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VoxDev Development Economics

VoxDev.org

Hear about the cutting edge of development economics from research to practice.

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36:33

S6 Ep38: Understanding and tackling school bullying

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/09/24

When children are victims of bullying or social exclusion at school, it can be devastating for every part of their lives. This is a global problem, but with a global solution: if we can teach kids about empathy, self-control, or the effects of their violent behaviour, it can reduce bullying. How well do these policies work, and can they be scaled up successfully? JPAL is about to publish a policy insight on this topic, bringing together the research and summarising what we know. Sule Alan of

29:44

S6 Ep37: The macroeconomics of climate change

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/09/17

Macroeconomists know that our economic activity influences – and is influenced by – the natural environment in which it is embedded, but we have learned that modelling those effects is far from easy. The scientific consensus around climate change is strong, but there’s not similar agreement over appropriate economic policies to deal with it. On the eve of COP 30, a new review of macroeconomics and climate shows how far we have come but also points out where the gaps in our knowledge are.Adrien

25:41

S6 Ep36: Culture and economic development

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/09/10

How does culture affect development policy, and how does development policy affect culture? If we don’t take account of cultural norms or fail to learn about how they interact with well-intentioned polices, then this gap in our knowledge may be undermining development projects. Can better measurement and collaboration with other social sciences fill these gaps? A new paper investigates what we know about the culture, policy, and economic development, and Natalie Bau of UCLA, Sara Lowes of UC San

37:49

S6 Ep35: Conflict and development

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/09/03

With record levels of armed conflict around the world in recent years, the study of conflict has gone from being a niche corner of economics into a thriving discipline that learns from, and interacts with, development economics. Rigorous empirical research on conflict is, however, relatively recent. The Reducing Conflict and Improving Performance in the Economy (ReCIPE) programme aims to provide a better understanding of the links between conflicts, economic growth, and public policies. this week

30:20

S6 Ep34: Food policy: Lessons and priorities for a...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/08/27

In 2025, the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) is 50 years old. “Lessons and Priorities for a Changing World”, its 2025 Global Food Policy Report, runs to just under 600 pages and covers the last five decades of progress in improving the world’s food systems – but also the challenges that remain, and the need for policy to keep evolving if we are going to build sustainable, healthy food systems. Johan Swinnen and Purnima Menon of IFPRI talk to Tim Phillips about the importance

31:10

S6 Ep33: The development bogeyman? Understanding the...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/08/20

What happens from the moment goods are manufactured or harvested, until they are bought by consumers? As we know from experience, most of the things we consume reach us having been bought and sold, sometimes many times, by intermediaries – most of us don’t order a phone from the factory. Many interventions designed to increase the welfare of consumers in developing economies are designed to shorten these supply chains by cutting out those traders in the middle. But what happens when you do that in

24:36

S6 Ep32: Contraception without prejudice: Reducing...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/08/13

Like all of us, healthcare providers bring their biases to work. But if those biases result in a reduced level of care for their patients, how can we correct them? An innovative experiment in three very different countries attempted to reduce bias in contraceptive care for women. Zachary Wagner of USC and Manisha Shah of UC Berkeley were two of a multidisciplinary team that implemented program and evaluated the results. They talk to Tim Phillips about how biases shape contraceptive care, the

23:32

S6 Ep31: Partnering with business for development...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/31

In the second of our two podcasts with Francis Annan of UC Berkeley on his research on mobile money first in Ghana, then beyond, Tim Phillips discusses how he worked with commercial providers, not just to set up the RCTs designed to investigate the extent and reduce financial fraud, but to ensure that the insights could be scaled up. While contacting sceptical commercial providers can often meet with little or no response, he says, the ability to frame research in a way that makes them realise the

31:40

S6 Ep30: Mobile money in Ghana

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/29

How can we design digital financial inclusion that minimizes fraud and maximises the benefit to the community in rural, low-trust, or cash-heavy economies? That’s the question posed by three studies of how mobile money works, or sometimes does not work, in Ghana’s villages. The author of those three studies: Francis Annan of Berkeley.In part one of a two-part VoxDev Talks special, Tim Phillips talks to Francis about this research, which has been a big part of his working life since he was a

35:22

S6 Ep29: The economics of period poverty

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/23

Stigma, shame and social norms around menstruation can prevent women and girls managing their periods with dignity and hygiene in low-income settings. So how can we provide information, influence those norms, and change behaviour to improve women’s health and well-being? Silvia Castro of LMU Munich and Kristina Czura of University of Groningen have conducted extensive field research in Bangladesh and other countries. They tell Tim Phillips how we can reduce the stigma and taboo around menstruation

