To cope with the growing agrarian crises in Afghanistan, the government (following the fall of the Taliban regime in 2002) has taken measures through cropland expansion “extensification” and switching to mechanized agriculture “intensification”. However, cropland expansion, on one hand, disturbs the existing land use/cover (LULC) and, on other hand, many socio-economic and biophysical factors affect this process. This study was based on the Kabul River Basin to answer two questions: Firstly, what was the change in LULC since 2001 to 2010 and, secondly, what are the drivers of cropland change. We used the spatial calculating model (SCM) for LULC change and binomial logistic regression (BLR) for drivers of cropland change. The net change shows that cropland, grassland, water-bodies, and built-up areas were increased, while forest, unused, and snow/ice areas were decreased. Cropland was expanded by 13%, which was positively affected by low and plain landforms, slope, soil depth, investment on agriculture and distance to the city, while it was negatively affected by plateaus and hill landforms, dry semi-arid, moist semi-arid, and sub-humid zones, precipitation, population, and the distance to roads and water. Climate adaptation measures, cropland protection in flood prone zones, population and rural migration control, farmer access to credit, irrigation, and inputs are necessary for agricultural deployment.

Measuring vulnerability and identifying determinants of vulnerability are key to designing interventions for marginalized groups like sex workers. The current study introduces a new approach of measuring vulnerability among female sex workers (FSWs) by adopting a multidimensional poverty measurement framework. A multidimensional vulnerability index was created from four dimensions and 16 indicators using a dual cut-off approach. The study found that 55% of FSWs were multidimensionally vulnerable with 48% of intensity in vulnerability. The overall value of multidimensional vulnerability index was 0.265. FSWs in Maharashtra were most vulnerable (82%). Lack of financial security contributed mostly to FSWs’ vulnerability. Further, compared to less vulnerable FSWs, multidimensionally vulnerable ones were more to engage in behaviors that put them at risk such as inconsistent use of condoms with clients, alcohol consumption, engaging in anal sex with clients and experiencing sexually transmitted infections. Findings suggest that structural, social and financial vulnerabilities of FSWs need to be addressed concurrently.

The paper is an attempt to analyse up to what extent free education can reduce households’ burden of private expenditure on education. Such an analysis is important in current government policy drive of reducing subsidies from social sectors and providing targeted free education to poor. Logically the social need of students availing free education is fulfilled by government so they are relieved from the risk of impoverishment due to high private expenditure. But analysis on NSSO data on Participation and Expenditure on Education, 2007-08 reveals that free educations is availed only at elementary level and at that level also free education is not universal. In the first part the distribution of free education has been discussed at each level of education, MPCE class and state. Next the average cost of education for students receiving free education and students’ not receiving free education has been calculated to compare up to what extent free education exempts students from private expenditure. Lastly the comparative share of each item of education to total expenditure has been analysed for each state to understand the particular item that is responsible for most of the expenditure on households. It has been observed that although the cost of education of those receiving free education is lower than those receiving paid education but in absolute terms there is significant expenditure on education by the households. Above school level free education is almost inexistent and expenditure on education is incurred on all consumption expenditure quartiles. Therefore even the poor households have a proportion of expenditure going to education as students either do not receive free education or do not get it absolutely free. Item wise break up of expenditure showed that free education relieves a household only from paying tuition fees. There are other important items of consumption like books, stationery, uniform and most importantly private tuition consumed by students in all MPCE quartiles and paid for by households. Quality of educational institutions have to be improved so that private tuition does not remain a necessity and overall education from primary to highest level have to be provided by the government to relieve households from expenditure burden.

Malnutrition has remained one of the most pressing challenges to human development and a rigid outcome of underdevelopment to respond to policies and interventions. Although forms and predictors of malnutrition is extensively studied, relatively less focus have gone to the micro-realities of policy implementation that can explain the barriers to achieving better service utilization outcomes. This study attempted to fill this gap by undertaking a micro-level qualitative analysis of the beneficiary experience from one of the largest nutrition services in the world i.e., the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) in India to gain insights on the social-environmental barriers to the supplementary nutrition program. Combining qualitative phenomenological design with a retrospective design, the study compared experience of current ICDS services to the services of its erstwhile strategic regime called the ‘Dular’ using data from a 2018 study in Bihar. 30 beneficiary mothers including 12 mothers with children in both regimes, 10 front-line and erstwhile second-line workers and 2 UNICEF officials were included in focus group discussion and one-to-one interviews. The analysis revealed that even if the ICDS budget allocation has increased, the strategic changes in the program downscaled in terms of service personnel by removing second line workers, this led to a deceleration in knowledge and practice gain among the beneficiaries. The current-ICDS was also challenged due to non-universal coverage in supplementary food delivery leading to exclusion of some children, the hazardous work condition of the FLWs, low FLW capability, and incoherence between the beneficiaries. Engagement of local governance was found to be an enabler.

This article examines the adequacy of private expenditure on education and health in the All India urban Poverty Line Basket (PLB) proposed by the Tendulkar Committee. Estimating the normative expenditures for education and health care and comparing them with the level of expenditure at poverty lines suggested by the Tendulkar Committee, the article observes that the revised PLB does not satisfy the normative level of expenditure required at the poverty line class. Adjusting the starting point of index multiplication upward by adding the normative cost of education and health care to the existing PLB, it attempts to answer the question whether households can afford adequate expenditure on education and medical care if they are simply provided with the value required. The results show that the normative expenditure is unmet even after an upward revision and that the poverty line monthly expenditure level, where households actually spend the normative amount of social expenditure, is far above the PLB. The other implication is that targeting based on a poverty line that does not satisfy social expenditure will leave out impoverished households. The article concludes that households at the poverty line class cannot take the social expenditure burden, nor can a transfer of adequate value make them capable of spending it. Rather, the social services should be provided by the government to all households so that they do not have to bear the expenses and that targeting is not required.