Poverty alleviation and welfare improvement of the poor

have been the primary goals of policy makers in the developing

world. Governments, policymakers, and international development

agencies have regularly allocated a wide range of resources in

attempts to improve socio-economic indicators of well-being amongst

the poor. Careful analysis backed by rigorous evaluation of these

efforts is of utmost importance in order to ascertain whether these

goals are being met. My work focuses on some of the development

goals and the role of policy efforts in addressing these.