Many population, health and nutrition (PHN) programs are designed to elicit behaviour changes in poor people living at the geographic and social peripheries. Few programs specifically target the disadvantaged, however, and research about clients focuses mainly on routine statistics rather than...

The author examines the role of different data collection methods--including the types of data they produce--in the analysis of social phenomena in developing countries. He points out that one confusing factor in the"quantitative-qualitative"debate is that a distinction is not clearly made...

Little of the literature on nutrition between 1960 and the 1980s included assessments of effective nutrition programs. In this important study, the author focuses on factors associated with successful nutrition programs in Africa. This report concentrates on summarizing the information received...

Market-oriented reforms of infrastructure in developing countries tend to focus primarily on commercially viable services in urban areas. Nevertheless, an increasing number of countries are beginning to experiment with extending the market paradigm to infrastructure services in rural areas that...

This paper shows empirically that"privatization"in the energy, telecommunications, and water sectors, and the introduction of independent regulators in those sectors, have not always had the expected effects on access, affordability, or quality of services. It also shows that corruption leads to...

Following the 1996 Peace Accords, Guatemala embarked on a major program of infrastructure reform involving the restructuring and privatization of the electricity and telecommunications sectors and a substantial increase in infrastructure investments partially financed by privatization proceeds....

This note provides a snapshot as of 2004 of the share of countries with an independent regulatory agency and with at least some private sector financing of its sectoral investment needs for electricity, water and sanitation, and telecommunications. Among other things, they show that: For...

The proliferation of mobile phones in developing countries has generated a wave of interest in collecting high-frequency socioeconomic surveys using this technology. This paper considers lessons from one such survey effort in a difficult environment -- the South Sudan Experimental Phone Survey,...

Studies on innovation and international trade have traditionally focused on manufacturing because neither was seen as important for services. Moreover, the few existing studies on services focus only on industrial countries, although in many developing countries services are already the largest...

This paper analyzes the recent evolution and impact of the global economic crisis on the offshore services industry. Using a global value chains framework, the authors classify the offshore services sector in a comprehensive set of general and industry-specific activities that correspond to...