This week we featured research on peacebuilding, natural resources, discrimination and more...
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We are excited to announce that our new Deputy Managing Editor, Emaan Siddique, started this week! On Tuesday, we also announced our forthcoming VoxDevLit on Foreign Direct Investment. Join us for the launch event of this Lit next Wednesday (February 12th). During this one hour webinar, Stefania Garetto, Nina Pavcnik, and Natalia Ramondo will outline the policy takeaways from economic research on the impacts of FDI and MNEs in low- and middle-income countries. Register here.
On Monday, Stefania Lovo and Sam Rawlings presented evidence on how e-waste dumping is contributing to child mortality in Ghana and Nigeria. This impacts child health through multiple channels including water contamination, food contamination, and air pollution. Specifically, they find a 10-percentage-point rise in mortality rates for children living in proximity to these dumpsites.
How can natural resource tax revenues fuel local economic development? On Tuesday, Antonella Bancalari and Juan Pablo Rud showed how these revenues, primarily from mining, have had a host of economic benefits in non-extractive areas in Peru.
Service workers are often evaluated based on customer interactions, with performance frequently measured by overall sales. In today’s article, Erin Kelley, Gregory Lane, Matthew Pecenco, and Edward Rubin explore how women in the service industry are negatively impacted by customer bias in sub-Saharan Africa.
Which policies can effectively rebuild communities and create a lasting peace? In this week’s episode of VoxDevTalks, Salma Mousa and Lisa Hultman discuss what happens post-conflict: peace-making, peacebuilding, and reconstruction. Mousa speaks to the importance of defining a conflict-specific research agenda in generating policy-relevant findings on conflict and peacebuilding.
Mobile connectivity improves access to land, enabling individuals to use land titles as collateral for bank credit and invest in construction. Angelo D'Andrea, Patrick Hitayezu, Kangni Kpodar, Nicola Limodio, and Andrea Presbitero examine the conditions under which the combination of technology and property rights broadens the range of financial products available to individuals, thereby enhancing access to credit and fostering investment.
Here is what we've been reading on USAID:
- Ken Opalo writes about the reasons behind, and potential impacts of, American aid cuts/disruptions.
- CGDEV have a collection of resources on Trump's aid and development policies, including Charles Kenny's message to Marco Rubio, and Rachel Bonnifield and Justin Sandefur pushing back on misinformation.
- Jishnu Das wrote about the costs of lost trust in the US.
There has been lots of related thinking on this developing story:
- Bård Vegar Solhjell and Håvard Mokleiv Nygård on Devex about why now is the time to prioritise evidence in aid spending.
- Samantha Power makes the case for USAID to an American audience on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.
- Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg and Michele Ruta write about the trade shirts redefining economic development.
- ODI have summarised the Donors in a Post-Aid World (dPAW) platform from ODI Global.
In other recent releases related to development economics:
- Rohini Pande discussed Voluntary Carbon Markets on Ideas for India's YouTube.
- Oliver Kim discusses how exchange rates actually work.
- Vivian Bronsoler Nurko outlines insights from a new learning methodology on fostering change via IGC.
- Tristan Reed discusses whether there is a way to do industrial policy without strong institutions.