26 June 2014: Revealed preference for open defecation: Evidence from a new survey in rural north India

Dean Spears
Research Institute for Compassionate Economics (RICE)

Abstract:
The paper summarizes the survey results. One key finding is that open defecation is very common even among people who live in households with latrines, so programs that hope to eliminate open defecation must move beyond latrine construction to promoting behaviour change.

Date: June 26, 2014
Time: 03:00 P.M.

Venue:
Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI)
Plot No. 47, Sector 44,
Institutional Area,
Gurgaon – 122002, Haryana (INDIA)

Location:

30 June 2014: Innovations in Data Collection: The Chitwan Valley Family Study in Nepal

Dirgha Ghimire
University of Michigan and ISER-Nepal

Abstract:
The Chitwan Valley Family Study (CVFS) is an 18-year old, multi-level, panel study of communities, households, and individuals based on multi-mode, mixed-methods data collection built around cutting-edge, computer-assisted personal interviewing (CAPI) and mobile phone technologies. CVFS serves as a unique laboratory based at ISER-N for interdisciplinary social and economic research in the heterogeneous, high-mobility setting of the Chitwan Valley in Nepal’s Inner Terai region. CVFS investigates the impact of this rapidly changing context on family formation using a combination of ethnographic, archival, geo-spatial, and survey methods. CVFS tracks domestic and international migrants and provides continuous measurement of community change going back seven decades and backed by 17 years of monthly demographic event data. CVFS data are available through ICPSR, the Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research at Michigan, www.icpsr.umich.edu.

Dr Ghimire will discuss CVFS design and its evolution, including tracking respondents over time and space and the use of innovative life history calendars for data collection using multi-level retrospective histories and measurements between panels. He will describe how CAPI makes it possible to collect high-quality panel data in less-than ideal field conditions but with active, real-time survey management at ISER-N and Michigan.

As panel studies around the world have shown, understanding the consequences of rapid social, economic, and environmental change for policy design, implementation and monitoring has become critical in all settings. Dr Ghimire will explore how the innovative design and execution of CVFS can be useful for similar cultural settings, such as in India.

Date: June 30, 2014
Time: 03:30 P.M.

Venue:
NCAER Conference Room
National Council of Applied Economic Research
Parisila Bhawan, 11, Indraprastha Estate
New Delhi-110002(INDIA)

Location:

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Note:
Please join us for tea after the seminar. For queries, please contact Ms Sudesh Bala at sbala@ncaer.org or on 011-2345-2669.

16 June 2014: Kinky Development: Fun, but not Productive

Lant Pritchett
Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University

Date: June 16, 2014
Time: 05:00 P.M.

Venue:
Conference Hall (Classroom), Ground Floor, R&T Building
National Institute of Public Finance and Policy,
18/2 Satsang Vihar Marg, Special Institutional Area,
New Delhi-110067(INDIA)

Location:

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Note:
Those who are interested may please confirm your participation to Ms. Suhasini Prasad at suhasini.prasad@nipfp.org.in latest by 15th June 2014

13 June 2014: What can an experiment in Maharashtra tell policymakers about the impact of sanitation on child height?

Dean Spears
Centre for Development Economics, Delhi School of Economics

Abstract:
Most of the world's open defecation happens in India. Open defecation releases germs into the environment, where children come into contact with them. What is the effect of these environmental diseases? This paper discusses a specific randomised sanitation experiment, conducted by the World Bank and the Government of Maharashtra in 2004 and considers the broader applicability of this evidence.

The evidence from this study suggests that reducing open defecation helps children grow taller – which is consistent with converging experimental and quasi-experimental evidence of the effect of sanitation on child height from a variety of sources. But in this case, the experiment was not ultimately carried out in all selected districts, although data were collected. This allows for a comparison between the two, which is particularly valuable because the final sites had the highest human development indicators. This raises the question of external validity and whether we would expect a similar sanitation experiment to yield similar results in areas with a lower human development baseline.

