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Agrimonitor Agricultural Policy Indicators: Total Support Estimate (TSE) 2023
No full textGovernments across the world utilize agricultural policies to intervene in their respective agricultural sectors. This infographic displays the level of total support offered to the agricultural sector, encompassing support for individual producers, the agricultural industry overall, and consumers. The Total Support Estimate (TSE) serves as the indicator, represented as a percentage of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of each country
How Accurately are Household Surveys Measuring the Size and Inequalities for the LGBT Population in Bogota, Colombia? Evidence from a List Experiment
Get PDFThis paper studies whether household surveys precisely identify the LGBT population and are suitable to measure labor market discrimination in Colombia. We first quantify the size of the LGBT population and estimate labor market inequalities from these data, highlighting potential pitfalls from using this approach. We then present findings from a list experiment in Bogotá, Colombia. Results show that household surveys underestimate the size of the LGBT population and may yield biased estimates of labor market inequalities. While survey estimates range between 1-4%, we find that LGBT people constitutes around 12-22% of the total population. We find heterogeneous reporting by sex, age groups, educational attainment, and marital status. Our findings suggest that while current measurement practices are a step forward for the LGBT populations statistical visibility, additional steps are required before household surveys may be used to consistently estimate discrimination and guide policy responses to protect this population
Ability Grouping and Student Performance: Experimental Evidence from Middle Schools in Mexico
Get PDFThis article relies on a large-scale field experiment in Mexico to measure the effects of two ability-grouping models (tracking and heterogeneous/bimodal groups) on student learning outcomes during middle school. Both strategies yielded an average learning gain of 0.08 of a standard deviation. We find larger and more persistent effects among initially high-achieving students and no significant effects among low achievers. Students in top tracking enjoyed multiple advantages, particularly a concentration of high-performing peers and a very homogeneous classroom, that facilitated the teacher\u27s work and increased students\u27 effort levels. Bimodal classes fostered greater effort levels among top students, while teachers induced less competition and allocated more time to practice and feedback activities, to the detriment of lecture time. Our results support the allocation of students to homogeneous classes to maximize performance gains among top students without hurting low achievers. Fostering inclusive learning among weaker students would require complementary investments under both models
Drones in Construction: Unpacking the Value that Drone Technologies Bring to the Construction Sector Across Latin America
No full textThe use of drone technology in capital projects is an emerging area that holds promise for growth. Drones are becoming more widely available, and regulatory bodies are gradually allowing their use on a larger scale. With the development of software solutions that can effectively utilize data, drones are increasingly being used throughout the entire lifecycle of capital projects, including smaller infrastructure projects. The benefits of using drones in construction projects are numerous and include providing an unparalleled record of all activities, reducing planning and survey costs, increasing productivity, improving the accuracy of volumetric measurements, and mitigating disputes over the project\u27s status. In the future, drone data will be integrated with CAD and BIM models and artificial intelligence (AI) to track construction progress and adherence to design automatically. While the construction industry has been slower in adopting new digital technologies than other sectors, leading global companies have widely adopted drones for capital project monitoring. In Latin America, drone adoption in the infrastructure sector is still limited, but early adopters have validated and are utilizing the technology. This report provides an examination of the current state of drone use in the Latin American region, including the benefits, barriers, early adopters, and what is required to promote its adoption
Migration, Integration, and Diaspora Engagement in the Caribbean: A Policy Review
No full textMigration has long been part of Caribbean nations reality. Often discussed in the context of emigration to North America and Europe, movements to and within the Caribbean are an equally important part of its history. In recent decades, climate change, natural disasters, and shifts in global mobility patterns have reshaped the migration landscape in the Caribbean. This document, produced by the Inter-American Bank (IDB) and the Migration Policy Institute (MPI), presents a policy review on migration in nine Caribbean countries, outlining challenges and opportunities for the integration of the migrant population and a successful engagement with diasporas to advance the development of the region
Research Insights: Do Different Classroom Assignment Strategies in Middle School Matter for Student Performance?
No full textWe implemented a large-scale field experiment in 171 public schools in Mexico grouping students based on initial academic performance under two models: tracking (i.e., sorting students by initial performance) and bimodal classrooms (i.e., grouping weak and strong students together in the same classroom). Students in tracking and in bimodal classroom experienced similar average learning gains of about 0.08 of a standard deviation. The treatment effects were larger and more persistent among initially high-achieving students and no significant among low-achievers
The Effectiveness of Management Training Programs: A Meta-Analytic Review
Get PDFWe conduct a meta-analysis of 44 studies and 68 different managerial skills training programs, with the aim of identifying program characteristics that can lead to more effective public policies promoting firm growth and entrepreneurship. We synthesize 431 estimates to assess the effects of these programs on firm performance. Our findings show that, on average, managerial skills development programs have positive returns on management practices, firm productivity, profits, and survival. We also examine how program and participant specifications affect program effectiveness. Our analysis suggests that, on average, business training programs focused on human resources, soft skills, marketing, and finance-accounting, especially when organized by local organizations, tend to result in better firm performance. Moreover, training of potential entrepreneurs and managers in specifically targeted sectors such as agriculture, manufacturing, or services was more likely to result in improvement compared to non-targeted programs. Finally, our results indicate that programs that involve both male and female participants are more likely to enjoy higher effects from managerial training interventions
The Central Role of Social Dynamics in Nudging Social Norms for Collective Health (Discussion Paper)
No full text“Norms-nudging” consists of publicizing how others in society behave on average, hoping to encourage further adoption of a desired behavior. While numerous studies show that norms nudges can work in small groups and one-shot interventions, increasing attention is being devoted to the challenges of scaling up to ongoing, population-level norms nudging policies. Regularly nudging entire populations, we argue, can unleash social adjustment dynamics that move the societal rate of the desired behavior in unexpected directions. We provide practical guidance on the kind of information needed to estimate the likely effectiveness of an ongoing, population-level norm nudging policy. We illustrate our approach through a survey-in-the-field experiment about face mask-wearing during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the context we study, our results suggest that publicizing initially high rates of mask-wearing would likely backfire by leading to lower equilibrium rates of mask-wearing. Our approach can be adapted and enriched to estimate the likely effects of nudging with norms at scale in other substantive realms and heterogeneous populations
Digital Tokens for Climate Action and Nature-Based Solutions: Exploration of Opportunities and Considerations
No full textThis report on digital tokens for climate action and nature-based solutions forms a valuable addition to the emerging body of knowledge and is specially intended to inform, inspire, and spur action for new, innovative, and potentially effective ways of providing financial resources and effective action for climate action and the conservation and regeneration of our natural capital. Using technology to lower costs and barriers to access, as well as a tool to generate social inclusion and democratize opportunities, is at the core of the intersection that we will be presenting in this document. Latin America and the Caribbean need to combine the opportunity that natural capital and biodiversity bring, with the acceleration of ecosystems of innovation and entrepreneurship aiming at inclusion and diversity. This report aims to add value in the understanding of how the harnessing of these digital tools can help untap opportunities in Latin America for climate action and the protection of its rich natural ecosystems
When Measure Matters: Coresidence Bias and Integenerational Mobility Revisited
Get PDFWe provide novel evidence of the impact of coresidence bias on a large set of indicators of intergenerational mobility in education. We begin re-examining a recent claim that the correlation coecient is less biased than the regression coecient. Then, we expand our analysis to show that there are indicators with varying average levels of coresidence bias going from less than 1% to more than 10%. However, some indicators with minimal bias produce high levels of re-ranking that make them uninformative to rank populations by the level of mobility. In contrast, other indicators with large bias generate more reliable rankings