Browsing by Author "Eghan, Mark"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    Essays on remittances, welfare and productivity of agricultural households in selected sub-Saharan African countries
    (Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2023-12) Eghan, Mark; Adjasi, Charles Komla; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences. University of Stellenbosch Business School.
    ENGLISH SUMMARY: The study assesses the impact of remittance flows on the productivity and welfare of agricultural households in sub-Saharan Africa. The thesis is organised into three empirical essays. The first empirical essay tests the impact of remittance receipts on agricultural productivity in Ghana. Using propensity score matching (PSM) methods it assesses whether heterogeneity in the economic activity of farming households affects the effects of remittances on the productivity of tradable and non-tradable crop farming households in Ghana. We find that, the involvement of farming households in other economic activities alters the impact of remittances on crop yield. This differential impact also varies according to whether the crop is tradeable or not. The second essay answers the question: What is the distributional effect of remittances on household welfare in The Gambia? We examine this question with an instrumental variable quantile regression approach to estimate the distributional welfare effect of remittances in The Gambia. After instrumenting for the endogenous remittance variable in the model and controlling for household demographic characteristics, the paper finds that the effect of remittance on household welfare is positive and significant; however, the effect is not uniform across the income quantiles. We find that rich households receiving remittances have greater welfare impacts than low-income households receiving remittances. Even though remittances have a higher welfare impact on rich households, the impact of a 10.12% increase in the welfare of low-income households is substantial. This suggests the possibility that remittances can be an enabling channel for low-income households to migrate to middle income status. The third essay estimates the impact of remittances on vulnerability to expected poverty among agricultural households in Ghana, Nigeria and The Gambia. We found that households that benefitted from remittances in all three countries could smoothing consumption to reduce their vulnerability to expected poverty and therefore guard against future poverty. In addition, although urban households were less vulnerable than rural households to expected poverty, rural households that received remittances became less vulnerable to expected poverty. This underscores the importance of remittances in enhancing the welfare of poorer households. The overall conclusion of the study is that remittances provide non-labour income that helps to improve the welfare of agricultural households, reduce poverty levels and reduce the vulnerability of agricultural households to expected poverty. These positive effects of remittances are more on poorer households. Since agricultural households are generally among the poor and vulnerable population in SSA, the results show that remittance helps to reduce the poverty and vulnerability to poverty among the poor of the poor. It is recommended that governments in sub-Saharan Africa put in place policies that ensure a reduction in the cost of sending remittances especially to rural farming households as an indirect way of reducing vulnerability to expected poverty.