Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford

🎊 The CSAE Conference 2025 call for papers is open! https://lnkd.in/e7s8b9kU #OxCSAE2025 is a three day event with a keynote, panels, and parallel sessions on a series of development economics topics. This conference brings together colleagues from across the development economics community to discuss Africa. 📅 23-25 March 2025, St Catherine's College, Oxford, UK. ⏰ Deadline for submissions with a funding application: 31 July 2024. General deadline (no funding considered): 16 September 2024. ℹ https://lnkd.in/e7s8b9kU Funding speakers We have funding available to support African speakers travelling from Africa to attend the event. Funded speakers are also invited to the Economic Development in Africa Workshop in December 2024, hosted by the University of Pretoria , South Africa. Find out more about our funding: https://lnkd.in/d-uGyHuu Watch our funding video: https://lnkd.in/eMbT8uBC

Do Ethiopian maize farmers know enough about their seeds to optimise fertiliser use? New VoxDev article by the CSAE's Doug Gollin (Department of Economics, University of Oxford and Tufts University), Nils Bohr, Tim Deisemann, Frédéric Kosmowski and Travis Lybbert. 👇 📖 Paper behind the article: 'The Seeds of Misallocation: Fertilizer Use and Maize Varietal Misidentification in Ethiopia' published in the Journal of Development Economics. https://lnkd.in/egn-q4kk

Less than two weeks to go to submit your paper for the CSAE Conference 2025: Economic Development in Africa, #OxCSAE2025! https://lnkd.in/e7s8b9kU Join development economists from around the world to discuss issues relevant to Africa. ⏰ Call for papers deadline: 16 Sept 2024, 23:59 BST 📅 Event dates: 23-25 March 2025, Oxford, UK ℹ Event page: https://lnkd.in/e7s8b9kU 📚 Topic information: https://lnkd.in/eCzSDc8i Aisha Nanyiti (Makerere University) discusses why she attends the CSAE Conference in the clip below. 👇 Watch the full video here: https://lnkd.in/epSPGTtZ

😊 We’re excited to welcome Ousseni Illy, Professor of International Law at the Université Thomas SANKARA, to the CSAE as a visitor. We look forward to working with you, Ousseni. https://lnkd.in/ekykVbW7

Join us for an exploration of research in development economics! Our course offers a rigorous examination of key topics such as economic growth, structural transformation, poverty traps, infrastructure, and the intersection of climate change with development. We combine reduced-form causal evidence with structural models to tackle big-picture questions that have long challenged development economists. This course is ideal for those looking to deepen their understanding of the complexities of economic growth and development. Find out more and register here: https://bit.ly/3ywbFkv #SummerInOxford #OxEconSummerSchool #SeptemberSummerSchool #OUESS #OxfordSummerSchool

🌟 NEW Episode 11 of the CSAE Research #Podcasts is here! 'General Equilibrium Effects of Cash Transfers in Kenya (Frisch Medal Award 2024)'. https://lnkd.in/eSbH73jf 🎙 Dennis Egger speaks to Stefan Dercon (Department of Economics, University of Oxford & Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford) about the research behind the The Econometric Society Frisch Medal Award winning paper. How large economic stimuli generate individual and aggregate responses is a central question in economics but has not been studied experimentally. Working with the NGO GiveDirectly, this project examined the impact of a one-time cash transfers of about USD 1000 to over 10,500 poor households across 653 randomised villages in rural Kenya, on the individual households but also the community at large. 📖 The research paper produced from this project was published in Econometrica and won the Frisch Medal Award 2024. https://lnkd.in/ehs9BPiF ✒ Authors: Dennis Egger (Department of Economics, University of Oxford), Johannes Haushofer (National University of Singapore), Edward Miguel (University of California, Berkeley), Paul Niehaus (UC San Diego) and Michael Walker (University of California, Berkeley).

