November 2025 Global Monthly Newsletter
New blog series: Guiding AI with evidence
How can AI improve education, health care, taxation, and other pressing social challenges? Our new AI blog series explores where AI is already making an impact across sectors and where more evidence is needed, drawing on recent evaluations. In the first installment, we outline six promising ways AI can contribute to social good. Subscribe to get the latest AI updates from J-PAL, including evidence deep dives, policy guidance, and research resources.
Sharing climate solutions this week at COP30
Our team is at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Belém, Brazil, connecting with partners and exploring new collaborations. We're sharing evidence on preventing deforestation while protecting livelihoods and helping corporations and philanthropies invest in climate adaptation that works. Across these efforts, we're highlighting the need for more research and policy partnerships to find and scale sustainable solutions. Learn more about the evidence in Energy, Environment, and Climate Change »
Housing First: Why rapid access keeps people housed long-term
Traditional housing programs in the US often require people to meet preconditions like employment or sobriety before placement. The Housing First approach flips that model—moving people into housing quickly, without any preconditions. A new J-PAL policy brief by Kate Christie (Senior Policy and Research Associate, J-PAL North America) synthesizes evidence from six randomized evaluations across the United States. The evidence is clear: the Housing First approach gets people into housing fast and keeps them housed. More research is needed on other outcomes like health and employment. Read the brief »
WATCH: Esther Duflo on scaling, aid, and the future of entrepreneurship
How do we create more stable, dignified jobs in low- and middle-income countries? Esther Duflo (MIT; Director, J-PAL; Scientific Director, J-PAL South Asia) sat down with Devin Chesney (Executive Director, Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs) to share insights on helping entrepreneurs grow small businesses that create lasting prosperity. Esther also reflected on her personal motivations and the importance of scaling evidence-informed solutions in a world of shifting aid budgets. Watch the conversation »
EVIDENCE-INFORMED DECISION-MAKING
How training brick manufacturers led to cleaner air
📍Bangladesh
Policy issue: Air pollution is a serious health threat in Bangladesh. Exacerbated by the growing brick manufacturing industry, coal burning kilns contribute to 17 percent of national CO2 emissions and cause an estimated 6,000 premature adult deaths annually.
Evaluation: Researchers partnered with the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) to deliver short, low-cost training to informal brick kiln owners. These trainings introduced operational changes, like improved brick stacking and continuous coal feeding, that reduce emissions while lowering fuel costs.
Results: Kiln owners rapidly adopted these practices because they cut costs while improving brick quality, resulting in a 20 percent reduction in emissions among compliant kilns. The program is now being scaled up across Bangladesh with support from J-PAL’s King Climate Action Initiative, which also supported the pilot and evaluation that demonstrated the solution’s impact. Read more »
Research by: Nina Brooks (Boston University), Debashish Biswas (icddr,b), Sameer Maithel (Greentech Knowledge Solutions), Grant Miller (Stanford), Aprajit Mahajan (Berkeley), M. Rofi Uddin (icddr,b), Shoeb Ahmed (Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology), Moogdho Mahzab (International Food Policy Research Institute), Mahbubur Rahman (icddr,b), and Stephen P. Luby (Stanford)
NEW PUBLICATION
Strategies for fostering fair, inclusive, and non-violent elections
A new brief by Anna Mysliwiec (Senior Policy Manager, J-PAL) and Aimee Barnes (Policy Manager, J-PAL) reviews evidence-informed strategies to strengthen elections. They found that election monitoring, voter information campaigns, and media literacy initiatives can help reduce fraud and violence, educate voters about their choices, and deepen political inclusion. Important questions remain on countering polarization, mitigating election violence, and more. Read the brief »
FEATURED EVALUATION SUMMARY
Subsidized land titles, social institutions, and land formalization
📍Democratic Republic of Congo
Policy issue: Formal property rights can play an important role in economic development and good governance, but they remain rare in sub-Saharan Africa. Understanding the relationship between land titling and social institutions can help governments develop more effective land titling policies.
Evaluation: In Kananga, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), researchers evaluated the impact of providing households with a subsidy to offset the costs of land titles on both starting and completing land registration, as well as on citizens’ participation in social institutions such as mutual aid or contributions to weddings.
