By freely sharing what we learn, we have built a reputation as thought leaders who translate ideas into action and action into results. You can browse through recently published articles from all our publications ( Checkpoint, Developments, Developing Alternatives, [email protected] ) below—or visit individual publication sites for a full archive.
Digital
Somehow, we have made it to the halfway point of 2020. This year has been wild, to say the least—more than 500,000 people around the world have died due to COVID-19. The murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Riah Milton, Dominique Fells, Oluwatoyin “Toyin” Salau, and quite literally countless other members of the Black communit…
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Indonesia knows climate and disaster risk: a vast archipelago of more than 18,000 islands and 230 million people, the country faces earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, drought, and rising sea level. Climate change is exacerbating these risks and compounding the vulnerabilities of the Indonesian people. As recently as 2019, for example, 11…
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With each technological advancement, more decisions in our daily lives are made by algorithms. They increasingly determine what advertisements we see, whether we’re considered for a job, or which books and movies are recommended to us—and how and where law enforcement is deployed in our communities. The ongoing protests to draw attention to, and…
Read MoreDeveloping Alternatives
During the COVID-19 health crisis, land might not appear to be an urgent issue. But it is becoming increasingly clear that the pandemic is more than a health emergency—it’s an economic and social emergency too, which threatens to worsen the economic outlook for many people who are already extremely vulnerable. We know those most at risk, in Ethi…
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Nigeria has Africa’s largest economy and population. But as recently as 2016, the country ranked near the bottom of the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business index, which measures business regulations and their enforcement worldwide. Nigeria’s low ranking that year—169 out of 190 countries—reflected the difficulty businesses faced in dealing with …
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In the current climate of data collection and data harvesting by every website, company, government or official body that has access to your browser traffic, usage history, and location, your data is always at risk and vulnerable. To add to this, nothing is absolutely, unequivocally, 100 percent secure. Even air-gapped computers that have no con…
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At a time when social distancing and other restrictive measures are forcing almost all of our interactions to take place virtually, the European Union (EU)-funded Balochistan Rural Development and Community Empowerment (BRACE) programme in Pakistan is harvesting responsiveness from already established networks to stop the spread of COVID-19. The…
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At the beginning of the coronavirus epidemic, Vasyl Mazurin, an entrepreneur from Druzhkivka in eastern Ukraine, approached city doctors with an offer to help repair equipment that could aid patients suffering with COVID-19. Medical staff took him up on the proposal and presented him with their old, non-functioning lung ventilators. “It was our …
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This analysis is Part 6 of a series on COVID-19, with a specific focus on Mexico. The analysis will be updated as we receive additional data and the code for all related analysis will be made available shortly. For the past two months, COVID-19 has made its way beyond the borders of the United States and into other countries of the Americas, nam…
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Any effective government response to crises such as COVID-19 will rely on good public financial management (PFM). As the International Monetary Fund makes clear, PFM systems will play an important role in tackling the immediate challenges posed by the pandemic, which include estimating and finding the financial resources needed to confront the d…
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Since discussions began around the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the global community has agreed that education is the right of every child, regardless of socio-economic status, religion, ability, culture, or geography. Yet even as the idea of inclusive education garners support, we struggle to move beyond talk to action. DAI hosted a pan…
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While the full impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on developing countries continues to unfold, it seems clear that the public health response of lockdowns and business closures is having a profound effect on developing economies. In the face of dwindling revenue, private companies with limited working capital reserves are forced to lay off staff an…
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Honduran parents often pull their young children out of school to accompany them on the perilous journey to the United States because of rumors suggesting that the presence of youngsters will ensure visas for families. Older students, seeking what they perceive as a safer or more prosperous future, drop out on their own to undertake the journey….
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Dear friends and colleagues: we had a lighthearted blog post ready to go this week, but in light of recent events, we’re sure it can wait. Instead, we’re using this time to pause and reflect about the killing of George Floyd and the years of structural racism and inequities that his story represents, both in the U.S. and across the countries whe…
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This article originally appeared in ImpactAlpha. It was written by DAI Board Member, Elizabeth Littlefield, formerly president and CEO of the Overseas Private Investment Corp., and current senior counselor and sustainability practice lead at Albright Stonebridge Group.
