Notes from the Field: Comparing Three Villages in Madhya Pradesh
I was in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh recently. Madhya Pradesh, or MP, as most Indians know it – is a big state in the middle of the country. It also has some of the poorest human development...
View ArticleToo little knowledge is a dangerous thing
Stefan Dercon’s wordle based on our data of the countries that economists work on led Chris Blattman and Tyler Cowen to wonder why there are more papers on Latin America relative to Africa in the...
View ArticleAre Non-Cognitive Gains in Education More Important than Test-Scores?
Most educational interventions are widely considered successful if they increase test-scores -- which indicate cognitive ability. Presumably, this is because higher test-scores in school imply gains...
View ArticleWho's listening to the "knowledge bank"?
We now know quite a lot about the supply of research on development, and about the part the World Bank plays. We know that the World Bank publishes a lot, that most research in the world is by...
View ArticleLife in a School
We usually think of schooling as a positive learning experience. However, sometimes this is not always the case. As recent news reports in the Hindu and on NDTV from India remind us, unfortunately for...
View ArticlePoor by (revealed) choice: A neophyte’s guide to Martin Ravallion’s proposal...
(based on discussions with Chico Ferreira, Ambar Narayan, Carolina Sanchez and especially, Aaditya Mattoo) This is part I of a three-part series.
View ArticlePoor by (revealed) choice Parts II and III: implications and critique
This follows on part I posted earlier today – we choose to split the post into two because of length. Part 2: What does Martin’s proposal imply?
View ArticleImproving access to drugs: Fitting the solution to the problem
Patricio Marquez’s post correctly identifies lack of access to quality medicines as one of the constraints to poor people’s health in Africa. But the solutions he recommends—more public money...
View ArticleUser fees and abuser fees
If user fees for health have been so vilified (including in comments on this blog), why are we bringing the subject up again? Because new evidence calls into question the prevailing view, namely that...
View ArticleA Data Guide to Sir Michael Barber’s “The Good News from Pakistan”
Shanta’s blog reported on Sir Michael Barber’s approach to implementing service delivery or “Deliverology”. Sir Michael was back at the World Bank on June 6th to present “The Good News from Pakistan”,...
View ArticlePrimarily Small: The Private Health Care of the Poor
Members of the Kenya Patient Safety Impact Evaluation team with Joseph Karisa, owner of Bamba Medical Clinic, Kilifi, Kenya. Photo credit: Jorge Coarasa
View ArticleIndia’s informal doctors are assets not crooks
This article was originally published on SciDev.Net. Read the original article. Most of us would agree that when it comes to healthcare providers, some training is better than none. Yet even this...
View ArticleOf quacks and crooks: The conundrum of informal health care in India
I usually don’t wake up to hate mail in my inbox. What prompted this deluge is a recent paper that evaluates the impact of a training program for informal health care providers (providers without any...
View ArticleSmart containment: How low-income countries can tailor their COVID-19 response
A policy of “smart containment” can work, if accompanied by considerable policy flexibility and intense data support.
View ArticleLearning trajectories through primary school: Lessons from a low-income setting
Learning trajectories through primary school: Lessons from a low-income setting
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