Results: Being offered a land titling subsidy increased the number of citizens who began the property registration process and obtained a land title, while decreasing participation in social institutions and worsening citizens’ evaluations of chiefs. Reflecting this, in 2017, DRC’s government provided guidance about setting ceilings on prices for land titles and standardizing the process, which resembled guidance from this study. Read more »
Research by: Pablo Balán (Tel Aviv University), Augustin Bergeron (Harvard), Gabriel Tourek (University of Pittsburgh), Jonathan L. Weigel (Berkeley)
FEATURED BLOGS
Advancing agricultural transformation through locally-led research
📍Rabat, Morocco
The UM6P-J-PAL Applied Lab for Agriculture (UJALA) has selected its first cohort of African Scholars to strengthen Africa’s evidence-to-policy capacity in agriculture. Meet the researchers developing data-driven, sustainable solutions for small-scale farmers and learn more about the program. Read more »
Strengthening girls’ agency by building life skills
Life skills programs can help boost girls' confidence and challenge restrictive gender norms. J-PAL Africa recently convened policymakers, implementers, and alumni to discuss how to scale life skills programs sustainably. In a new blog post, staff share reflections from this webinar, highlighting the importance of government engagement, community support, and implementer capacity. Read more »
FEATURED RESEARCHER
"Stay curious and persistent, but always ground your research in the real challenges facing your communities.”
Oluwaremilekun Adebisi on advancing women’s education and entrepreneurship
In our latest African Scholar Spotlight, Oluwaremilekun Adebisi from the University of Ilorin in Nigeria shares how working with women and rural communities facing livelihood challenges shaped her passion for development economics. She discusses her J-PAL-funded research in Nigeria on mobile learning to expand girls’ access to education in crisis-affected regions, and soft skills training to strengthen women-led businesses. Read more »
WELCOMING OUR NEW AFFILIATED PROFESSORS
This summer, we welcomed 29 talented researchers to the J-PAL network. We will feature a few of them here each month.
Erwin Bulte
Wageningen University
Farah Said
Lahore University of Management Sciences
Tobias Salz
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
📺 FEATURED MULTIMEDIA
WATCH: Egypt and Indonesia collaborate on strengthening social protection programs
In Jakarta last year, senior officials from Egypt and Indonesia came together to discuss how evidence can strengthen the design and delivery of social protection policies. Conversations focused on improving data quality, health insurance subsidies, and cash transfer programs. The event was organized by J-PAL Middle East and North Africa through the Egypt Impact Lab, in collaboration with J-PAL Southeast Asia and J-PAL Global, and supported by the Islamic Development Bank and Community Jameel.
Read about the ideas exchanged and hear from participants »
FEATURED EVENT
Displaced Livelihoods Webinar Series: Workplace contact and social cohesion in Uganda
🗓️ November 20
How can workplace interactions between refugees and local workers promote social cohesion? In the next Displaced Livelihoods Initiative webinar, Mariajose Sila-Vargas (Senior Research and Policy Manager, J-PAL Europe) and Robert Hakiza (Executive Director, Young African Refugees for Integral Development) will share new evidence from Uganda on how workplace-based contact can reduce explicit biases and increase positive behaviors among people from different communities. Register here »
FEATURED TRAINING
Last chance to enroll in J-PAL’s Evaluating Social Programs online course
🗓️ Enroll now and complete by December 16
Join a global community of learners and gain practical skills for designing randomized evaluations and using evidence to maximize impact. Learn more and enroll »
🗞️ MEDIA HIGHLIGHTS
Mizoram min launches project to tackle violence against women
The Times of India
Life’s work: An interview with Esther Duflo
Harvard Business Review
Can AI make the poor world richer?
The Economist
📄 NEW RESEARCH PAPERS
Social Learning among Urban Manufacturing Firms: Energy-Efficient Motors in Bangladesh
Ritam Chaurey, Gaurav Nayyar, Siddharth Sharma, and Eric Verhoogen
Do Homelessness Prevention Programs Prevent Homelessness? Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial
David C. Phillips and James X. Sullivan
Income Support, Marriage, and Family Stability
Hema Shah, Lisa A. Gennetian, Katherine Magnuson, and Kimberly G. Noble
The Effect of Supporting Districts to Operationalise Digital Payments for Vaccination Campaign Workers: A Cluster Randomised Controlled Trial During the 2022 Polio Vaccination Campaign in Uganda
Peter Waiswa, Margaret McConnell, Juliet Aweko, Daniel Donald Mukuye, Charles Opio, Maggie Ssekitto Ashaba, Andrew Bakainaga, Elizabeth Ekirapa-Kiracho