Read MoreDevelopments
COVID-19 has hit economies around the world, with devastating effects on businesses. Businesses in frontier and emerging economies may face the worst debt crisis since the early 1980s. Since the advent of COVID-19, more than US$100 billion in capital has flowed out of these markets—three times as much as in the first two months of the 2008 globa…
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The past few decades have seen an intense effort to encourage investment in forward-looking renewable energy technologies, principally in onshore solar and wind generation. Over this time, a global supply chain that involves both large businesses and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has emerged to service these onshore projects. More re…
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Jenny Baker was appointed to lead DAI’s Global Health business in March of this year. Given all that has happened in the health arena since then, it has taken us longer than usual to catch up with the incoming Senior Vice President. Here we get her perspective on health and development challenges in the era of COVID-19.
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The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), through the Honduras Local Governance Activity (HLG), is supporting the prevention and early detection of COVID-19 in 41 municipalities, 8 municipal associations, 18 nongovernment-managed health centers, 6 hospitals, 4 shelters for victims of gender-based violence, and 7 youth groups in this…
Read MoreDigital
Over the past few months, I have been reading article after article about how to run a successful virtual workshop, training, event, and so on, all of which provided useful advice. But, as I have run my fair share of virtual meetings these days, and because I am often described as “direct” by my peers and colleagues, I thought I would take a sta…
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Crisis or no crisis, gender-based violence—including sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment (SEAH)—takes place where there is a combination of opportunity, rationalisation, motivation, and power imbalance. But crises tend to exacerbate the inequalities that favour these conditions. Depending on the nature of the crisis, we may see different …
Read MoreDeveloping Alternatives
In 2016, the Government of Malawi enacted a Customary Land Act (CLA), enabling smallholder farmers to convert their customary land rights to private land rights with registered title. Crucially, the CLA gives land holders increased tenure security, which in turn is hoped to lead to increased investment in land improvements.
Read MoreDigital
Silicon chips are literally black boxes to most of us. We understand that transistors are somehow etched in tiny patterns on these silicon wafers, and that these patterns make possible the computers, phones, and other electronic devices that run our modern world. Digital solutions are built on a foundation of silicon, and the landscape of silico…
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We recently spoke with Nikhil Gehani, Director of Communications at MIX, a global data resource for socially responsible investors and businesses, about inclusive finance and what it means for low-income countries. This is an excerpt of that interview.
Read MoreDevelopments
Alongside priorities of healthcare and slowing the rate of infection, almost all governments have identified a range of fiscal and monetary instruments to mitigate the economic impacts of the virus.
Read MoreDigital
As many countries struggle to manage the COVID-19 crisis, governments globally are looking to data-driven technologies to minimize cases or to help facilitate a transition out of lockdown. The technologies being claimed to protect, prevent, and track include symptom tracking apps that help us understand the disease, digital contact tracing apps …
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Even the strongest economies are struggling to cope with the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. China saw its first drop in gross domestic product since 1992 and Germany, Europe’s largest economy, could contract by up to 5.4 percent this year. While it’s too soon to predict how less developed countries will fare, all indicators point to s…
Read MoreDigital
During this unprecedented global economic downturn caused by COVID-19, accelerators, incubators, and other entrepreneurship support organizations have a valuable role to play in helping entrepreneurs and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in emerging and frontier markets. Over the past two months supporting the Shell LiveWIRE global entre…
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The challenges of measuring the infection rates of COVID-19 are enormous for even the most prepared countries, given the need for testing to reach a significant enough amount of the population to accurately detect its spread. While the total number of recorded cases in the world thus far have mostly been in the United States, Europe, and East As…
Read MoreDigital
This post was written by DAI Data Scientist Jamie Parr, with contributions from Greg Maly, Gratiana Fu, Eduardo González-Pier, Susan Scribner, and Kirsten Weeks. This analysis is Part 4 of a series on known risk factors associated with COVID-19, with a specific focus on Mexico. It is the first of several posts that will provide an analytical ove…
Read MoreDigital
Less than two weeks ago, on April 21, 2020, Microsoft announced its support for the growing open data movement through the launch of an “Open Data Campaign.” Having recently spent several days researching successful open data initiatives, the statement caught my attention. The World Bank uses the Open Knowledge Foundation’s definition for open d…
Read MoreDevelopments
After many years of conflict, recurrent natural disasters, and humanitarian crisis, Somalia is highly susceptible to poverty and food insecurity, and its health indicators are among the worst in the world. Against this backdrop, the COVID-19 pandemic is a palpable threat to the country’s healthcare system, food security, and already fragile econ…
Read MoreDigital
Often in the early days of digital development, it felt like there was a small group of big, innovative brains in one room all working on similar visions of how best to leverage the growing presence of the iconic Nokia 3310 across the developing world. Frontline SMS, Ushahidi, Souktel, and other groups were leading the charge from various corner…
Read MoreDigital
Everyone is talking about digital transformation—especially now that digital processes and tools are a mandatory part of daily activities for most businesses, schools, and citizens across the world in response to the global COVID-19 outbreak. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and DAI have been working to enhance digital skill…
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Local content practitioners—particularly those working in the sustainability, contracts, procurement, and supply chain departments of large companies—face enormous pressure from two sides: on one side, the pressing need to reduce costs in light of cratering economic activity across the board, and particularly in the energy sector; on the other s…
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Statistics are of paramount importance for governance. High-quality data inform policy making and the public debate: They help assess and design policies and hold governments accountable. However, as the World Bank reported in 2017, Africa’s statistical capacity lags behind most of the developed world. Absent adequate statistics, policy makers a…
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This blog originally appeared in Science Speaks. When the sickness and deaths subside, when ventilators and face masks are back in storerooms, when health workers don’t fear for their lives as they work, and when families and friends gather once again, what will be the lesson we have learned?
Read MoreDigital
The next installment in our COVID-19 analysis series connects the dots between the datasets we have explored in our previous posts and brings in a new dataset that came to our attention over the past couple of weeks. In this paper, we look at the relationship between country scores from the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI)’s Global Health Securit…
Read MoreDigital
While tackling the spread of the COVID-19 disease takes a multi-faceted approach, behavior change—especially around personal and respiratory hygiene, proper handwashing, social distancing, and so on—remains a critical need across countries where DAI and our clients operate. Further, as organizations and individuals increasingly embrace digital-b…
Read MoreDeveloping Alternatives
International development programmes can have far-reaching consequences, often into sectors or circumstances not immediately obvious or relevant to the programme itself. These knock-on effects can be especially fraught in the case of land, which has important cultural, economic, and social meaning to those who use it. When designing land registr…
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In upending the supply chain world order, the pandemic will redefine how we source goods and labor Even in the throes of what is perhaps the most severe economic shock in a century, there is little doubt that the crisis will bequeath a “new world order” when it comes to supply chain management. For policy makers, corporate leaders, and supply ch…
Read MoreDigital
Five years in Cambodia leading the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded Development Innovations project taught me a lot about innovation. I saw innovators employ entrepreneurial thinking to develop out-of-the-box, creative solutions to problems, helping hundreds of thousands of Cambodians—automated phone calls warning people …
Read MoreDigital
This article was written by DAI’s Jamie Parr, with contributions from Greg Maly and Gratiana Fu. This analysis is Part 2 of a series on known risk factors associated with COVID-19. We aim to use publicly available data sets to identify national and subnational populations most at risk for infection and case fatality. The analysis will be updated…
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Nepal is in the midst of a demographic shift. Over the past three decades, its fertility rate has declined and population growth has stalled. The country has quickly moved from a high-mortality, high-fertility society to a low-mortality, low-fertility society. Although this shift is an encouraging indicator of development, the changing demograph…
Read MoreDigital
One of the participants in the Think Global Make Local product development workshop, sponsored by our Cambodia Development Innovations project in 2016, created a design for a toy called Doy Doy. With Doy Doy’s silicone straws and plastic connectors, kids can build complex structures. The product has gone on to achieve modest commercial success l…
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In the United States, widely available tools enable Americans to register and file taxes from home, and paying Uncle Sam has never been easier or cheaper. But in places such as Guatemala—where electronic governance is just now taking root and literacy, language, and gender present hurdles—the high burden of tax compliance can cause involuntary e…
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With a long record of progressive reforms stretching back to the Personal Status Code, adopted in 1957, one year after independence, Tunisia has a strong claim to be the most progressive Arab and perhaps even Muslim country in terms of women’s rights. Polygamy is illegal. There are strong laws against domestic violence. Tunisian women participat…
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Innovations for Agribusiness (InovAgro) is the first market systems development project in Mozambique. Funded by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and active in 11 districts in three northern provinces, the project—a private sector-led agriculture growth initiative that partners with companies seeking to engage with smallhol…
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It’s hard to imagine that The Gambia emerged only recently from 22 years of authoritarian rule: first impressions are of a vibrant and happy nation. Surrounded by Senegal to the north, east, and south, The Gambia is known as the “smiling coast of Africa” because Gambians are said to possess a knack for putting people at ease. Now three years int…
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“From better health to increased wealth, education is the catalyst of a better future for millions of children, youth, and adults. No country has ever climbed the socioeconomic development ladder without steady investments in education.”—Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO An effective education system is one of the most critical contributo…
Read MoreCheckpoint
The rise of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization presented civilians caught in IS-controlled areas with limited choices. While a small percentage joined the group as combatants—either willfully or under coercion—more sought other ways to survive and provide for their families. In these situations, ordinary people can easily become compl…