We believe that sanitation does indeed foster child growth, a proxy of overall child health. However, this study should encourage broader reflection on the external validity of randomised evaluations. We need to ask whether the pool of experimental data we have is influenced by site selection bias, as an experiment requires a high-capacity organisation willing and able to carry out research and implementation. If so, what are the precautions that need to be taken when making policy recommendations based on experimental evidence?

Date: June 13, 2014
Time: 03:30 P.M.

Venue:
Seminar Room, Ground Floor
ISID Complex, Plot No. 4
Vasant Kunj Institutional Area
New Delhi- 110 070(INDIA)

Location:

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Note:
Please register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/delhi-seminar-series-tickets-11852973563
Watch the seminar live at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQC6rJVd15Y

9 June 2014: India's Clinical Establishment Act 2010: Overview, Status & Implications for Health Insurance

Sunil Nandraj,
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India and Public Health Foundation of India

Abstract:
The Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010 was enacted by the Central Government registration and regulation of all clinical establishments in the country, to prescribe the minimum standards of facilities and services provided by them. The implementation of this legislation is closely interlinked with effective delivery of health insurance schemes such as Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY). For the seminar, Sunil Nandraj will present his findings on the Act and its implications for social health insurance in India.

Date: June 9, 2014
Time: 04:30 P.M.

Venue:
GIZ Conference Room,
21, Jor Bagh,
New Delhi 110 003(INDIA)

Note:
RSVP: igssp@giz.de.

11 June 2014: Inflation Target at The Zero Lower Bound

Siddhartha Chattopadhyay
IIT Kharagpur

Abstract:
We propose that, the monetary authority adopt the inflation target as a time varying policy instrument at the zero lower bound (ZLB) with the same zeal with which they have adopted a fixed inflation target away from the ZLB. Specifically, after an extreme adverse shock reduces demand, the monetary authority promises future inflation by raising the inflation target in the Taylor Rule and announcing its persistence over time. The loss under our proposed policy is very similar to that under optimal monetary policy with the advantage that it is communicable using the language of the inflation target and implementable using the Taylor Rule. We also show that the inflation target and its persistence could be raised high enough to keep the economy away from the ZLB, but welfare costs are large.

Date: June 11, 2014
Time: 04:00 P.M.

Venue:
Conference Hall (Classroom), Ground Floor, R&T Building
National Institute of Public Finance and Policy,
18/2 Satsang Vihar Marg, Special Institutional Area,
New Delhi-110067(INDIA)

Location:

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Note:
Those who are interested may please confirm your participation to Ms. Suhasini Prasad at suhasini.prasad@nipfp.org.in latest by Tuesday, 10th June 2014

2 June 2014: Inflation Volatility: How Much More Costly is it for Developing Countries?

Shesadri Banerjee
NCAER

Abstract:
Scholars and policymakers have unanimously recognized the adverse economic and welfare consequences of inflation. However, relatively less attention is given to inflation volatility and its consequences. Inflation episodes are often more volatile (i.e. inflation fluctuates a lot) in emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs) as compared to advanced countries. This stylized fact raises the question of how costly is it for the EMDEs, such as India, when they suffer such greater volatility of inflation. This paper evaluates the welfare consequence of high inflation volatility by measuring the resulting loss of output. It shows that developing countries incur far greater loss of GDP—nearly twice—than advanced countries as a result of the high volatility of inflation. This finding re-emphasizes the importance of inflation targeting in the monetary policy frameworks of EMDEs, not dissimilar to the recent approach adopted by the Reserve Bank of India.

Date: June 2, 2014
Time: 03:30 P.M.

Venue:
NCAER Conference Room
National Council of Applied Economic Research
Parisila Bhawan, 11, Indraprastha Estate
New Delhi-110002(INDIA)

Location:

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Note:
Please join us for tea after the seminar. For queries, please contact Ms Sudesh Bala at sbala@ncaer.org or on 011-2345-2669.