EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Aid and internal migration in Malawi

Mauro Lanati, Marco Sanfilippo and Filippo Santi

World Development, 2023, vol. 162, issue C

Abstract: This paper uses geographically disaggregated data to investigate the role of foreign aid as a pull factor for internal migration in Malawi over the period 1998–2008. Employing a standard gravity model of migration, we show a positive relationship between the volume of foreign assistance a district receives and the number of immigrants. While aid makes districts more attractive as migrant destinations, there is no evidence of a counterbalancing push factor effect on internal mobility. We also dig deeper into the mechanisms through which foreign aid can shape internal migration decisions. According to our results, the positive welfare effects of foreign assistance manifest themselves not only through a rise in economic opportunities, but also in improved access to public services in recipient districts.

Keywords: Foreign Aid; Malawi; Sub-Saharan Africa; Internal Migration (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F35 O55 R2 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X22003242
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:162:y:2023:i:c:s0305750x22003242

DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2022.106134

Access Statistics for this article

World Development is currently edited by O. T. Coomes

More articles in World Development from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().

 
Page updated 2024-07-02
Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:162:y:2023:i:c:s0305750x22003242