Dorothy Pyatt Postgraduate Research Grants 2024-2025

The paradox of high human development with persistently high poverty and inequality in Mongolia

 In spite of its high human development index of 0.741 in 2022, Mongolia continues to have persistently high poverty and socio-economic inequality. To address this question, this study uses the lens of multidimensional well-being to explore the principal factors contributing to the stagnation of poverty and continued inequality in Mongolia over the past decade. The well-being framework draws upon Amartya Sen's capability approach and seeks to provide a comprehensive analysis of Mongolia's socio-economic landscape and identifies the reasons for persistently high poverty and inequality, evaluates government policies aimed at enhancing well-being, and assesses human well-being of the Mongolian people on five dimensions such as governance, ecology, culture, health (both physical and emotional), education, and standard of living, in both the urban and rural areas. A review of the literature outlines how the concept of development has evolved from purely economic measures to a broader understanding of human well-being incorporating various dimensions of quality of life. This research aims to provide actionable recommendations for policy interventions to promote equitable and sustainable economic growth. This is done by analysing quantitative and qualitative data collected by the researcher in a mixed-methods study in six selected areas of the country. These areas are characterised respectively by high poverty, low poverty, dzud (extremely harsh climate) and drought. The quantitative enquiry, in the form of a structured, survey comprising between 200 and 300 respondents distributed equally among the six selected areas. The survey includes a multi-domain survey of well-being. The qualitative enquiry, in the form of face-to-face, in-depth interviews comprise of 60 (ten in each site) in-depth interviews in all the six selected areas. The findings are expected to highlight the complex interplay of economic development, environmental sustainability, and social equity and to propose strategies for leveraging Mongolia’s human development achievements to address ongoing socio-economic and environmental challenges. 

Munkhzul Chimid-Ochir (2025)

Investigating Wellbeing and Development Outcomes of Labour Migration through the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility Scheme. 

The Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme allows for labour migrants from nine Pacific countries and Timor-Leste to live and work in Australia on temporary visas. The number of participants has increased six-fold since 2020, reaching over 30,000 in March 2024. Analytical reports of the macro-level quantitative economic benefits generated by labour migrants’ remittances under the scheme reinforces the credentials of labour migration as a development-oriented activity. However, this is at odds with consistent coverage (in both academic and grey literature) of labour migrants’ experiences in Australia, living with exploitation, harassment, bullying, and transnational separation from their families. 

This project will bring a multidimensional and multidisciplinary approach to analysing the outcomes of the PALM scheme to reconcile these two contrasting claims through a theoretical framework centred on wellbeing, development, and labour migration. This project will analyse wellbeing outcomes for labour migrants and their households from Vanuatu, building upon previous research in Timor-Leste. Comparative analysis of wellbeing outcomes between participating and non-participating households will be complemented by a novel investigation into secondary data sources. This investigation will include analysis of the Australian Bureau of Statistics' Person Level Integrated Data Asset, as well as Household Income and Expenditure Surveys and Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys from Vanuatu. These methods will answer the key research question of whether the scheme is delivering on its primary goal of international development for Vanuatu and other participating countries. The money from the Dorothy Pyatt Award enabled research in places across South Australia, New South Wales, and Queensland, conducting face-to-face qualitative interviews with labour migrants currently living and working in Australia. 

Hogan, C., 2026. Temporary labour migration: Addressing issues of agency and isolation. Population, Space and Place, 30(1), e2729.

Christopher Hogan (2025)

Rural land consolidation and migration in the processes of urban-rural integration and rural revitalization in China 

With the gradual expansion of urbanization in China, massive rural-urban migration has contributed to the decline of the countryside, and hence the emergence of policies to address this. China released the Rural Revitalization Strategy in 2017 to achieve sustainable rural development in a win-win manner between urban and rural areas. The Strategy aims to promote modernization and comprehensive development of rural areas. Urban-rural integration is the core goal, in which land consolidation and rural migration play a crucial role. However, there is still a large gap in understanding the relationship between land consolidation and rural population migration, and there is a lack of theoretical support and evidence on how land consolidation affects people's migration decisions. 

Using mixed methods, this study aims to investigate how land consolidation will affect rural people's migration decisions in the context of China's rural revitalization strategy. This study will be carried out in three regions with different economic development: agricultural-dominated area (county-level); industrial-dominated area (prefecture-level city); metropolitan area (sub-provincial) in Shandong Province, eastern China. It will target at least 600 valid questionnaires to be collected from rural residents. In addition, various qualitative data collection techniques will be employed, such as key informant interviews, and focus group discussions with villagers. The main part of the research project is the fieldwork, which will be carried out in Shandong, where there has been a large outflow of rural population. Shandong is an ideal case study well representative of the characteristics of development – high rural-urban migration, commercial agriculture and China’s biggest concentration of land consolidation and farm mechanisation. Therefore, Shandong has a certain representativeness in the eastern part of China and has high research value. Rural revitalization is a new strategy. To date studies have explored its connection with population migration and land consolidation, but they have mainly focused on theoretical analysis and large-scale quantitative research. There is a lack of evidence on how specific policies are implemented, how residents view these measures, and how these strategies affect residents' decision-making. 

Feng, Z., Robinson, G.M. and Tan, Y., 2025. Rural revitalization in China: Reversing rural decline and eliminating poverty. Geography Compass, 19(7), e70039. 

Zhongqi Feng (2024)