Simona Bignami-Van Assche
Ari Van Assche
Philip Anglewicz
Peter Fleming
Catherine van de Ruit

http://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol24/27/

doi:10.4054/DemRes.2011.24.27

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Abstract

AIDS morbidity and mortality are expected to have a large impact on households’ labor supply in rural Malawi since they reduce the time that adults can spend on production for subsistence and on income generating activities. However, the data demands for estimating this impact are high, limiting the amount of empirical evidence. In this paper, we utilize a unique combination of quantitative and qualitative data, including biomarkers for HIV, collected by the Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project, to analyze the impact of AIDS-related morbidity and mortality on time allocation decisions for rural Malawians. We evaluate both the direct effect of HIV/AIDS on the time allocation of affected individuals as well as its indirect effect on the time allocation of surviving household members. We find that the latter is the most important effect of AIDS-related morbidity and mortality, especially on women’s time. Specifically, AIDS induces diversification of income sources, with women reallocating their time from work-intensive (typically farming and heavy chores) to cash-generating tasks (such as casual labor).

Author's affiliation
Simona Bignami-Van Assche
Université de Montréal, Canada
Ari Van Assche
HEC Montréal, Canada
Philip Anglewicz
Tulane University, United States of America
Peter Fleming
University of Pennsylvania, United States of America
Catherine van de Ruit
University of Pennsylvania, United States of America

Keywords
Africa, AIDS/HIV, economic impact, Malawi, time allocation

Word count (Main text)
5649

Other articles by the same author/authors (in Demographic Research)

	[20-21] The Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project 2004-06: Data collection, data quality, and analysis of attrition
	[20-6] Overestimating HIV infection: The construction and accuracy of subjective probabilities of HIV infection in rural Malawi
	[19-32] Hotspots and Coldspots: Household and village-level variation in orphanhood prevalence in rural Malawi
	[S1-2] An Assessment of the KDICP and MDICP Data Quality: Interviewer Effects, Question Reliability and Sample Attrition
	[S1-3] Are we measuring what we want to measure?: An analysis of individual consistency in survey response in rural Malawi

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