How to overcome market failures was once the key question underlying development research. A primary conclusion of this research was that governments had to step in to resolve these market failures, for example by providing free public services or protecting infant industries. However, many of these interventions have themselves failed the poor people they were intended to help.

At the recent IFPRI Staff Retreat Research Day, Shanta Devarajan, Senior Director for Development Economics at The World Bank, discussed these complex issues in a keynote address and outlined several key directions for future development research.

See the blog post here.