Blogs

Charity Troyer Moore is the India Director for Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) at Harvard University. She is leading the project, “Building Capacity to Use Research Evidence (BCURE),” implemented in India by EPoD and IFMR LEAD. We recently took the … Read More

Usually, economic growth in lower-middle-income countries creates more jobs for women. But as India’s economy grew at an average of 7 percent between 2004 and 2011, its female labor force participation fell by seven percentage points, to 24 percent from … Read More

A good part of my college days was spent in commuting from my home to college in a train. A lot of passengers, including me, would know that the station is approaching from the stench caused by open defecation by … Read More

2015 is set to be a watershed year for the growth and deepening of banking and financial services in India. The Reserve Bank of India and the Union Government, have accorded policy priority to ‘Financial Inclusion’ through an array of … Read More

According to the Open Data Handbook Open data is data that can be freely used, re-used and redistributed by anyone – subject only, at most, to the requirement to attribute and sharealike. One particular category of Open Data is called … Read More

Isn’t research exciting? We can help identity problems that are perhaps not apparent on the surface and yet exist, or are likely to arise in the future; at the same time, we also help practitioners arrive at solutions. It is … Read More

The Earth is covered with soil: soil on farmlands, soil on the sea floor, soil on our shoes as we walk into an apartment. But past its omnipresence, soil is a microcosm of biodiversity in and of itself. Laden with … Read More

Access to money, and more broadly, access to finance and economic empowerment are at the heart of economic growth and development. Very often, financial freedom is restricted due to various economic, social, and in a few instances, political constraints. Rural … Read More

Today,both government and non-government bodies are adopting a Community Driven Development (CDD) model, which operates on the principle that the poor can effectively identify their needs; thus, when provided with adequate information, appropriate capacity and financial support, they can address … Read More

The role of the Micro Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME) sector in India cannot be ignored. With 4.6 million enterprises, it employs 800 million people, and accounts for 45 percent of manufactured output and 40 percent of exports[1]. However many … Read More