Can Multi-Sectoral Development Interventions Boost Livelihoods and Women’s Labor Supply? Evidence from NRLM in India

ABSTRACT

Diversifying household livelihoods and increasing women’s labor force participation is a major developmental challenge in South Asia. Multi-sectoral development approaches can provide better economic opportunities and women’s employment simultaneously. This study provides evidence on the livelihoods and women’s labor supply impacts of the National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), a $5.1 billion livelihoods initiative. The study matches primary data from 4,202 households and 726 villages using the 2011 Population Census and the 2012 Socio-Economic and Caste Census. The instrumental variable estimates suggest that participation in NRLM is associated with an improvement in the number of household livelihoods by 0.707, livelihood diversification by 0.13σ, and women’s working participation rate (WPR) by 15.4 percent. The study identifies two sets of channels, namely, formation of productive assets and access to formal credit, through which NRLM influenced livelihoods and women’s WPR. Heterogeneous program effects suggest that women in socially and economically deprived households benefitted most.

HIGHLIGHTS

• The study highlights India’s National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), the world’s largest livelihoods initiative.

• NRLM improved opportunities for women’s gainful employment in farm and nonfarm productive activities.

• The program’s impact reflects the efficacy of multi-sectoral development interventions.

• It relies on a unique multi-sectoral approach that mobilizes rural poor women into SHGs and their federations.

• The study argues for interventions that influence gender roles in the context of rural growth and development.

KEYWORDS:

• National Rural Livelihoods Mission
• women’s working participation rate
• self-help groups
• India
• instrumental variable

JEL CODES:

• D13
• J16
• J21

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank Shivani Gupta, Vinay Kumar Vutukuru, Gayatri Acharya, Madhur Gautam, Ritam Chaurey, Rinku Murgai, Parmesh Shah, and Shantanu Kumar for their comments.

SUPPLEMENTAL DATA

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/13545701.2022.2037684.

Notes

1 The deprivation criteria include (a) only one room with kucha (temporary/makeshift) walls and kucha roof, (b) no adult ages 16–59, (c) female-headed household heads (HHs) with no adult male member between ages 16–59, (d) disabled member and no able bodied adult member, and (e) SC or ST household.

2 The program has seen the development of advanced economic activities that have reached significant scale through the provision of technical services for improvements in agricultural productivity, improvement in livestock management and diversification to high-value agriculture (2 million beneficiaries), introduction of digital financial services (142,000 households), and convergence with other government programs (World Bank 2018).

3 Data accessed on Oct 9, 2018 Source: NRLM MIS (https://aajeevika.gov.in/); 1 US$ = 70 INR.

4 In a few cases, there were not enough sample blocks, so all the blocks were taken.

5 The SECC data was given priority over the Census data wherever data was available from both sources. This was done primarily because the study team had access to household level data through SECC and also it was a more recent survey.

6 The activities include self-employed farming, self-employed non-farming, enterprise or business, fisheries, salaries government, salaried public sector, salaried, private, agricultural wage labor, agricultural family worker, non-agricultural family worker, not working, senior citizen or infant, household work, student, beggar or charity, and foraging and rag picking.

7 Women’s WPR as per Census 2011 data is 49 percent for the sample villages.

8 The control households were surveyed both from the control and treatment villages. Therefore, the IV method will provide LATE for the subpopulation of compliers.

9 NRLM has implemented Aajeevika Skill Development Program (ASDP) and 25 percent of its funds are dedicated for skilling and facilitating rural youth to participate in relatively high wage employment. Another major component of NRLM is nurturing of self-employment and entrepreneurial activities.

10 Absence of heterogeneous program effects in the income subgroups may also be because the targeting outcomes improve when based on social identity instead of economic conditions. Caste is exogenous to households and in most cases easily observable whereas measurement of economic conditions is subject to misreporting and measurement. Therefore income based enrollment strategy would require comprehensive income module while listing.

11 Approximately 168 million masks, 0.52 million protective equipment, 0.51 million liter of sanitizers, and 122,000 soup kitchens were operated and delivered by NRLM promoted SHGs during March-October 2020.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India.

Notes on contributors

Vivek Pandey

Vivek Pandey is Development Economist at the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA). His work explores women’s agency in the context of decentralization, market linkages, community based organizations, and local governments. At IRMA, he leads the research efforts of the Verghese Kurien Policy Lab.

Abhishek Gupta

Abhishek Gupta is with World Bank and is part of the Rural Development Group.