BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Growth Lab - ECPv6.15.20//NONSGML v1.0//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN METHOD:PUBLISH X-WR-CALNAME:Growth Lab X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Growth Lab REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H X-Robots-Tag:noindex X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20180311T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20181104T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20190310T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20191103T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20200308T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20201101T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20210314T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20211107T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20220313T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20221106T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20230312T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20231105T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20240310T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20241103T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20250309T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20251102T060000 END:STANDARD BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT DTSTART:20260308T070000 END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:-0400 TZOFFSETTO:-0500 TZNAME:EST DTSTART:20261101T060000 END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20190329T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20190329T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20190115T003300Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250909T235355Z UID:15061-1553860800-1553864400@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Tackling Poverty Through Diplomacy and Development DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Fatema Z. Sumar\, Vice President of Global Programs\, OXFAM America About the talk: At a time when 65 million people are displaced from their homes and more than 800 million people go to bed hungry every night\, how can we make a real difference in tackling poverty & social injustices? During this talk\, Fatema will draw on her experiences as a diplomat and development leader and offer case “samples” from her experiences working in the U.S. Senate\, the U.S. State Department\, the Millennium Challenge Corporation\, and Oxfam America. We will explore different pathways to sustainable change – and how where you sit can define how you approach development. About the Speaker: Fatema Z. Sumar joined Oxfam America in 2018 as Vice President of Global Programs\, where she oversees our regional development and humanitarian response programs. Fatema comes to Oxfam with a distinguished career in the U.S. government\, leading U.S. efforts to advance sustainable development and economic policy in emerging markets and fragile countries. Most recently\, she served as Regional Deputy Vice President for Europe\, Asia\, Pacific\, and Latin America at the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)\, where she managed investments focused on international growth and poverty reduction. Prior to MCC\, she served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for South and Central Asia at the U.S. Department of State and as a Senior Professional Staff Member on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Fatema holds a Master’s in Public Affairs from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School and a Bachelor of Arts in Government from Cornell University. She studied abroad at the American University in Cairo. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/tackling-poverty-through-diplomacy-and-development/ LOCATION:Bell Hall (B500)\, Belfer Building 5th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20190405T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20190405T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20190115T003400Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250916T175426Z UID:14927-1554465600-1554469200@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Improving Smallholder Farmers’ Livelihoods through Mobile Phone-Based Agricultural Advice DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Jonathan Lehe MPA/ID ’17\, Director of New Programs\, Precision Agriculture for Development (PAD) About the talk: The majority of the world’s 450 million smallholder farmers and the 2 billion people who depend on them live in rural villages in developing countries\, growing crops at close to subsistence levels to feed their families. Smallholders typically harvest only 30% to 50% of potential yields due to suboptimal farming practices in quickly changing contexts. Small changes in agricultural practices can substantially improve productivity and profitability\, but farmers continue to lack the advice they need to close the yield gap and maximize their incomes\, despite significant budgets spent on traditional in-person agricultural extension programs. However\, mobile phone ownership is 50 to 70% in developing countries\, and access to mobile phones is even higher—typically 70 to 90%—presenting a huge opportunity to provide digital agricultural advisory services. In addition to technological advances\, recent advances in research methods can also be leveraged to improve the delivery of agricultural extension\, including behavioral economics\, big data and machine learning techniques\, A/B testing\, and rigorous evaluation techniques. Jonathan Lehe\, Director of New Programs at Precision Agriculture for Development (PAD)\, will discuss how the organization is working to improve the lives of farmers in developing countries. About the Speaker: Jonathan Lehe is PAD’s Global Research Manager. Mr. Lehe holds a Masters in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) from the Harvard Kennedy School. He has more than 10 years of experience in the global health and education sectors\, managing research projects and implementation of programs to scale up access to critical public services in Africa\, Asia\, and the Caribbean. He has previously worked at the Clinton Health Access Initiative\, and consulted for the World Bank\, Bridge International Academies\, and MIT’s Jameel Poverty Action Lab.  URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/improving-smallholder-farmers-livelihoods-through-mobile-phone-based-agricultural-advice/ LOCATION:Perkins Room (R429)\, Rubenstein Building 4th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20190412T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20190412T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20190115T003500Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250916T175426Z UID:14920-1555070400-1555074000@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Hard Data: Adventures in Evidence Collection DESCRIPTION:Speakers: Charity Moore\, India Research DirectorSonya Suter\, Senior Program Manager About the Speakers:Charity Moore: Charity Troyer Moore is the India Research Director for Evidence for Policy Design at the Harvard Kennedy School. She leads research-policy engagements with a variety of entities in India to ensure that research is attuned to the problems facing policymakers and integrated into policy design and program implementation. Charity’s research examines how to use technology to improve public service delivery and governance; the drivers and potential solutions to India’s low female labor force participation; land rights; and social protection programs. She holds an M.A. in Economics and Ph.D. in Agricultural\, Environmental\, and Development Economics.Sonya Suter: Sonya Suter is a Senior Program Manager at Evidence for Policy Design where she oversees the management of Rohini Pande’s research portfolio in India\, including a range of projects on environment\, gender\, governance\, and financial inclusion. Prior to joining EPoD\, Sonya was the Special Assistant to the Managing Director at the World Resources Institute\, where she supported the organization’s management team\, expansion through international offices\, and engagement on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals among other projects. Sonya also worked as a Research Assistant at ICF International on land use and transportation policy and has worked on research projects in Rwanda and Tanzania. Sonya holds an MPA from the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University and a BA in environmental policy from the Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. About the Talk: Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) is a policy research initiative based at Harvard Kennedy School and working around the globe to improve lives by designing and enabling better policy. In India\, we collaborate on research-policy engagements focused on governance\, environmental and energy issues\, financial inclusion\, and gender equality – using theory\, economic frameworks\, and evidence to identify effective policies\, and help build capacity to implement them. However\, whether studying barriers to women’s economic empowerment\, implementation of social welfare programs\, or uptake of clean cookstoves\, often the real thing we want to measure (social norms\, time use\, or even real-time air quality) is elusive –because measurement itself is complex\, institutions are not set up for research collaborations\, or both. In this seminar\, Charity and Sonya will share experiences\, lessons\, and innovations in data collection from EPoD’s work in India. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/hard-data-adventures-in-evidence-collection/ LOCATION:Bell Hall (B500)\, Belfer Building 5th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20190419T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20190419T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20190115T005700Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250916T175426Z UID:14901-1555675200-1555678800@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Empowering Women in South Asia’s Slums: The Challenges of Environmental Degradation DESCRIPTION:Speakers: Amit Patel\, Assistant Professor\, McCormack Graduate School for Policy and Global Studies\, University of Massachusetts BostonAmmar Malik\, Director\, EPoD Research About the Talk: Environmental degradation reduces the environmental capacity to meet social and ecological needs of societies\, which is exacerbated by natural hazards and extreme climate events\, and often intensify existing vulnerabilities. Marginalized groups in cities\, particularly women and poor\, are disproportionately at risk to face negative consequences of such environmental stressors. To better understand relationship between women empowerment and environmental degradation in cities\, we surveyed 1\,199 households in 12 informal settlements of New Delhi (India)\, Dhaka (Bangladesh)\, and Islamabad and Lahore (Pakistan). Using this data\, we created the Empowerment in Informal Settlements Index (EISI) and the Women’s Empowerment in Informal Settlements Index (WEISI) that systematically measure men’s and women’s empowerment. We found that women were significantly less empowered than their male counterparts in all three countries\, with widest gaps in Pakistan. We tested several linkages between empowerment and measures of environmental degradation using regression analyses and found many significant associations.  How Climate Change and Environmental Degredation Hurts Women More Than Men in Slums of South Asia (Policy Brief) About the Speakers:Amit Patel\, PhD: Amit Patel is Assistant Professor at University of Massachusetts Boston’s McCormack Graduate School for Policy and Global Studies. Amit’s research focuses on bottom-up approaches to improve socio-economic outcomes for urban poor. His main research projects funded by the National Science Foundation\, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation\, Urban Institute\, and the World Bank focus on housing and health disparities concerning urban poor living in slums in the Global South. He regularly teaches courses on public policy theories\, urban politics and policies\, and advanced quantitative methods. Amit has a PhD in public policy from George Mason University and prior training in management\, urban and regional planning\, and architecture. When he is not in the field or in front of the computer\, you will find him behind the camera.Ammar Malik: Ammar A. Malik is the Director of EPoD Research. He leads research-policy engagements that derive actionable policy insights from rigorous research. He oversees EPoD’s labor market and education research portfolios in the Middle East\, identifying and supporting opportunities for data and economic analysis to inform local policies that empower underrepresented groups and support social and economic development. