urban poor, and to improve urban governance overall. It also identifies successful or promising community-based approaches to dispute resolution that can be useful in urban project design. It uses ADB's Governance policy as a framework for analyzing key findings of Access to Justice for the Urban Poor, a regional technical assistance grant to four developing member countries in Asia and the Pacific - Bangladesh, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand. The findings consist of case studies illustrating typical problems encountered by the poor in connection with access to urban assets and services, and identifies the types of grievances or disputes that may arise because of these issues. The publication reproduces key case studies to illustrate significant concepts.

This publication suggests solutions that can be built into the design of urban development projects undertaken by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to address the common problems and grievances of the urban poor, and to improve urban governance overall. It also identifies successful or promising community-based approaches to dispute resolution that can be useful in urban project design. It uses ADB's Governance policy as a framework for analyzing key findings of Access to Justice for the Urban Poor, a regional technical assistance grant to four developing member countries in Asia and the Pacific - Bangladesh, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand. The findings consist of case studies illustrating typical problems encountered by the poor in connection with access to urban assets and services, and identifies the types of grievances or disputes that may arise because of these issues. The publication reproduces key case studies to illustrate significant concepts.