Allocation of Child’s Time for Schooling in Rural Ethiopia: Does Households’ Participation in Off-farm Activities Matter?

Abstract

Using panel data collected over the course of three rounds, the study seeks to investigate the factors that influence households' need for their children to attend school, concentrating primarily on off-farm activities as a primary explanatory variable of interest. The study used propensity score matching with a difference-in-difference estimator. The data is gathered from children whose ages are below 15 and their households in rural Ethiopia. The findings show that the net effect of a household's participation in off-farm activities on a child’s schooling was negative. The rationale behind this result is that household participation in off-farm activities increases the demand for child labor, which decreases a child’s time spent in school and studying. Other factors such as household size, the age of the head, farm income, and livestock ownership significantly affected a child’s schooling. A household’s participation in off-farm activities is influenced by the head's age, access to credit, assistance, household size, the mean schooling of a male and female, shocks, and livestock ownership. According to the study, incentivizing households to educate their children rather than substituting child labor for adult labor should be considered. Adoption of labor-saving technologies may encourage children to attend school by decreasing the desire for child labor. By fostering the livestock industry, rural families can be strengthened, and a comprehensive family planning strategy should be considered.