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/empowering-women-in-south-asias-slums-the-challenges-of-environmental-degradation/ LOCATION:Democracy Lab (R414 AB)\, Rubenstein Building 4th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20190426T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20190426T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20190115T010100Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250909T235349Z UID:15069-1556280000-1556283600@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America. DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Andrés Reséndez\, Professor\, Department of History at University of California Davis; Author\, The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America. About the talk: The Other Slavery examines the system of bondage that targeted Native Americans\, a system that was every bit as terrible\, degrading\, and vast as African slavery. Anywhere between 2.5 and 5 million Native Americans may have been enslaved throughout the hemisphere in the centuries between the arrival of Columbus and the beginning of the 20th century.  And\, interestingly\, in contrast to African slavery which targeted mostly adult males\, the majority of these Indian slaves were women and children. About the Speaker: Andrés Reséndez is a professor of history and author. His specialties are early European exploration and colonization of the Americas\, the U.S-Mexico border region\, and the early history of the Pacific Ocean. His latest book\, The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt\, 2016)\, was a finalist for the 2016 National Book Award and winner of the 2017 California Book Awards in nonfiction and the 2017 Bancroft Prize from Columbia University. He teaches courses on food and history\, Latin America\, and Mexico. He is currently working on a new book provisionally titled Conquering the Pacific: The Story of How a Mulatto Pilot and a Friar-Mariner Learned to Navigate the Largest Ocean and Launched our Global World. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/the-other-slavery-the-uncovered-story-of-indian-enslavement-in-america/ LOCATION:Democracy Lab (R414 AB)\, Rubenstein Building 4th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20191018T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20191018T130000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20191011T185000Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250916T175428Z UID:14906-1571400000-1571403600@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Female Labor in Jordan: A Systematic Approach to the Exclusion Puzzle DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Semiray Kasoolu\, Research Fellow\, Growth Lab About the Talk: Women in Jordan are excluded from labor market opportunities at among the highest rates in the world. Previous efforts to explain this outcome have focused on specific\, isolated aspects of the problem and have not explained its persistence. After a careful review of the available literature and key stakeholder interviews in Jordan\, we develop a comprehensive framework to analyze the causes of low female employment rates and systematically test their validity. We find that the nature of low female inclusion in Jordan’s labor market varies significantly with educational attainment\, and identify evidence for different factors affecting different educational groups. Among women with high school education or less\, we report extremely low participation levels and find the strongest evidence for this phenomena tracing to traditional social norms and poor public transportation. Among university graduates and above\, we find that the problem is not one of participation but rather unemployment\, which we trace to a problem of a small and undiversified private sector that is unable to accommodate women’s needs for work and family balance. About the Speaker: Semiray Kasoolu has been a Research Fellow at the Center for International Development’s Growth Lab since 2017. Her research areas include labor markets and gender and growth diagnostics. She works in projects in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Prior to joining CID\, she worked with the World SME Forum in the Republic of Georgia to diagnose constraints to the growth of small and medium-sized enterprises and as an analyst at Goldman Sachs. Semiray holds a Master in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID\, 2017) from the Harvard Kennedy School. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/female-labor-in-jordan-a-systematic-approach-to-the-exclusion-puzzle/ LOCATION:Rubenstein 414\, HKS CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20200306T130000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20200306T140000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20200218T210800Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250916T175428Z UID:15083-1583499600-1583503200@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:You Get What You Pay For: Sources and Consequences of the Public Sector Premium in Albania and Sri Lanka DESCRIPTION:Speaker: Ljubica Nedelkoska\, Postdoctoral Fellow\, Growth Lab About the Talk: We study the factors behind the public sector premium in Albania and Sri Lanka\, the group heterogeneity in the premium\, the sources of public sector wage compression\, and the impact of this compression on the way individuals self-select between the public and the private sector. Similar to other countries\, the public sectors in Albania and Sri Lanka pay higher wages than the private sector\, for all but the most valued employees. While half of the premium of Sri Lanka and two-thirds of it in Albania are explained by differences in the occupation-education-experience mix between the sectors\, and the level of private sector informality\, the unexplained part of the premium is significant enough to affect the preferences of working in the public sector