News: Warmest Congratulations to the Nobel Prize Winners in Economics

Limestone Analytics offers the warmest congratulations to our colleagues at MIT and Harvard, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics this week. Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo, and Michael Kremer were responsible for some of the earliest work applying state of the art, rigorous methods to assess the impact of the international development projects. ‘I have the highest admiration for these economists,’ say Christopher Cotton, the Principal Economist at Limestone and the Jarislowsky-Deutsch Chair in Economic and Financial Policy and Director of the John Deutsch Institute at Queen’s University. ‘They pioneered the use of rigorous scientific methods for learning about what works and what doesn’t in economic development. Their work has increased the standards for evaluation and the degree of accountability in the field.’

Most international development programs and projects undergo performance evaluation to assess how well a program was implemented. But the typical project stops short of doing a rigorous impact evaluation that carefully measures the impact the project on the outcomes of the communities and individuals they serve. The methods introduced by Banerjee, Duflo and Kremer help change this. Limestone Analytics is a Canadian and a U.S. consulting firm known for combining academic rigour and practical solutions to governments and organizations. We help our clients design right-fit evaluations for their projects and programs, maximizing learning and accountability while recognizing the practical constraints faced by implementers. Our team of academic and professional economists also builds on these tools to help organizations pursue innovative financing options that tie funding to evaluation.