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Blog post
Not by growth alone: The salience of redistribution in poverty eradication
Recent studies posit that the per capita incomes of developing countries are at last on track to catch up to those of industrialised countries as policies and institutions in these countries are converging to those of the rich world. In this post, Enevoldsen and Pande contend that this country-level catch-up will not be sufficient to eradicate extreme poverty, as the...
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Blog post
India’s rising unpaid care crisis: Prioritising social protection investments for inclusive economic growth
With India performing dismally in the domain of care work, and the pandemic having worsened the care crisis due to school and child care centre closures, along with mounting domestic work, it is imperative for policy responses to recognise and address the disproportionate burden of care on women. Low female labour force participation rates are a direct manifestation of this...
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Blog post
Increasing COVID-19 vaccine acceptance: Evidence from Mozambique
The COVID-19 pandemic has heavily impacted low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) with widespread food insecurity and falling living standards. To fully recover, countries will need not only an effective rollout of COVID-19 vaccinations, but also significant public trust and acceptance to ensure that they are taken up. In Mozambique, we conducted a study on how the...
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Blog post
Timeliness and coverage of child vaccinations across India
Despite free vaccinations for children below 12 years of age under the Universal Immunisation Programme, one-third of global child deaths due to vaccine-preventable diseases occur in India. In this article, Debnath and Chaudhuri use nationally representative data from 2005-06 and 2015-16, to examine the timeliness and coverage of routine immunisation in the country....
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Blog post
Building a strong evidence base for policymaking and action in cities
The IGC hosted the event "Building a Strong Evidence-base for Policy Making and Action in Cities", the first of three events in support of the call to action on sustainable urbanisation in the Commonwealth, developed jointly by the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the Commonwealth Association of Architects, the Commonwealth Association of Planners, and the...
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Blog post
Intermediate cites and climate action: Driving change through urban land use and governance
In the first blog of this two-part series, it was argued that especially in low-income settings, intermediate cities, through strong rural-urban linkages, can provide an important social safety net in addition to their potential to alleviate poverty in the long-term. Moreover, and although largely undervalued by the international community and countries, intermediate cities...
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Blog post
Intermediate cities: A missing piece in the climate change puzzle
Research and debate on climate change currently underestimate the importance of a key group of players: intermediate cities. Currently conversation and studies on climate change often centre on large and relatively wealthy capital cities. Their size in population, data availability and comparatively higher energy use per person are factors that draw attention. In...
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Blog post
Environmental judicial activism: Bridging gaps in Pakistan’s environmental protection strategy
In low-income countries, the role of the judiciary in mitigating the effects of climate change often faces significant hurdles in resources, capacity, and political will. In Pakistan, however, the establishment of several judicial commissions are tackling these challenges by supporting climate research, developing proactive approaches to climate issues, and creating...
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Blog post
The growing concerns around vaccine hesitancy in India
Vaccine hesitancy will prolong the return to normalcy, and abysmal figures such as a mere 10% having been fully vaccinated in India by early August of this year, are a wakeup call for policymakers and healthcare administrators. Health workers face stiff resistance from people who believe that vaccines cause impotence, lack of trust in vaccine efficacy, serious side...
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Blog post
Can consumer incentive schemes enhance VAT revenue collections in developing countries?
There has been a resurgence in the adoption of consumer incentive schemes within the realm of revenue collection in recent years, due in part to technological advancement, digitisation of records, and the rise in digital payment platforms such as mobile money. These schemes can help address evasive practices that some retail firms currently engage in. Their success however,...
Blog post
Diversifying economics: Resources for Black and other underrepresented minorities
This post has been updated recently on 14 October 2021. Over 2011-2017, the top 20 economic departments in the US awarded PhDs to only 15 Black students. In 2017, only 0.6% of the doctorates in economics and 2% of the undergraduate degrees in economics awarded in the US went to Black women. The Institute for Fiscal Studies recently found that Black economists in the UK...