for different groups. We show that the compressed distributions of public sector wages and benefits create incentives for positive sorting into the public sector among most employees\, and negative sorting among the most productive ones. Work co-authored with Ricardo Hausmann and Sehar Noor. URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/you-get-what-you-pay-for-sources-and-consequences-of-the-public-sector-premium-in-albania-and-sri-lanka/ LOCATION:Bell Hall (B500)\, Belfer Building 5th floor\, HKS CATEGORIES:Growth Lab,Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20231129T110000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20231129T121500 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20231124T214700Z LAST-MODIFIED:20250908T230107Z UID:14998-1701255600-1701260100@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:Research Seminar: Anticipating Climate Change Across the United States\, with E. Rossi-Hansberg DESCRIPTION:The Growth Lab’s Research Seminar series is a weekly seminar that brings together researchers from across the academic spectrum who share an interest in growth and development. Speaker: Adrien Bilal – Harvard University Register: https://harvard.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ORfldxS0QwaTky5BhjVUsw Website: https://sites.google.com/site/adrienbilal/ Paper: NBER Working Paper 31323 -https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w31323/w31323.pdf Abstract: We evaluate how anticipation and adaptation shape the aggregate and local costs of climate change. We develop a dynamic spatial model of the U.S. economy and its 3\,143 counties that features costly forward-looking migration and capital investment decisions. Recent methodological advances that leverage the ‘Master Equation’ representation of the economy make the model tractable. We estimate the county-level impact of severe storms and heat waves over the 20th century on local income\, population\, and investment. The estimated impact of storms matches that of capital depreciation shocks in the model\, while heat waves resemble combined amenity and productivity shocks. We then estimate migration and investment elasticities\, as well as the structural damage functions\, by matching these reduced-form results in our framework. Our findings show\, first\, that the impact of climate on capital depreciation magnifies the U.S. aggregate welfare costs of climate change twofold to nearly 5% in 2023 under a business-as-usual warming scenario. Second\, anticipation of future climate damages amplifies climate-induced worker and investment mobility\, as workers and capitalists foresee the slow build-up of climate change. Third\, migration reduces substantially the spatial variance in the welfare impact of climate change. Although both anticipation and migration are important for local impacts\, their effect on aggregate U.S. losses from climate change is small. Speaker Bio: Adrien Bilal is a macroeconomist with interests in labor and spatial economics. Adrien received his PhD in Economics from Princeton University. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Economics at the department of Economics at Harvard University and was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Becker-Friedman Institute at the University of Chicago.  URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/research-seminar-anticipating-climate-change-across-the-united-states-with-e-rossi-hansberg/ LOCATION:HYBRID Weil Hall (Belfer L1) / Zoom CATEGORIES:Speaker Series END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20251202T101500 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20251202T113000 DTSTAMP:20260506T114233 CREATED:20251128T232637Z LAST-MODIFIED:20251128T233402Z UID:17292-1764670500-1764675000@growthlab.hks.harvard.edu SUMMARY:The Geographic and Sectoral Impact of Productivity DESCRIPTION:Speaker Series\n\n\nFederico Huneeus will discuss the geographic and sectoral impact of productivity changes and the local and aggregate impact of development policies\, the growth of the lithium industry\, and the closure of a major steel company. \n\n\n\nSpeaker: Federico Huneeus\, Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at Duke University\, Senior Economist at the Central Bank of Chile \n\n\n\nPaper Abstract: We study the geographic and sectoral impact of productivity changes in a model that includes production linkages throughout the supply chain\, labor migration\, international and domestic trade\, congestion of fixed factors\, firm entry and exit\, and knowledge diffusion. To quantify these impacts\, we construct\, for the first time for Chile\, input-output matrices disaggregated by geography and sector\, consistent with national accounts\, using administrative data and surveys. We use the model to study the local and aggregate impact of development policies\, the growth of the lithium industry\, and the closure of a major steel company. In addition to aggregate impacts\, we identify winners and losers from these events. \n\n\n\nThis event is online only. Please register in advance. The Zoom session is open to the public. \n\n\n\nSpeaker Bio: Federico Huneeus is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at Duke University. He is also a Senior Economist at the Central Bank of Chile. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Yale University Cowles Foundation. He has a PhD in economics from Princeton University. He is a trade economist who investigates issues related to firm behavior\, from a micro and macro perspective\, with a special focus on the study of production networks of firms\, how they are formed\, how they affect productivity growth and how they affect the impact of development policies. He also has a line of research on understanding equity-efficiency trade-offs. \n\n\n\nThe Growth Lab’s Research Seminar series is a weekly seminar that brings together researchers from across the academic spectrum who share an interest in growth and development. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n Share URL:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/event/17292/ CATEGORIES:Academic Research Seminars,Online,Speaker Series ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/IMG_0138.jpg END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR