IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/oxdevs/v28y2000i1p71-95.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do Anti-poverty Programmes Reach the Rural Poor in India?

Author

Listed:
  • Raghav Gaiha

Abstract

This paper argues for a shift of emphasis from larger outlays on two major anti-poverty schemes - the rural public works (RPW) and integrated rural development (IRDP) programmes - to improvements in their design and implementation. Enhanced outlays do not matter much, as they tend to be mistargeted. More specifically, based on National Sample Survey data for 1987-88, neither RPW nor IRDP covered a large segment of the rural poor, while among their beneficiaries the shares of the (relatively) well-off were not negligible. However, the RPW was more effective in excluding the non-poor rather than attracting the poor. There has been a progressive weakening of targeting in both schemes as leakages to the non-poor rose. More of the poor are likely to benefit from RPW if the wage rate is lowered (relative to the agricultural wage), if a combination of piece and time rates is used and if wages in kind are discontinued. On the other hand, in the context of IRDP, there is a need to eliminate the interest subsidy, place greater emphasis on the reduction of transaction costs and to vest rights of land in women. Given the key role of the Village Panchayat in poverty alleviation, it is imperative that it is accountable to the village community. But above all, benefits to the poor from anti-poverty programmes depend ultimately on whether they have the collective strength to affirm their interests.

