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Study of Treatment Effects in Village-Level Studies. Working Paper Series no. 33

OAR@ICRISAT

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Title Study of Treatment Effects in Village-Level Studies. Working Paper Series no. 33
 
Creator Kumara Charyulu, D
Bantilan, M C S
 
Subject Agriculture-Farming, Production, Technology, Economics
 
Description Village-Level Studies (VLS) are one of the most efficient ways to understand rural farming systems
and also help identify the socioeconomic and institutional constraints faced by the farming community.
ICRISAT initiated longitudinal VLS in three important and contrasting production regions in India’s
semi-arid tropics (SAT) in the mid-1970s. These ‘first generation’ studies continued between 1975 and
1985 and were then discontinued. They were revived during 2001-2002 after a gap of 17 years, and
this second round of studies is referred to as ‘second generation’ VLS.
The basic aim of these studies is to monitor the same households as they evolve and respond to
normal development opportunities, without any deliberate intervention in their lives. Precautions are
taken to keep the effect of an outsider’s presence in the village to a minimum so that it will not influence
household behavior. Some social science researchers believe that a continuous engagement of VLS
sample households may enlarge the horizons of the respondents, rendering them more progressive
and knowledgeable than the non-VLS households. They also presume that the presence of a resident
investigator in the study village and continuous association with ICRISAT research staff might create
some ‘treatment effect’ on VLS households. These hypotheses need to be tested by using indicators
of treatment effect. The present study was initiated to ascertain whether the VLS activity has had any
effect in terms of improving the welfare of the people in the study villages. The detailed analysis of
census and sample household data in both first and second generation VLS led us to conclude that
there are no treatment effects occurring due to engagement of households or villages by the VLS
research team.
 
Publisher International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics
 
Date 2012
 
Type Monograph
NonPeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
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Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/7211/1/WPS-33_StudyofTreatmrnt_2012.pdf
Kumara Charyulu, D and Bantilan, M C S (2012) Study of Treatment Effects in Village-Level Studies. Working Paper Series no. 33. Documentation. International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, Patancheru, Andhra Pradesh, India.