LAHORE: The three-day 7th International Conference on Applied Development Economics (ADE) began here at Lahore School of Economics (LSE) on Monday.

The conference, organised by the Centre for Research in Economics and Business (CREB) and the Innovation and Technology Centre (ITC), LSE, in collaboration with the International Growth Centre and the Consortium for Development Policy Research, broadly focuses on health, gender, inter-generational mobility, work and information frictions, adaptive strategies for climate resilience, digital interventions and labour market adjustments, trade frictions and industrial policy, poverty alleviation, human capital and education frontiers.

The aim of the conference is to highlight recent research that can have a lasting policy impact for sustainable growth in the developing world, provide early-career researchers an opportunity to obtain feedback on their ongoing work and foster a mutually beneficial exchange of ideas and discussions among researchers on potential collaborations.

LSE Rector Dr Shahid Chaudhry, in his inaugural remarks, expressed joy in sharing the room with exceptional economists from nine countries. He also shared his perspective on the present economic situation of Pakistan and underlined macro-economic mismanagement as the main cause of poor economic performance of the country.

Experts from nine countries attend the conference

The first day of the conference opened with a plenary address by Christine Valente, Professor of Economics at the University of Bristol, focused on what determines the demand for contraception in high-fertility settings and the role of husbands in this regard.

The professor said that low prevalence of pregnancy avoidance can be explained by differences in subjective expectations of the spouses.

The first session on Health, Gender & Intergenerational Mobility was chaired by Dr Theresa Chaudhry, Professor of Economics at the LSE.

The first speaker of the session, Syeda Warda Riaz, Assistant Professor of Economics at LUMS, discussed the effects of a modest financial incentive (transport subsidy) programme aimed at improving maternal healthcare on child health outcomes.

She said the programme succeeded in creating a positive impact on height-for-age z-scores which improves by 0.30 SD and in lowering moderate stunting by 8 percentage points. Following this, the second presenter, Meiping Sun from Fordham University discussed her paper which examined the long-term and multi-generational benefits of skilled birth attendance (SBA), which involves having a trained midwife or doctor present at delivery to safely perform normal deliveries using aseptic techniques and provide first-line emergency obstetric care.

Her findings indicated that having skilled health professionals to attend childbirths can result in significant long-term and multi-generational benefits.

The third paper by Meseret Abebe from Addis Ababa University examined the impacts of early childbearing on educational attainment and time allocation, drawing on data from the Young Lives Panel Study in Peru. The authors’ analysis reveals that early childbearing leads to a 17pc decrease in years of education, a 6pc lower chance of completing primary education, and a 33pc reduction in the likelihood of being enrolled in school.

The second plenary address was delivered virtually by Zaki Wahhaj, Professor of Development Economics in Department of International Development at the King’s Collage, London.

He discussed legal interventions to address child marriage in Bangladesh. His research examined a video-based information campaign designed to raise awareness in rural communities about the new child marriage law passed in March 2017.

It was found that strengthening community surveillance around child marriage can significantly improve outcomes for adolescent girls. The plenary address was followed by the commencement of the second and final session for the day, on ‘Gender, Work and Information Frictions’.

Dr Hamna Ahmed, Associate Professor, examined in her paper how intra-household information asymmetries influence preferences for outside-home employment for women.

The second and last paper for the day was presented by Kate Vyborny, an economist at the World Bank South Asia Region Gender Innovation Lab. Her study examined how limited information about workers’ past performance distorts hiring, wages and productivity, particularly for women in South Asia.

Published in Dawn, August 19th, 2025