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Does information provision foster or hinder the effectiveness of microcredit for human capital investments?

信息提供是否会促进或阻碍小额信贷对人力资本投资的有效性？

基本信息

批准号：
ES/T001879/1
负责人：
Orazio Attanasio
金额：
$ 10.96万
依托单位：
Institute for Fiscal Studies
依托单位国家：
英国
项目类别：
Research Grant
财政年份：
2019
资助国家：
英国
起止时间：
2019 至无数据
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=ES%2FT001879%2F1
关键词：
Does information provision foster hinder

项目摘要

Information provision and awareness campaigns are popular tools in international development, aiming to raise knowledge on particular topics, such as health, in order to trigger behaviour change, and to generate demand for related goods and services; with the overall aim of improving human capital outcomes. Despite their popularity, potential unintended consequences of such communication activities have to date been little studied.The proposed research is designed to contribute to filling this gap by gaining a deeper understanding of the role of information provision in hindering, or fostering the effectiveness of microcredit for human capital investments. Microcredit - small, usually collateral-free loans given to households in low-income countries - has been much studied and their ability in relaxing poor households' credit constraints to allow them to invest in entrepreneurial activities and cope with adverse events acknowledged. More recently, microcredit has also been shown to be effective in fostering human capital investments particularly preventive health investments such as bednets, water connections and toilets, supporting the emerging trends of private enterprises increasingly taking a role in solving social and environmental problems; and in growing numbers of investors seeking to make financial investments that produce significant social or environmental benefits. Microcredit programs often ensure high loan repayment through joint liability - groups of borrowers are liable for each other's loans, and thus monitor each other. However, this feature could influence the take-up and use of microloans for human capital investments, since financial returns to such investments take time to be realised.Acknowledging that poor awareness of the existence of social programs could hinder take-up of these programs, awareness creation campaigns have become an essential component of the roll-out of new policy initiatives. However, such campaigns typically deliver multiple messages, which could inadvertently lead to recipients taking away a message that is contrary to that intended by the program designers, implying that information campaigns could backfire and hinder the adoption of human capital investments.We are in the unique position to research such unintended consequence and their mechanisms by building on an interesting puzzle that emerged from a previously conducted study. In particular, we found that providing information alongside microcredit for human capital investment (sanitation), led to a similar increase in loan uptake on average as the provision of sanitation microloans only, but it resulted in fewer clients using the loan for household toilets, contrary to our original hypothesis.We intend to explore three channels that could explain this puzzling finding. First, the delivery of the information campaign - through a different organisation from that providing the sanitation loans - might have how peer monitoring of sanitation loan use occurred, resulting in fewer toilets being built. Second, the information campaign might have increased awareness about the existence of the sanitation loans (and their favourable conditions), attracting households who wanted to borrow for a non-sanitation purpose. Third, the information campaign could have unintentionally discouraged households from using sanitation loans for sanitation, by making them believe, for instance that their own sanitation investments would be ineffective unless accompanied by similar investments from their neighbours. We propose to answer these questions using a mixed-methods approach, combining a theoretical model, with quantitative data collected within the RCT and qualitative research. The key advantage of this combined approach is that it allows us to triangulate the research findings and hence to establish and explain patterns, trends, and mechanisms, in other words dig into the policy relevant questions of 'what' and 'why'.

信息提供和宣传活动是国际发展中流行的工具，旨在提高对健康等特定主题的认识，以引发行为改变，并产生对相关商品和服务的需求；总体目标是改善人力资本成果。尽管此类传播活动很受欢迎，但迄今为止对此类传播活动潜在的意外后果的研究还很少。拟议的研究旨在通过更深入地了解信息提供在阻碍或促进人力资本投资小额信贷有效性方面的作用，从而有助于填补这一空白。小额信贷（通常是向低收入国家家庭提供的小额无抵押贷款）已得到广泛研究，其放松贫困家庭信贷约束的能力也得到承认，使他们能够投资于创业活动并应对不利事件。最近，小额信贷也被证明可以有效促进人力资本投资，特别是预防性健康投资，如蚊帐、供水和厕所，支持私营企业在解决社会和环境问题中日益发挥作用的新兴趋势；越来越多的投资者寻求进行能够产生显着社会或环境效益的金融投资。小额信贷计划通常通过连带责任确保高额贷款偿还——借款人团体对彼此的贷款负责，从而相互监督。然而，这一特点可能会影响小额贷款用于人力资本投资的吸收和使用，因为此类投资的财务回报需要时间才能实现。认识到对社会计划的存在认识不足可能会阻碍这些计划的实施，提高认识活动已成为推出新政策举措的重要组成部分。然而，此类活动通常会传递多种信息，这可能会无意中导致接收者带走与项目设计者的意图相反的信息，这意味着信息活动可能会适得其反并阻碍人力资本投资的采用。我们处于独特的地位，可以通过之前进行的研究中出现的一个有趣的谜题来研究这种意外后果及其机制。特别是，我们发现，为人力资本投资（卫生）提供小额信贷的同时提供信息，与仅提供卫生小额贷款相比，平均贷款吸收量有所增加，但导致使用贷款用于家庭厕所的客户减少，这与我们最初的假设相反。我们打算探索三种渠道来解释这一令人费解的发现。首先，信息宣传活动的实施（通过与提供卫生贷款的组织不同的组织）可能会对卫生贷款的使用情况进行同行监督，从而导致修建的厕所数量减少。其次，信息宣传活动可能会提高人们对卫生贷款的存在（及其优惠条件）的认识，吸引那些想要为非卫生目的借款的家庭。第三，信息宣传活动可能会无意中阻止家庭使用卫生贷款进行卫生设施建设，例如让他们相信，除非邻居进行类似的投资，否则他们自己的卫生设施投资将是无效的。我们建议使用混合方法来回答这些问题，将理论模型与随机对照试验和定性研究中收集的定量数据相结合。这种组合方法的主要优点是，它使我们能够对研究结果进行三角测量，从而建立和解释模式、趋势和机制，换句话说，深入探讨“什么”和“为什么”的政策相关问题。