The International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (Icrisat), supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, will improve global understanding of the dynamics of rural poverty through the recently launched Village Dynamics Studies (VDS) project.
Seeking to improve the quantity and quality of village-based information for better decision-making, the five-year project will be implemented along with the National Centre for Agricultural Economics and Policy Research in the humid tropics of east India, while the International Rice Research Institute will implement it in Bangladesh in collaboration with the Centre for Policy Dialogue and SocioConsult.
“The purpose of this VDS project is to decrease the incidence and severity of absolute poverty by markedly increasing the availability of time-series data at the district, household and individual levels,” Icrisat director-general William Dar said in a release.