24:23

S6 Ep28: Can storytelling reduce violence against...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/16

There is a long history of using “edutainment” – mass media storytelling, to pass on information about important social issues, and even to try to change behaviour. But does this work, and in what circumstances can it help? Amber Peterman of UNICEF has just published a review of what we know about edutainment’s power to reduce violence against women and children. She talks to Tim Phillips about its track record in changing attitudes to problems such as FGM and child marriage, and the potential of

29:27

S6 Ep27: Why “brain drain” is an incomplete story of...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/09

Many developed countries are creating immigration policies designed specifically to attract the most talented migrants. We often assume that when those skilled and educated citizens migrate from low-income countries in search of high-paying opportunities, it causes a “brain drain” in their home countries, delaying or hobbling development. A new article in the journal Science puts that assumption to the test and finds that there is also the possibility of a brain gain at home, as investments in

20:40

S6 Ep26: Minibuses, major gains: Rethinking urban...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/03

In the second of our special episodes recorded at the 5th annual STEG conference, Lucas Conwell of UCL talks to Tim Phillips about how the private minibus networks, such a distinctive feature of urban transit in developing country cities, can improve their service when there is little room for public investment or regulation. If you have ever tried them, they can seem chaotic, but would require large or small policy tweaks to make them work efficiently, and what would those tweaks be? Lucas has

15:02

S6 Ep25: Gas flaring threatens agriculture and...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/07/01

This week on VoxDev talks we have two special episodes recorded at the 5th annual STEG conference. STEG is a research initiative that aims to provide a better understanding of structural change, productivity, and growth in low- and middle-income countries. For many economies in the Global South, fossil fuel extraction has been both a blessing and a curse. Nowhere more so than Nigeria, where oil production generates huge revenues, but also creates an environmental and social burden for the people

28:02

S6 Ep24: Going for economic growth: Lessons from...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/06/25

In October 2024, Prabowo Subianto became president of Indonesia. He inherits the “Golden Indonesia” vision: By the time the country celebrates 100 years of independence in 2045, it aims to be one of the five largest economies in the world. But if Indonesia remains dependent on commodity exports like palm oil, coal, natural gas, and rubber, does it risk getting stuck in the “middle income trap” – too wealthy to compete with low-wage nations, but without the human capital or technology to become a

33:59

S5 Ep6: Development Dialogues: What is the role of...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/06/18

In the latest episode of the collaboration between Yale’s Economic Growth Center and VoxDev, host Catherine Cheney discusses one of Africa’s most persistent development challenges: the low productivity of smallholder farmers. Despite decades of investment, innovation, and policy reform, yields on African small farms remain significantly below those in high-income countries. While the limitations of smallholder models, that doesn’t mean that the problem is easy to solve, not least because the way

30:15

S6 Ep23: Why we need to invest in foundational learning

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/06/11

It was almost business as usual at the Education World Forum in London last month. At the world’s largest annual gathering of education and skills ministers, this year’s theme was & "Building stronger, bolder, better education together." But the context was far from routine. The conference took place against a backdrop of global funding cuts to education programmes—the Institute for Economics and Peace estimates that more than 35 million children around the world depend on foreign aid for their

23:59

S6 Ep22: Understanding Brazil’s falling income...

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/06/04

From Brazil, we bring good news for poverty reduction: Brazil’s formerly sky-high wageinequality is not quite so sky-high anymore. From 1995 to 2015 Brazil became a more equal society, a trend that contrasts with rising inequality during that time in high-income countries. A soon-to-be-published article in the Journal of Economic Literature reviews the research that estimates the reduction, discovers the factors that have contributed to it and the mechanisms that have driven it. Alysson Portella of

35:51

S6 Ep21: Can economists shape the future of AI?

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/05/28

AI’s boosters claim that it is going to revolutionize growth in the developing world. Thesceptics, many of whom are economists, point to a thin evidence base and the risk of unintended consequences. This is not an easy question to research, not least because the underlying technologies are literally changing by the day, while the pace of academic research is often measured in years. One of those researchers is David Yanagizawa-Drott of the University of Zurich. We spoke to him about his hopes and

18:36

S6 Ep20: How does social media influence conflict?

VoxDev Development Economics ·

2025/05/21

The Reducing Conflict and Improving Performance in the Economy (ReCIPE) programmewas established in April 2024 as a CEPR research initiative to provide a better understanding of the links between conflict, economic growth, and public policies. One of its themes is the link between conflict and hate speech, social media use, media bias, and propaganda. We need to know more about how media has influenced violence, xenophobia, and recruitment for armed groups. Also, how we can use media sentiment to

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