This paper examines women's power relative to that of their husbands in 23 Sub-Saharan African countries to determine how it affects women's health, reproductive outcomes, children's health, and children's education. The analysis uses a novel measure of women's empowerment that is closely linked...

Trees on farms are often overlooked in agricultural and natural resource research and policy in Sub-Saharan Africa. This paper addresses this gap using data from the Living Standards Measurement Study?Integrated Surveys on Agriculture in five countries: Ethiopia, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania, and...

Recent research suggests that isolation from regional and international markets has contributed significantly to poverty in many Sub-Saharan African countries. Numerous empirical studies identify poor transport infrastructure and border restrictions as significant deterrents to trade expansion....

Intra-household inequalities have long been a source of concern for policy design, but there is very little evidence. The current practice of ignoring inequality within households could lead to an underestimation of both overall inequality and poverty levels, as well as to the misclassification...

This paper uses unique data collected in rural Pakistan to assess the extent to which consanguinity, which is widespread in North Africa, Central and West Asia, and most parts of South Asia, is linked to child cognitive ability and nutritional status. As economic benefits of marrying cousins may...

This paper studies the effect of rolling out mobile money agents in rural Northern Uganda. In a randomized experiment, 168 areas were randomly selected to receive an agent in 2017, with another 163 areas serving as a control group. Administrative data on mobile money transactions suggest that...

This study conducted a randomized control trial in rural Burkina Faso to estimate the impact of alternative cash transfer delivery mechanisms on education, health, and household welfare outcomes. The two-year pilot program randomly distributed cash transfers that were either conditional or...

This paper evaluates the impact of access to credit from banks and other financial institutions on household welfare in Mauritania. Micro-level data from a 2014 household survey are used to evaluate the relationship between credit access, a range of household characteristics, and welfare...

Policy makers in developing countries, including India, are increasingly sensitive to the links between spatial transformation and economic development. However, the empirical knowledge available on those links is most often insufficient to guide policy decisions. There is no shortage of case...