Suggested Citation

  • Raghav Gaiha, 2000. "Do Anti-poverty Programmes Reach the Rural Poor in India?," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(1), pages 71-95.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:oxdevs:v:28:y:2000:i:1:p:71-95
    DOI: 10.1080/713688307
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/713688307
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/713688307?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Parikh, K. & Srinivasan, T.N., 1989. "Poverty Alleviation Policies In India: Food Consumption Subsidy, Food Production Subsidy And Employment Generation," Papers 591, Yale - Economic Growth Center.
    2. Bina Agarwal, 1997. "''Bargaining'' and Gender Relations: Within and Beyond the Household," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 3(1), pages 1-51.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Raghav Gaiha & Katsushi Imai, 2002. "Rural Public Works and Poverty Alleviation--the case of the employment guarantee scheme in Maharashtra," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(2), pages 131-151.
    2. Klonner, Stefan & Oldiges , Christian, 2014. "Safety Net for India's Poor or Waste of Public Funds? Poverty and Welfare in the Wake of the World's Largest Job Guarantee Program," Working Papers 0564, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    3. Raghbendra Jha, 2001. "The Challenge of Fiscal Reform in India," ASARC Working Papers 2001-11, The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre.
    4. Kailash Chandra Pradhan & Shrabani Mukherjee, 2018. "Covariate and Idiosyncratic Shocks and Coping Strategies for Poor and Non-poor Rural Households in India," Journal of Quantitative Economics, Springer;The Indian Econometric Society (TIES), vol. 16(1), pages 101-127, March.
    5. Jha, Raghbendra & Bhattacharyya, Sambit & Gaiha, Raghav & Shankar, Shylashri, 2009. ""Capture" of anti-poverty programs: An analysis of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Program in India," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 456-464, September.
    6. Raghav Gaiha & Katsushi Imai, 2004. "Vulnerability, shocks and persistence of poverty: estimates for semi-arid rural South India," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(2), pages 261-281.
    7. Raghav Gaiha & Vani S. Kulkarni & Manoj K. Pandey & Katsushi S. Imai, 2009. "National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, Poverty and Prices in Rural India," ASARC Working Papers 2009-03, The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre.
    8. Raghav Gaiha & Ganesh Thapa & Katsushi Imai & Vani S. Kulkarni, 2007. "Endowments, discrimination and deprivation among ethnic groups," Economics Discussion Paper Series 0722, Economics, The University of Manchester.
    9. Raghav Gaiha, 2004. "Is There a Case for the Employment Guarantee Scheme in India? Some Recent Evidence," ASARC Working Papers 2004-09, The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lauren Pandolfelli & Ruth Meinzen-Dick & Stephan Dohrn, 2008. "Gender and collective action: motivations, effectiveness and impact," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(1), pages 1-11.
    2. Astrid Sneyers & Anneleen Vandeplas, 2013. "Girl Power in Agricultural Production: How Much Does it Yield? A Case-Study on the Dairy Sector in India," LICOS Discussion Papers 34113, LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance, KU Leuven.
    3. Leanne Roncolato & Alex Roomets, 2020. "Who will change the “baby?” Examining the power of gender in an experimental setting," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 823-852, September.
    4. Joshua Sikhu Okonya & Netsayi Noris Mudege & Anne M. Rietveld & Anastase Nduwayezu & Déo Kantungeko & Bernadette Marie Hakizimana & John Njuki Nyaga & Guy Blomme & James Peter Legg & Jürgen Kroschel, 2019. "The Role of Women in Production and Management of RTB Crops in Rwanda and Burundi: Do Men Decide, and Women Work?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-15, August.
    5. Sarah Ryser, 2019. "The Anti-Politics Machine of Green Energy Development: The Moroccan Solar Project in Ouarzazate and Its Impact on Gendered Local Communities," Land, MDPI, vol. 8(6), pages 1-21, June.
    6. Vellore Arthi & James Fenske, 2018. "Polygamy and child mortality: Historical and modern evidence from Nigeria’s Igbo," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 97-141, March.
    7. Allendorf, Keera, 2007. "Do Women's Land Rights Promote Empowerment and Child Health in Nepal?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 1975-1988, November.
    8. Rie Makita, 2009. "The visibility of women’s work for poverty reduction: implications from non-crop agricultural income-generating programs in Bangladesh," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 26(4), pages 379-390, December.
    9. Elke Holst & Andrea Schäfer & Mechthild Schrooten, 2010. "Gender, Transnational Networks and Remittances: Evidence from Germany," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 296, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    10. Boulier, Bryan & Emran, M. Shahe & Hoque, Nazmul, 2021. "Access to Credit, Education, and Women’s Say in the Household: Evidence from Bangladesh," MPRA Paper 109009, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Farha Naz & Shahab E. Saqib, 2021. "Gender-based differences in flood vulnerability among men and women in the char farming households of Bangladesh," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 106(1), pages 655-677, March.
    12. Malapit, Hazel Jean L., 2012. "Why do spouses hide income?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(5), pages 584-593.
    13. Alexandra Peralta, 2022. "The role of men and women in agriculture and agricultural decisions in Vanuatu," Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 59-80, January.
    14. Ruth Badru, 2020. "Distribution and Gender Effects on the Path of Economic Growth: Comparative Evidence for Developed, Semi-Industrialized, and Low-Income Agricultural Economies," Economics Working Paper Archive wp_959, Levy Economics Institute.
    15. Silke Schwarz, 2014. "Women¡¯s Economic Empowerment and Social Change from a Culture-Psychological Perspective," Business and Management Research, Business and Management Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 3(4), pages 1-10, December.
    16. Auriol, Emmanuelle & Platteau, Jean-Philippe & Camilotti, Giula, 2017. "Eradicating Women-Hurting Customs: What Role for Social Engineering?," CEPR Discussion Papers 12107, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Ospina-Cartagena, Vanessa & García-Suaza, Andrés, 2020. "Brechas de Género en el trabajo Doméstico y de Cuidado No Remunerado en Colombia," Working papers 52, Red Investigadores de Economía.
    18. Sandrine A. Koissy-Kpein, 2015. "Gender-based violence and gender bias in schooling decision: Evidence from sub-Saharan Africa," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2015-107, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    19. Sandhya R. Mahapatro, 2018. "Impact of Labour Migration on Socioeconomic Position of Left-Behind Women in Bihar," The Indian Journal of Labour Economics, Springer;The Indian Society of Labour Economics (ISLE), vol. 61(4), pages 701-718, December.
    20. Eileen Trzcinski & Elke Holst, 2010. "Interrelationships among Locus of Control and Years in Management and Unemployment: Differences by Gender," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 974, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:oxdevs:v:28:y:2000:i:1:p:71-95. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CODS20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.