On 8 – 9 July 2015 the Centre for the Evaluation of Development Policies (EDePo) at the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) conducted its first summer conference, ‘Improving productivity in developing countries: identifying bottlenecks and obstacles to productive investments and technology adoption‘.

The conference marked the end of a three-year DEGRP project, and attracted researchers and distinguished keynote speakers from around the world including Pascaline Dupas (Stanford University), Eliana La Ferrara (Bocconi University), Imran Rasul (University College, London and IFS), Stefan Dercon (DFID), and Mark Rosenzweig (Yale University).

Work presented addressed four core constraints to productivity: informational resources available to individuals, market failures, operational resources and social norms. Sessions covered the latest research and insights around health promotion, gender, credit and insurance, land and labour productivity, expectations and uncertainty, as well as networks and technology adoption and taxes and public finances.

Visit the IFS event page for presentations and video interviews.