Guha, Anusha; (2024) Essays on Economics of Education and Agriculture in Developing Countries. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This thesis explores two critical aspects of development: education and agriculture. The first chapter examines teacher effectiveness in Vietnam. Using a panel dataset, we estimate both classroom and teacher effects on academic and non-cognitive skills. Our findings reveal moderate teacher impacts on academic skills, but substantial classroom effects on both cognitive and noncognitive skills. Through analysis of classroom recordings, we identify key pedagogical practices that contribute to high-quality learning environments. Results highlight significant differences in the specific areas of classroom practice that influence different developmental outcomes. Given that teacher quality alone explains limited variation in students’ attainment, we posit that home inputs and their interaction with school inputs play a crucial role. The second chapter thus investigates the joint role of home and school inputs in the skill formation. It considers parents’ time and material investment and child time investment as home inputs, and class value-added as school inputs. Results indicate that school inputs and parental time investment significantly influence cognitive skills, while material investment and child time investment are more important for noncognitive skills development. We also find that home and school inputs are substitutes in the production of child skills. Notably, parents decrease investment in their children in response to higher classroom quality. The last chapter shifts focus to agriculture, examining the competition among intermediaries and its impact on agricultural prices by leveraging a novel source of exogenous variation in competition - the introduction of online platforms. Using a unique dataset that captures both inter- and intramarket competition, we demonstrate that trader participation and spatial competition significantly affect farmer prices. We then evaluate a policy initiative which transitioned sales from an offline to an online platform. By investigating these less explored channels, it offers new perspectives on the factors shaping farm-gate prices in developing economies and the potential of online platforms to enhance market outcomes.

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