Poverty statistics are conventionally compiled using data from household income and expenditure survey or living standards survey. This study examines an alternative approach in estimating poverty by investigating whether readily available geospatial data can accurately predict the spatial...

Granular spatial information on the distributions of human population is relevant to a variety of fields like health, economics, and other areas of public sector planning. This paper applies ensemble methods and aims at assessing their applicability to analyzing and forecasting population...

The spatial granularity of poverty statistics can have a significant impact on the efficiency of targeting resources meant to improve the living conditions of the poor. However, achieving granularity typically requires increasing the sample sizes of surveys on household income and expenditure or...

Roads are vital to support the transportation of people, goods, and services, among others. To yield their optimal socioeconomic impact, proper maintenance of existing roads is required; however, this is typically underfunded. Since detecting road quality is both labor and capital intensive,...

At the onset of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) lockdown in the Philippines in April 2020, the Asian Development Bank, in partnership with the Philippine government and the private sector, implemented the Bayan Bayanihan (BB) food relief program which served approximately 162,000 households...

Using unique survey data from Georgia, Mongolia, and the Philippines, we examine gender gaps in entrepreneurship. The overall incidence of entrepreneurship is highest in Cavite, Philippines, while the gender gap in ownership is highest in Mongolia. On average, enterprises operated by men have...

Since the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, significant global progress has been achieved in promoting gender equality in education and health. However, progress has not been as remarkable in advancing women's rights on asset ownership and control, which is critical for...