Past events

This page provides a list of archived events we have held, including video recordings, related blogs, and (more recently) audio podcasts: Devpolicy Talks.

2024 |2023 |2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011

https://www.flickr.com/photos/dfataustralianaid/10687070725/in/album-72157637142087723/

Gender differences in social learning among Vanuatu cocoa growers

12–1pm 26 August 2020

Dr Alexandra Peralta

» watch the recording
» view presentation

In this webinar, Dr Alexandra Peralta presented a new study analysing social learning effects among men and women in cocoa-growing households in Vanuatu.

Dr Peralta finds that information network links are determined by proximity for both men and women. Separated gender analysis highlights wide gender gaps in access to information from peers and other information channels. The results robustly show learning effects among men but not among women, and that despite women and men participating almost equally in cocoa production and postharvest activities, women participated in fewer extension visits and less training activities. Women have fewer contacts within their information networks and scored lower than men in the knowledge test. Ignoring gender dynamics in the acquisition of information for the design and implementation of extension interventions can result in widening these gaps.

These results have implications for the design and implementation of gender-inclusive extension strategies.

Speaker

Dr Alexandra Peralta is a Lecturer in Agricultural and Food Economics with The Centre for Global Food and Resources (CGFAR) at the University of Adelaide. She is a development economist with experience on impact evaluation, field experiments and farmer decision-making models. Her recent research focuses on the evaluation of the impact of development interventions in Indonesia and the Pacific.

Read Dr Peralta’s draft paper here. Please note that this is a draft only not for citing or further sharing.

This webinar was free and open to the public. It was recorded, and the recording will be made available soon through the Development Policy Centre website.

» read more

COVID-19: economic costs and responses in the Pacific

12.30–2pm 19 August 2020

Professor Stephen Howes, Dr Jenny Gordon, Dr Neelesh Gounder and Maholopa Laveil

» watch the recording
» listen to the podcast
» view presentation by Stephen Howes
» view presentation by Jenny Gordon
» view presentation by Maholopa Laveil

The economic costs of COVID-19 continue to mount, globally and in the Pacific. But what is the damage in the Pacific, and how are Pacific governments responding? In this seminar, we explored the economic damage caused by COVID-19 and the responses Pacific governments are taking. Professor Stephen Howes presented an overview based on the Pacific Covid Economic Database the Development Policy Centre had put together. Dr Jenny Gordon, Chief Economist of DFAT, provided her assessment. Dr Neelesh Gounder and Mr Maholopa Laveil presented perspectives on Fiji and PNG, respectively.

Chair
Sadhana Sen, Regional Media Adviser, Development Policy Centre, ANU

Panelists
Professor Stephen Howes, Director, Development Policy Centre, ANU

Dr Jenny Gordon, Chief Economist, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Dr Neelesh Gounder, Senior Lecturer in Economics, University of the South Pacific

Maholopa Laveil, Lecturer in Economics, University of Papua New Guinea

» read more

https://www.flickr.com/photos/dfataustralianaid/10703373444/in/album-72157637431518595/

How to meet Australian demand for Pacific foreign vocational workers

11am–12pm 12 August 2020

Michael Clemens and Satish Chand

» watch the recording
» listen to the podcast
» view presentation by Satish Chand

Historically, Australia has lacked a coherent policy to attract immigrants with less extensive formal training and education, despite the needs of their aging population and labour market. Recent moves to develop such a policy have thrown up numerous questions, such as how many vocational workers are needed, for which the economic literature has few answers.

The Center for Global Development (CGD) has recently concluded a project with the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) which has produced two papers. The first paper estimates the demand for vocational workers in Australia by 2050, finding that demand will exceed native supply by over two million. While there will be ample, skilled, labour available within Pacific Island countries, facilitating this movement in a managed way that maximizes the development potential of migration will be key. To that end, the second paper proposes the development of a ‘Pacific Skills Partnership’, a model which would facilitate skills creation across 14 low-income Pacific Island countries, with the greatest development potential lying in Papua New Guinea.

