Substantial upward economic mobility in the majority of countries in Europe and Central Asia in the 2000s translated into achievements in reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity. Although factors associated with upward mobility vary significantly by country, education and jobs...

During the early 2000s, Moldova experienced strong economic growth and poverty and inequality reductions. This paper aims at uncovering the patterns behind these poverty trends by looking at economic mobility and its associated factors in Moldova. The findings build on the synthetic panel...

International migration has increased rapidly in recent decades and this has been accompanied by a remarkable increase in transfers made by migrants to their home countries. This paper investigates the effect of the rural economic growth brought about by migration and remittances on Nepal's...

This paper estimates the impact of the 2008 food price spike and the 2009 contraction in global growth on undernourishment rates. The analysis is based on a methodology that uses a calorie-income relationship and income distribution data. The authors find that the 2008 global food price spike...

Using nationally representative household survey data from five countries -- three from South Asia (Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nepal) and two from Sub-Saharan Africa (Tanzania and Uganda) -- this paper conducts a systematic assessment of the correlation between various measures of household food...

The 2008"food price crisis"and more recent spikes in food prices have led to a greater focus on policies and programs to cushion their impact on poverty and malnutrition. Estimating the income elasticity of micro-nutrients and assessing how they change during such crises is an important part of...

This paper assesses inequality of opportunity in educational achievement using the Human Opportunity Index methodology on data from the Programme for International Student Assessment. The findings suggest that there are large inequalities in learning outcomes as measured by demonstrated...

Do household consumption-smoothing strategies in poor countries entail significant long-run costs in terms of reduced human capital? This paper exploits the timing of monsoon rainfall shocks and the seasonal nature of agriculture to isolate income effects on early childhood anthropometric...