Pervasive poverty and undernutrition persist in Bangladesh. About half the country’s 130 million people cannot afford an adequate diet. Poverty has kept generations of families from sending their children to school, and without education their children’s future will be a distressing echo of their own. Furthermore, from birth, children from poor families are often deprived of the basic nutritional building blocks that they need to learn easily. Consequently, the pathway out of poverty is restricted for children from poor families.

There is renewed interest in the intrahousehold allocation of welfare, particularly among economists studying poor countries where even slight differences in the allocation of household resources can have dramatic consequences on child and female nutrition, morbidity, and mortality (Haddad and Hoddinott 1994; Rose 1999; Dercon and Krishnan 2000). The evidence collected so far tends to demonstrate that the allocation of consumption and leisure among household members varies systematically with their relative contributions to household total income (Thomas 1990; Alderman et al.

Gender differences in health and nutrition have long been a subject of study in the intrahousehold allocation literature. Unlike consumption expenditures or farm production, measurements of health and nutritional outcomes are always at the individual level, and thus factors that underlie systematic differences in outcomes—such as age, gender, and position within the household—are more readily apparent.

It is a well-known fact that households in developing countries often undergo weather-related and other shocks that drastically affect incomes. A large and growing literature explores the effectiveness of response to these events. One strand of the literature addresses the strategies that households and governments use to protect against income shocks (Udry 1990; Fafchamps, Udry, and Czukas 1998; Kochar 1999). A second strand looks at the effectiveness of these strategies in reducing fluctuations in consumption.

Despite substantial economic liberalization since the early 1990s, nontraditional exports in Zambia have grown only moderately and agricultural performance overall has been disappointing. Though agriculture accounts for less than 20 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), it is the most important source of employment, especially for women. Interpretations of Zambia’s poor performance variously emphasize external factors, such as declining copper prices and vulnerability to weather shocks, and market imperfections.

Reduction of rural poverty is one of the greatest challenges the Government of Nepal faces. Since most of the country’s agricultural production is semi-subsistence-oriented, increased commercialization of this rural-based economy is essential for poverty reduction and economic growth. Consequently, farm output diversification and productivity improvements are high-priority areas for the government.

This book synthesizes IFPRI's recent work on the role of gender in household decisionmaking in developing countries, provides evidence on how reducing gender gaps can contribute to improved food security, health, and nutrition in developing countries, and gives examples of interventions that actually work to reduce gender disparities. It is an accessible, easy-to-read synthesis of the gender research that IFPRI has undertaken in the 1990s.

The collective model of the household predicts that bargaining power determines the share of resources allocated to an individual within the household. The concept of bargaining power is elusive, however. It is perhaps useful at this point to outline the possible determinants of bargaining power, while not making any claims to measure power itself.

Most economic research treats the household as a single agent, assuming that individuals within the household share the same preferences or that there is a household “head” who has the final say. This simple framework has proved immensely useful; despite a common misperception, it can explain many differences in well-being or consumption patterns within households.

Economists who analyze household decisionmaking allocation have traditionally assumed that the household acts as a single unit. They assume that there exists one decisionmaker whose preferences form the basis of household welfare and that all household resources are effectively pooled. This approach is known as the “unitary model,” the “common preference model,” or the “joint family utility model,” depending on the study consulted.

"To end hunger and prevent the recurrence of famine and starvation, we need to take the following steps: invest in public health, child nutrition, education, women’s and girls’ social status, and other components of human capital; reform public institutions and create innovative funding and partnership arrangements; change government policies at all levels to be both pro-poor and pro-growth; increase funding for scientific and technological research to boost agricultural production and efficiency; and develop specific policies and institutions to deal with environmental degradation caused

El documento contine los elementos conceptuales para el desarrollo de un Marco Estratégico de mediano plazo de cooperación de la FAO en Agricultura Familiar en América Latina y el Caribe.
La aprobación de este Marco se realizará en la Conferencia Regional de la FAO a llevarse a cabo en Buenos Aires, Argentina del 26 al 30 de marzo de 2012.