In this webinar, we invite participants to discuss the findings of both of these papers, helping to refine and nuance their conclusions, identify the barriers to policy implementation, and chart a way forward.

Speakers:

Michael Clemens is Director of Migration, Displacement, and Humanitarian Policy and a Senior Fellow at the Center for Global Development, where he studies the economic effects and causes of migration around the world. He has published on migration, development, economic history, and impact evaluation, in peer-reviewed academic journals including the American Economic Review, and his research has been awarded the Royal Economic Society Prize.

Satish Chand is a Professor of Finance in the School of Business at the University of New South Wales and based at the Australian Defence Force Academy in Canberra. Satish is also an Adjunct Professor at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University. His research interests include labour migration, fragile states, and the challenges of development.

Related papers:

This webinar is presented by the Center for Global Development and the Development Policy Centre at Crawford School of Public Policy, The Australian National University.

This webinar was free and open to the public. It was recorded, and the recording will be made available soon on the Development Policy Centre website.

CGD

» read more

https://www.flickr.com/photos/worldremit/24821859611/

Is mobile money changing rural Africa? Evidence from a field experiment

4–5pm 15 July 2020

Cátia Batista

» watch the recording
» view presentation

What is the economic impact of newly introducing mobile money in rural areas underserved by financial services? In this webinar, Cátia Batista presented the findings from the first randomised controlled trial to answer this question.

Following a sample of rural communities in Southern Mozambique, experimental results show that the availability of mobile money translated into clear adoption of these services, measured through administrative data on mobile money transactions. The study finds that mobile money improved consumption smoothing by treated households, that is, they became less vulnerable to adverse weather and self-reported shocks. However, mobile money also led to reduced investment, especially in agriculture. The study documents increases in the number of migrants in a household and in the migrant remittances received by rural households particularly in the presence of adverse shocks, while there are no clear effects on savings. Results are interpreted as evidence that, by drastically reducing the transaction costs associated with migrant remittances and improving migration-based insurance possibilities, mobile money acted as a facilitator of migration from rural to urban areas.

Presenter

Cátia Batista is Associate Professor of Economics at the Nova School of Business and Economics, where she is also Founder and Scientific Director of the NOVAFRICA research centre. She holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the Department of Economics of the University of Chicago. Cátia has research interests related to international migration and remittance flows, financial inclusion, entrepreneurship, technology adoption, education and policy evaluation.

The event was a public webinar and recorded. The recording will be made available soon through the Development Policy Centre website.

» read more

https://www.flickr.com/photos/au_unistphotostream/10470864116/in/photostream/

Migration and household finances: how a different framing can improve thinking about migration

10–11am 10 June 2020

Timothy N. Ogden

» view presentation
» listen to the podcast

It is time to fundamentally reframe the research agenda on migration, remittances, payments and development. Many policymakers in the developing world, and researchers, tend to view migrant remittances as windfall income, rather than as returns on investment, which is how families with migrants tend to see remittances. Migration is thus, among other things, a strategy for financial management in poor households: location is an asset, migration an investment.

Some of the most basic questions about remittances and their effects remain inadequately answered, in part because of a blinded research agenda. Asking better questions is a step toward better policies, programs and regulations and, above all, to enable people on low incomes to improve their lives.

In this webinar, Timothy N. Ogden discussed some of the new and alternative research questions that emerge from the shift of perspective on remittances – from windfall to return on investment.

Speaker:

Timothy N. Ogden is Managing Director of the Financial Access Initiative, a research centre housed at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. Prior to joining the Financial Access Initiative he was the Chief Knowledge Officer at Geneva Global, Inc., an international philanthropy advisory company, and founding editor of Gartner Press. He also founded and currently leads Sona Partners, a thought leadership communications firm, where he has helped develop more than 20 books for major publishers.

This webinar is based on the article: “Migration and household finances: How a different framing can improve thinking about migration”. Also check out the videos based on the article: “What’s Behind Door #3? Investment in Migration for the World’s Poor”, and “When is Income Not Income?”.

Subscribe to The Weekly faiV, the Financial Access Initiative’s weekly newsletter on microfinance and financial inclusion.

» read more