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Editor’s Note: This post expands on a report originally prepared for the Centre for Development Results. The Somali peninsula—home to 14.32 million people—suffered a devastating drought in early 2017, leading to widespread crop failures and livestock losses that have dangerously affected the region’s food security. The Food and Agriculture Organ…
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Development responses to violent extremism are challenged by a lack of methods for rigorously testing assumptions about and determining the relative importance of different drivers of extremism. DAI’s Center for Secure and Stable States designed and implemented a mixed-methods research methodology for addressing these challenges on the Enhancing…
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Counter-threat finance—the efforts to reduce the flow of money that funds terrorism and organized crime—has been a key component of the international community’s struggle against terrorism since the terror attacks of September 11, 2001. When we think of counter-threat finance, international banking, money laundering, and oil smuggling come to mi…
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In complex and unstable environments, standard performance monitoring is often insufficient to ensure activities remain relevant and adapt to the evolving ecosystem in which they are implemented. DAI’s complexity-aware planning (CAP) cycle is designed for situations where the understanding of a country’s conflict is narrow, conditions are consta…
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In conflict-affected countries, formal legal systems often are limited, with department or agency staffs absent or overloaded or both, leaving communities with few or no dispute resolution mechanisms. In their place, communities tend to rely on informal processes or institutions to resolve disputes before they escalate to violence. Development p…
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I recently traveled to South Sudan to investigate efforts to address trauma in a region that has experienced nearly 27 years of war since the 1980s. As a global development professional and trauma educator, I don’t need to be convinced of the need to address trauma as part of a portfolio of peacebuilding activities. Encouragingly, an increasing …
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As measures to counter violent extremism (CVE) are complex and unproven, development practitioners must pay attention to any and all variables that even appear to be important. One of those key common factors is the importance of a good facilitator. Luckily, the field of public health has much to teach us on this topic.
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Is it possible to build a fragility index that is truly useful as a tool for day-to-day development programming on the ground? That’s what we’re trying in Nigeria.
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It is broadly understood that language—especially generalizing and dehumanizing language—can play a central role in fostering communal violence. William Donohue has shown how the language of classification was a key early warning in the Rwandan genocide, for example. Such instances should remind the development community to be mindful of the wor…
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A review of “Conflict, Violent Extremism and Development: New Challenges, New Responses” One of the most acute challenges of working in conflict zones is differentiating between “legitimate” conflict actors and extremist groups. In countries such as Libya and Syria, state collapse has led to a proliferation of armed groups and institutions—all c…
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Recent research by DAI’s Enhancing Governance, Accountability, and Engagement (ENGAGE) project team in Mindanao demonstrates that while membership in violent extremist groups is overwhelmingly male, there is limited evidence to suggest that support for violent extremist ideologies differs fundamentally between the sexes.
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So-called fake news is an issue du jour in Washington and beyond. While it has undoubtedly been hyped for political reasons, fake news is real, its dangers clear and present—especially in unstable environments. Even in the United States, the Pizzagate conspiracy theory and subsequent Comet Ping Pong shooting in Washington, D.C., in December 2016…
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Since the Bamako Agreement of 2015, the international security and development community has invested in significant stabilization programs for Northern Mali, and specifically the Timbuktu, Gao, and Kidal regions. Northern Mali and its roughly 1.3 million people are more engaged and resilient as a result, but now “the center” of the country—home…
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The social critic and author Christopher Hitchens wrote: “What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.” Research, applied learning, and fierce debates about measuring success and failure, about embracing new ideas and technologies, and about adapting concepts and practices from both the development and national defens…
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Anyone who has worked in transition or stabilization environments knows the value of good research. But good research tends to have two drawbacks that constrain its applicability for professionals working in unstable environments: it takes time and it’s expensive. Even the best research, if it comes too late, is of little use if you’re working i…
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