This week we featured research on cash transfers, AI bias, teaching teachers, pollution and more...
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This week we released our VoxDevLit on Electricity Infrastructure. In this VoxDevLit, Senior Editor Robyn Meeks and Co-editor Meera Mahadevan synthesise research on the impacts of electricity infrastructure, covering access, reliability, financial sustainability, appliance adoption, and mini-grid technologies. Watch the launch event and download the VoxDevLit here.
Cash transfers are now part of the policymaker’s toolkit for poverty alleviation. In today's article, Tommaso Crosta, Dean Karlan, Finley Ong, Julius Ruschenpohler and Chris Udry outline evidence from 115 studies in 34 low- and middle-income countries which shows that unconditional cash transfers have robust positive impacts across most key economic and social outcomes: consumption, income, total assets, food security, psychological well-being and children’s education and health.
Every year, developing countries spend considerable resources on training teachers—yet these efforts often prove unfruitful. Juan F. Castro, Paul Glewwe, Alexandra Heredia‐Mayo, Stephanie Majerowicz, and Ricardo Montero present evidence from a large-scale, pedagogy-focused teacher coaching programme in rural Peru, which offers promising results for achieving sustained improvements in students’ educational outcomes and provides valuable insight on evaluating programme impacts in sectors with high turnover.
As artificial intelligence becomes more widely used in talent recruitment, employers must seriously consider the biases these models may introduce in hiring decisions. In a study of five leading large language models, Jiafu An, Difang Huang, Chen Lin, and Mingzhu Tai find that intersectionality, rigorous piloting, and human oversight are necessary to reduce algorithmic bias.
Despite offering attractive conditions for foreign investment, a combination of structural and institutional barriers often prevent developing countries from realising their full potential. In this week’s episode of VoxDevTalks, Yonas Alemu describes the obstacles he overcame to establish a grain-based food producing company in Ethiopia, supporting local farmers and talent in the process.
In Bangladesh, Nina R. Brooks, Debashish Biswas, Sameer Maithel, Grant Miller, Aprajit Mahajan, M. Rofi Uddin, Shoeb Ahmed, Moogdho Mahzab, Mahbubur Rahman, Stephen P. Luby, and Naomi Frim-Abrams show that aligning business owners' profit motives with environmental and health goals can effectively reduce the harm caused by pollution from brick kilns.
Previous research finds that peer-to-peer learning can successfully promote technology adoption, making participatory approaches that emphasise iterative, two-way communication now common in agricultural development. In Tanzania, Violet Lasdun, Aurélie Harou, Chris Magomba, and Davíd Guereña examine whether this peer learning extends to a digital framework and find that it does when users employ the platform, but keeping users engaged remains a key challenge.
In Tuesday’s article, Krzysztof Krakowski and Lucas Ronconi conducted a field experiment outside metro stations in Bueno Aires to study accountability-seeking behaviour. They found that while the threat of sanctions was more effective at reducing fare evasion, appealing to social norms had a more meaningful effect on civic engagement.
Elsewhere in development:
- Make sure to check out J-PAL's Evidence Effect page and accompanying blog series which share what they have learned about improving the lives and livelihoods of people who are experiencing poverty.
- Ken Opalo has written about how to electrify Africa for economic growth and development.
- Ken Opalo also joined the High Energy Planet podcast with Katie Auth & Rose Mutiso to discuss why growth must be at the centre of Africa's future.
- Han Sheng Chia and Markus Goldstein discuss how organisations can cut through the noise to identify smart bets in AI applications for development.
- An initiative called Project Resource Optimization has been launched to try to find philanthropic capital to preserve the most cost effective and life-saving USAID programs.
- Advanced Research for Climate Emergencies (ARC) funds cutting-edge research and strategic partnerships to predict, prevent, and prepare for catastrophic climate risks.