⭐ NEW What Works Hub for Global Education Working Paper 'Understanding Gaps between Policy and Practice' https://lnkd.in/e5PqrRcR ✒ Noam Angrist (Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford) and Stefan Dercon (Department of Economics, University of Oxford and Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford) Read it here: https://lnkd.in/e5PqrRcR ℹ Abstract: Substantial effort is invested in improving education policy, yet for policy to matter it must be implemented in practice. This article presents new systematic analysis of the gap between #education policy and practice across 50 countries during COVID-19, a time of substantial policy innovation. Researchers find large gaps between policy intent and policy implementation in practice. While “policy-practice gaps” are large in most regions of the world, Latin America is a bright spot, with lessons for other regions. This article further examines two components of the policy-practice gap to help better understand it: naive policy and ineffective service delivery. Researchers find policies are often designed sensibly and are not naive; rather most of the policy-practice gap can be explained by ineffective service delivery. These findings highlight the need to prioritise implementation science in education to close the gap between policy and practice. Researchers also examine settings beyond COVID-19, and find similar patterns in the policy-practice gap. Substantial attention among the education community today is dedicated to policy making, yet minimal attention is paid to policy implementation. These results motivate as much attention on the latter as the former.

How can different kinds of policy help refugees and other displaced populations find work? What are the benefits of running an adaptive targeted field experiment in the context of jobseekers in developing countries? Listen to the research team discussing a project examining the impact of three interventions designed to improve formal employment outcomes for Syrian refugees and for local jobseekers in Jordan, as part of the CSAE Research Podcasts series 🎧https://lnkd.in/epVP-QSn Read the VoxDev article here 👇

What if there was a way to deliver foreign aid that solves three big problems all at once: that humanitarian aid arrives too late; that climate adaptation aid is spent on activities of iffy effectiveness; and that far too little aid runs through local actors? It turns out there is. And we should be doing much more of it. On the Center for Global Development blog Ashley Pople and Stefan Dercon summarise the results of a study into an 'anticipatory cash transfer', which predicts when disaster (in this case, flooding in Bangladesh) will strike and pays out cash to vulnerable households before it happens (link in comments). The results were incredible. I quote here: "Compared to households who did not receive any cash, recipients of anticipatory cash transfers reported that: - They were 52 percent less likely to go a full day without eating during the floods. - Their children were 3.8 percent more likely to consume enough food (three meals or more) three months later... - They had 18.7 percent higher life satisfaction. - They faced a reduction in the loss and damage of livestock, household assets, and crops. - Their earnings potential was higher three months later – an early sign of recovery..." These are really large effects. And they chime with other research into this mechanism. There are a few such schemes around the world now, but they're individually funded, cover a small number of places, a small number of disasters and almost always run through donor-established cash transfer mechanisms. In an accompanying blog (also linked in comments), I set out a better way: instead of lots of little schemes, make one big one and run them through the national cash transfer schemes. Doing this will require some investment, but it has lots of substantial benefits. It would be more efficient and wider in scope, because you pool risk across geographies and disasters, which means you need to sit on less money in total, to cover more disasters. It also makes payouts less unpredictable, because you can model the likelihood of different numbers of triggers being met in a single year and budget accordingly. It would not just localise humanitarian aid, it would contribute to the better running and value of local cash transfer schemes. Creating lists of vulnerable households (including those who don't usually receive the transfer) is really valuable, as we learnt during COVID. And it would be--really effective--climate adaptation spending (a complement to, not a replacement for, investment in public goods and collective action). It allows vulnerable households to respond effectively, however that looks for them. They know that better than we do, and they often do things we don't anticipate when disasters actually hit. Just enable them to act and let them cook. Humanitarian support is one of the most popular parts of foreign aid, but there's lots of scope to make it better, for everyone. This is one way.

Register to join CSAE Director Stefan Dercon for an online public lecture and Q&A on “South Africa’s Gamble on Economic Development and Inclusion, Then and Now". https://lnkd.in/eGeW2wPr 📆 04 December 2024, 5 pm (GMT)/6 pm (SAST) 💻 Register here: https://lnkd.in/eGeW2wPr ℹ As part of this year's CSAE Economic Development in Africa Workshop (https://lnkd.in/drYeJxtg) at the University of Pretoria , we invite you to join us online for Professor Dercon's talk discussing the subtle interplay between elites and development in South Africa, and what it means for growth and development. Building on examples from other countries, Professor Dercon will provide insights and realistic strategies for policymakers and practitioners to challenge as well as work with entrenched power structures for growth and more equitable development outcomes. Speaker information: Stefan Dercon is the Director of the CSAE, University of Oxford, and Professor of Economic Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford and Department of Economics, University of Oxford. Find out more about Professor Dercon here: https://lnkd.in/euN9rbuG