Land for lads and literacy for ladies?

The analysis is based on household surveys in selected rural communities of the Philippines, Sumatra in Indonesia, and Western Ghana. I have an intention to reach my readers with most of the observations of the authors -- as they are pertinent and pointed to policy making also in Bangladesh. But, for the sake of shortness of space today, allow me to submit, at times paraphrased, some of the observations drawn from the section on background and rationale of their research. It appeared to me relevant in the sense that the ongoing debate on gender equality could, perhaps, benefit from the empirics discussed in the book.

The bearing of the book
Particularly, the importance of the book to me lies in its linking of land inheritance and education to well-being. We heard much about the increasing role of female education and its impact, but possibly, the least has been heard on land inheritance issue. Whereas, in rural areas, passing down land and providing an education are the main pillars through which parents pave the way for the future welfare of their children. Empirical evidence cited by the authors tends to show that, in terms of social and economic rights, gender biases in favour of men are less significant in Southeast Asia than in sub-Saharan Africa or South Asia. In much of Africa, for example, women have unequal access to land, more commonly gaining weak land rights through their husband upon marriage. Gender gaps in education portray a similar pattern: East Asia, Latin America, Europe, and Central Asia have the highest gender equality in education, South Asia has the lowest.

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Determinants of decisions
In Southeast Asia, where farming is male labour intensive, parental preference in land inheritance may favour sons. Among the Llocanos of Northern Philippines, for example, parents traditionally gave a portion of their land to the newly married son as gift. In the Llocanos, the practice is both primogeniture and ultimogeniture. In the former case, the eldest child alone inherits parental property, while, in the latter situation, the youngest one is prized with paternal property. This, of course, depends on the availability of land. Compared to this, among the Llonggos of Panay Island in the middle Philippines, daughters and sons may receive land rights more equally and independently, although for land constrained households, children who help the parents in farming receive more land than do their siblings.

In Indonesia traditionally land has been bequeathed from mother to daughters in a matrilineal inheritance system. Where rice and cinnamon production are equally male and female labour intensive, the share of land is equal. But in rubber and paddy fields, males get rubber lands and females paddy fields subject to the suitability of operations. The system at present is egalitarian rather than matrilineal.

The authors of the book hypothesize that emerging gender patterns in land acquisition and schooling respond to changing perceived opportunities available to adult men and women. Parents are careful in their choice of distribution of land and educational opportunities among children considering both their old age and the well-being of the children. The foremost consideration is the likely return from land and education and for male and female. It is being argued that in areas where market and social institutions reward male farmers and female human capital, parents allocated land to the lads and literacy i.e. education, to the ladies. It is also postulated that the gender difference in schooling is affected by the perception of the private returns to schooling. The costs of investing in schooling of girls who work longer hours for household activities may be higher because of higher opportunity costs of time. Although school fees are the same for both, distance is a disincentive to schooling of girls, as parents are concerned for security of daughters and they have to pay for transportation as they do not want girls walking long distances.

Again, parents may consider investment in schooling of girls less attractive in the wake of women earning less than men and providing less support in old age. Empirical evidence cited by the authors shows that in both developed and developing countries females earn, on average, only 75 per cent as much as males. Ipso facto, parents may act on lower returns to daughters' education. In societies where women move to the households of their husbands, thus limiting the ability to transfer resources to parents, investment in daughters appears even less desirable.

The authors then wrote about several episodes including the attitude of teachers and parents in affecting schooling attainment. For example, teachers may think that girls are no good at mathematics or parents may think that schooling is more important for boys than for girls, holding other things constant. In the Philippines, in contrast and according to an ethnographic study, parental decisions are also affected by children's decisions. Philippino parents invest in the schooling of girls because they are more studious, patient, willing to sacrifice, and interested in studies, which are traits likely to earn success in schools. Boys, on the other hand, are more prone to vices such as drinking, and are fond of roaming around and playing with their barkada i.e. peer group.

Parental decisions regarding wealth transfers could impact upon gender income inequality over time because returns to land and human capital are major components of rural household income. Greater access to land and increasing schooling might also empower women to bargain. More importantly, the distribution of income at household level between men and women has ramifications for other members and also for the society. Let us turn to that aspect.

Money and men
Men generally spend higher proportion of their income on tobacco and alcohol compared to women contributing larger share of income on food and children's health care. In Brazil, the effect of women's unearned income on child survival probabilities is almost 20 times than that of men's unearned income. In Taiwan, women's income share has a significant positive effect on the budget shares allocated to staples and education and a negative effect on the budget share going to cigarettes and alcohol. Even in patriarchal societies such as in Bangladesh where women generally bring fewer assets to marriage and where husbands control most of the resources, women's assets have a positive effect on educational expenditures; they also reduce girls' rate of illness. It thus appears that differences in access to land and education by men and women could have important effects on the welfare of the household.

Leaving aside the private returns positively pointed to increased allocation of resources under women's control, empirical evidence also highlights the higher social returns from such increased access. For example, as cited in the book, Schultz argues that regions that have most successfully promoted equal education for men and women -- East Asia, Southeast Asia and Latin America -- also fared well in terms of economic and social development. This did not happen in South Asia and Africa. The other benefits of female education are reduced fertility and improvement in child survival. Empirical evidence shows that a three-year increase in the average schooling is associated with as much as one less child per woman. In countries where girls are only half as likely to go to school as boys, there are on average 21.1 more infant deaths per 1,000 live births than in countries with no gender gap. In addition, improvement in women's status also reduces child malnutrition. For example, 43 per cent of the total reduction in child malnutrition is adduced to increased women's education.

Concluding observation
In the above paragraphs, I have just given a background to the policy relevance of research undertaken by A.R.Quisumbing, J.P.Estudillo, and K.Otsuka on land and schooling. The background and the rationale for research have been drawn from an arsenal of researches done before by various scholars and amply acknowledged by the auhtors. Hopefully, in our next installments, we shall highlight the results of their research as far as the sample areas are concerned.

Abdul Bayes is a Professor of Economics at Jahangirnagar University.