This study uses data from a special subsample of the National Agricultural, Food, and Public Policy Preference Survey to assess use of weather data for agricultural decision making. Responses from 284 Arizona farmers and ranchers were used to examine (i) the importance producers placed on different types of weather data for production and marketing decisions; (ii) which producer characteristics accounted for differences in the importance they placed on weather data; (iii) producer use of weather data for specific production and marketing decisions; and (iv) which factors distinguish weather data users from nonusers. A model of demand for weather information was developed and used to specify count data and discrete choice multivariate regression models. The intensity of weather data use was greater among producers with diversified agricultural production. Diversified producers were more likely to use data for timing of planting, cultivation, and harvest. Weather data use was lower among producers with greater reliance on off-farm income. Producers who rated government risk-management programs as important also found more weather data types important and used weather data for more decisions. Access to satellite TV increased data use but access to the Internet did not.

Rural poverty reduction is closely related to increase in agricultural growth and productivity. While, agriculture remains the main occupation in villages, agriculture sector growth has been showing a declining trend in since 1991. One of the key reasons for this is poor crop and soil management practices, and imbalanced application of fertilizers historically over years by farmers due to lack of timely, accurate and reliable information on nutrient management and crop cultivation practices. Mobile phone growth over last few years have made it a ubiquitous device and can help reach out to large number of farmers. Through this action-research a system was designed, developed and implemented at the farm level to answer the question whether providing customized crop cultivation and nutrient management practices to farmers can improve livelihoods and if so what are the implications of such an effort. This study has shown that ICTs when appropriately harnessed can increase farmers' access to information. Tailor-made information to individual farmers can improve farm productivity. Farmers still need to attain greater level of awareness on new crops and management practices and mobile phones can be the vehicle to support this. Farmers are interested in bundled services providing a variety of information related to crop production, processing and sale. This study also indicates the importance of socially embedding the technology with the help of local institutions to effectively address information needs of farmers

Political competition between parties to win electoral support is a distinguishing feature of democratic forms of government. Parties seek to attract electoral support with programmatic promises (public goods, services) for the benefit of all citizens as well as targeted redistribution in several countries, broadly termed as “clientelistic linkages.” Cash, gifts and nonmaterial goods such as jobs, exclusive access to public services are forms of clientelistic goods discussed in the literature. Studies on clientelism have spiked since the last quarter of the 20th century in several disciplines including political science and economics. The studies have clarified the definitions and distinguished between the various forms of clientelism while shedding light on how parties decide to adopt the clientelistic approach, the form of benefits offered, whether groups or individuals are targeted for clientelistic benefits, the mechanisms that solve the political commitment problem inherent in clientelistic relationships, and the correlates and consequences of clientelism. The section on theory outlines a spatial model that predicts when political parties will target swing or core supporters for redistributive benefits. The advances in empirical methods for studying clientelism and vote buying, including experimental methods have provided evidence that politicians target swing or core supporters and at times adopt mixed strategies favoring both groups. The burgeoning empirical literature has clarified the effectiveness of vote-buying as well as anti-vote buying campaigns. A direct relationship between poverty and vote buying is now contested and it is evident that further research, particularly those tying up theory with empirical findings is required to understand clientelism and vote buying.

Developing countries experience both household air pollution resulting from the use of biomass fuels for cooking and industrial air pollution. We conceptualise and estimate simultaneous exposure to both outdoor and household air pollution by adapting the Total Exposure Assessment model from environmental health sciences. To study the relationship between total exposure and health, we collected comprehensive data from a region (Goa) in India that had extensive mining activity. Our data allowed us to apportion individuals’ exposure to pollution in micro-environments: indoor, outdoor, kitchen, and at work. We find that higher cumulative exposure to air pollution is positively associated with both self-reported and clinically- diagnosed respiratory health issues. Households in regions with higher economic (mining) activity had higher incomes and had switched to cleaner cooking fuels. In other words, household air pollution due to higher biomass use had been substituted away for outdoor air pollution in regions with economic activity.

We highlight an overlooked channel of disease transmission in developing countries: dirty drains. We make the case that sanitation efforts should move to improve the condition of drains to build on increased toilet provision since they are a key transmission channel for waterborne diseases. We develop an economic model of sanitation externalities that incorporates the role of drains and then empirically examine the relationship between the sanitary quality of neighborhood drains and household ill-health incidence using a primary survey of 1,530 households from rural Uttarakhand, India.We find a strong and positive association between household ill-health incidence and dirty neighborhood drains, controlling for household toilet usage, community-level toilet availability, and an array of other household attributes. We employ a variety of robustness checks to validate our findings. Our findings suggest that bringing the policy focus to overall sanitation infrastructure will have substantial health returns.