Browsing by Author "Naidu, Vijay"

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Assessing Micro Realities With Macro Policy: a Study of the Self Help Group (SHG) - Bank Linkage Programme
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2008) Misra, Alok; Naidu, Vijay; Hawke, Gary
"There is a growing fascination with the mechanics of microfinance, with the vehicle. There is less and less concern about the passengers and their destination," Aminur Rahman. Widespread poverty remains a key development challenge in India. Expanding access of the poor to credit has been at the centre of poverty alleviation policy in India. The major thrust of policy until the 1990s was on increasing credit supply at subsidized rates through expansion of the banking network. Inadequacy of this approach to reach the poor and ensure sustainability of lending institutions led to a reorientation in the policy. In this backdrop, Self Help Group-Bank Linkage Programme (SBLP) was conceptualized as an innovative microfinance programme building on the synergy between existing banking network, NGOs and informal groups of rural poor. The success of SBLP is described in terms of outreach to the poor through collateral free lending, full cost recovery and high repayment rates, thereby balancing the needs of clients and institutions. Though influenced by Financial System approach, institutional sustainability has come to the fore; client level impact is mainly interpreted in terms of proxies like repayment rates. This research focuses on clients of SBLP to investigate whether SBLP is effective in reaching the poor, meets their needs and its impact on their economic and social life. Through participatory study of four SHGs comprising 62 members in three villages, the research documents clients' perspective on SBLP. The role of policy, banks and Self-Help Promoting Agencies (SHPA) is also analysed to assess the suitability of operational design to meet the needs of the rural poor. The findings show that while SBLP has been able to effectively overcome barriers in access to financial services, the economic impact on clients is limited to consumption smoothing and reduction in recourse to informal credit. Group dynamics positively affect confidence of members and social impacts depend on the orientation of SHPA. Programme focus on achieving numbers has resulted in enlisting SHPAs having neither the capacity nor orientation to provide economic facilitation to the groups. The constraint faced by SBLP to go beyond first generation issue of access to financial services to economic development lies in its inability to build capacity of the group members, provide local context based financial services and livelihood support. While the microfinance community debates on lending approaches, the major contribution of this research is in arguing that access to credit is not sufficient for positive economic impact. The needs and livelihood choice of the poor depend on the local context and are shaped by their past experience. The linear process of development based on credit, ignores key factors such as unproductive landholdings, low risk appetite of the poor and their inexperience in setting up micro business. Unless these are addressed through public investments in agriculture, availability of risk mitigation mechanisms and provision of support services, the impact of credit availability on poverty would continue to be minimal.
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DEVE501: Development Studies: Development Theory and Practice
(Victoria University of Wellington, 2006) Naidu, Vijay
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DEVE501: Development Studies: Development Theory and Practice
(Victoria University of Wellington, 2005) Naidu, Vijay
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Poverty in the Land of Miracles: A Study of Reforms and Poverty Alleviation Strategies in Chile
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2006) Kousary, Lida; Murray, Warwick; Naidu, Vijay
This thesis aims to examine the relationship of poverty reduction to Chile's overarching political doctrines of neoliberalism (1975-1990) and neostructuralism (1990-2005). Owing to Chile's prototype status as a 'miracle economy', and its remarkable achievements in poverty reduction, the research seeks to gain insights into Chile's chief success factors and current'situation with respect to poverty. The study adopts both an historical and contemporary perspective to analyse the impacts of the major reforms on poverty and income distribution over the past 30 years and evaluates the Chile Solidario system as a modern case study. The key finding of this research is that the radical neoliberal and structural adjustment policies espoused by the 'Chicago Boys' had severe negative effects on the poor and middle class during Pinochet's dictatorship regime. The transition to democracy and adoption of neostructuralism has produced drastic reductions in poverty, attributed to the Concertacion governments' progrowth economic agenda, progressive social policies, and innovative institutional reforms. Post-dictatorship, the new faces of poverty in Chile are associated with social exclusion, isolation and vulnerability underpinned by persistent and high forms of inequality, a stratified social protection system and a dual labour market. Chile Solidario has presented an innovative and unique anti-poverty strategy by adopting a 'rights-based' approach to combat indigent poverty in Chile. It suffers, however, from methodological and fundamental shortcomings when it comes to dealing with chronic poverty and the empowerment of the poor. The newly emerging development model in Chile presents some contradictions in its 'growth with equity' principle. There are unresolved tensions between market social rights and democratic freedoms in this model that do not give top priority to equity and poverty reduction.
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Tourism as an Economic Development Tool for Ovalau, Fiji Islands: An Analysis of Selected Issues
(Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, 2005) Frew, Michael J.; Teaiwa, Teresia; Naidu, Vijay
In a quantitative analysis of the tourism environment for the island of Ovalau, Fiji, this research document aligns key elements of Fiji tourism and development policy with some important Ovalau tourism issues. For tourism to yield broad development benefits, Ovalau tourism planners must harness the beneficial characteristics of the islands' peripheral location, alleviate the obstructive characteristics of peripherality, and create an enabling environment for locally led tourism entrepreneurship. A pragmatic approach to local development is promoted where local initiative and control of tourism activities may lead to engagement with an inherently global market sector on terms appropriate to the local setting. The role of tourism planners is highlighted and a call is made for harnessing the limited local resources through a single, united, multi-party Ovalau tourism planning body. Although small-scale tourism activities are endorsed as being most likely to yield successful development outcomes, a larger local project planned for late 2005 can be seen as further evidence of the pragmatic local approach to tourism development. The need to raise local tourism awareness is also identified as local ambivalence to past heritage protection and tourism initiatives has led to economic activities on Ovalau remaining focussed on the potentially unsustainable tuna fishery. The research finds that tourism can indeed be an effective economic development tool for Ovalau, and can also be an agent of diversification beyond current reliance on the fishing industry. This research provides tourism planners with an outline of the peripherality issues confronting the Island, along with catalysts and inhibitors of local indigenous Fijian entrepreneurial activity. In order for tourism to contribute to economic development, Ovalau tourism policy makers must be able to address these main research issues.