Ninth Annual Himalayan Policy Research Conference (2014)

This paper examines the determinants of poverty in Bangladesh. Poverty is multi-dimensional in nature and depends on interactions of various socio-economic factors. Several demographic and health factors can shape up the economic status of a household, and theory suggests that the ability of a household to earn a given level of income can depend on the characteristics internal to the household. While most studies done on poverty measurements rely on the income, expenditure and consumption data, this study has used data from Bangladesh Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS). The main objective of this paper is to identify the factors that have relative effect on poverty of the household.

This research paper addresses the question: How much of a role has the increase in migration and remittance played in the reduction of poverty and in the rise and subsequent fall in income inequality in Nepal?

This interpretive study reveals students motivated by extrinsic rewards aligned with promises of high paying jobs due to strong test performances rather than being intrinsically motivated by the benefits of learning for its own sake.

This paper analyzes the effect of climate risk on food security in rural Nepal, utilizing the Nepal Living Standard Survey data and climate risk index data. We construct two indicators for food security, caloric intake per capita and food diversity, which captures comprehensive information of food security. The copula method, which allows us to obtain flexible bivariate parametric model for the continuous-count data, is used to simultaneously estimate the caloric intake and food diversity models.

To add to the existing state of knowledge, the present paper will list out the existence of other unidentified factors that may have a bearing on health outcomes. The relatively new branch of KABB (knowledge, attitude, belief and behavioral) studies tries to locate any differences, if they exist, in the awareness of the population about better health and behavioral practices. This paper seeks to understand the potential role being played by cultural and religious practices in explaining the inconsistency in individual’s knowledge and behavior.

It is time to learn from the recent incidents and reframe our planning approach and also, increase our efforts on a priority basis. When it is being planned to extend the Indira Gandhi Canal to the Thar Desert districts, it is essential to construct outlets so that during any emergency outflow of excess water is assured. There are evidences of the existence of some ancient channels along with some extinct rivers like the Leek and the Sheepasaria linking the area with the seasonal river Luni. There is an urgent need to study the terrain and topography of the area to develop its drainage system and for it rehabilitation.

In this paper, I explore the research possibilities for a relatively unknown yet growing phenomenon of Nepali migratory routes to the United States via Latin America. While it is no secret that Nepalis are increasingly entering into foreign labor migration schemes that contribute to nearly one-quarter of the country’s GDP, these routes tend to be limited to Asian parts of the world, such as India, the Arabian Gulf, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan. Although labor migration of Nepalis to the United States has existed for some time, it has tended to be based on plane travel via tourist, student, employment or diversity visas. However, as United States immigration officials continue to tighten visa regulation in the post 9-11 era, new avenues of entering the country through undocumented means have emerged for Nepali migrants who have joined a trend of Indian citizens traveling to the United States via Latin American routes.

This paper will set out an argument for the need of a stronger constitutional and legal mechanism for institutionalizing the substantive equal citizenship rights of women in order to end the gendered nature of concept of nationality and citizenship right in Nepal.

This paper develops a spatially integrated conceptual framework on ecosystem service modeling approach taking the case of the President Churia-Tarai-Madhesh Conservation (PCTMC) program of Nepal that has faced several management controversies while serving the downstream communities.

Using panel data from the Nepal Living Standard Surveys, this paper examines the dynamics of chronic and transient poverty and their socioeconomic determinants between 1996 and 2011.

It is in the frame of recent nation-centric politics – in patterns of ethnic (caste/tribe/religion/language) strategizing common to greater South Asia – that pan-Himalayan Tamang identity begins to be more forcefully asserted in Nepal and India. To examine the nature of formation and assertion of Tamang identity is to revisit the debate over the relationship of ethnicity, identity politics, religion and other aspects of culture in defining and redefining the nature of communities in the South-Asian nation-states. In the history of modern India as in other parts of greater South Asia, the concept and reality of ‘nation’ has acquired very great importance. It is true of both colonial and post-colonial experience. Alongside, the notions of tradition and traditionalism, modern and modernism, ethnicity as construction and ethnicity as reality have gained renewed importance in considerations of socio-economic and cultural realities in today’s world.

The result of a multiple time series regression model shows that export, trade-to-GDP ratio, etc. reduced poverty rate in Bangladesh. The export of garments created a large manufacturing sector in the country, which provided jobs to more than 3 million people, majority of whom are women. A further research can be done in the future to see how women education and women employment in the manufacturing sector is driving the economy and society of Bangladesh.

Considering the research gaps on student motivation of treating economics as an interesting subject matter, the learning goal of my research is to find what works best to engender positive learning experience for students dealing with serious motivational issues. My research design is based on the convergent parallel mixed methods using the quantitative pre-and-post anonymous online questionnaire surveys and the qualitative short reflection notes.

This study attempts to determine factors that influence women’s autonomy and empowerment in Nepali households. We look at a set of such variables for women, for instance, land ownership, access to credit from formal and informal financial institutions, decision to work outside of family, input to decision making on such family matters as accessing health services for herself and her children, sending children to school, and handling family finance. We explore whether there is gender bias on access to formal sources of credit or availability of public services.