This week we featured research on cash transfers, anti-migrant sentiment, teacher reform & more...
Sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter and updates on our upcoming VoxDevLit launch events straight to your inbox.
We released two fascinating podcasts this week. In Tuesday's episode of VoxDevTalks, Ugo Gentilini discussed his new book on the history of cash transfers. On Thursday, Tim Phillips spoke to Marianne Bertrand and Stefano Caria about the huge potential of signalling interventions.
In agriculture, mobile-based extension programmes hold significant promise for disseminating information about modern inputs and management practices to millions of smallholder farmers who would otherwise be difficult to reach through in-person visits. In today's article, Raissa Fabregas and Michael Kremer evaluate six different text-message-based agricultural extension programmes that collectively reached over 128,000 farmers in Kenya and Rwanda.
Teacher quality is widely recognised as a key determinant of student learning. The methods by which teachers are recruited, selected, and retained are of significant interest to policymakers seeking to improve student outcomes. On Tuesday, Matias Busso, Sebastian Montano, Juan Muñoz-Morales and Nolan Pope outline how student outcomes suffered as a result of a merit-based teacher hiring reform.
Despite its potential, most individuals never manage to successfully obtain online work, particularly in developing countries. A key question is whether people already have the technical skills needed to compete on online platforms, but need help learning how to get onto such platforms and get contracts, or whether they also need more extensive training on technical skills. Maria Victoria Fazio, Richard Freund and Rafael Novella explore this question in the context of El Salvador.
Understanding how host societies perceive and respond to large influxes of migrants is crucial for fostering social cohesion and guiding effective integration policies. On Wednesday, Jeremy Lebow, Jonathan Moreno-Medina, Salma Mousa and Horacio Coral outlined why anti-migrant sentiment in Latin America may be a national-level phenomenon, driven by national narratives rather than based on local experiences with migrants.
An unresolved policy question is whether support in the form of grants should be flexible (“cash grant”) and its exact use left to the discretion of the beneficiary or whether it should be earmarked and accompanied by strict procurement rules and possibly an own contribution (“matching grant”). In Monday's article, Michael Grimm, Sidiki Soubeiga and Michael Weber outline their research on whether cash grants or earmarked grants are better for supporting firms in Burkina Faso.
Malnutrition has been well-established as a cause of long-term physiological harm and has been strongly associated with impaired cognitive development, lower academic achievement, and behavioural issues in children. Yesterday, Mehreen Mookerjee, Manini Ojha and Sanket Roy outline evidence from India showing contraception plays a vital role in reducing child malnutrition, potentially by enabling parents to invest more resources in each child.
Make sure to check out ReCIPE's new website (CEPR's new research programme on Reducing Conflict and Improving Performance in the Economic), with details on their first annual conference in February.
Elsewhere, there was lots of interesting reading:
- David Cutler and Edward Glaeser wrote about the mysteries of cities and economic growth.
- There were more super interesting job market blogs on Development Impact: Breaking the Cycle of Violence by Francisco Eslava, Agricultural mechanization by Steven Brownstone, Winners and losers in the gig economy by Pascuel Plotkin & Unpacking the impact of NGOs on development by Sarah Shaukat.
- Oliver Kim wrote about the potted history of what we call poor countries.
- Arianna Legovini and Samuel Fraiberger outlined learnings from a panel on using generative AI for development impact.
- On the GiveWell blog, read why they have re-evaluated the impact of cash transfers.
Two great podcasts:
- Saad Gulzar discussed how bureaucrats can fix South Asia’s winter pollution problem.
- Dennis Egger joined Money & Macro Talks to talk about basic income in Africa.
Plus the following announcements:
- FCDO invites you to an early market engagement session for the Evidence on Evidence Use Programme, which aims to enhance understanding of the use of evidence in policymaking. Sign up here.
- USAID launches new collaboration with leading evidence organizations to improve Agency cost-effectiveness.
- J-PAL x FID: Opportunités de financement pour les chercheurs africains - starting soon today!
- Innovations for Poverty Action are hiring a Country Director for Zambia.
We will be back on Monday with a full week of content on sustainable urbanisation, menstrual stigma and more!