News Releases

Dec 12, 2005

IDB fund announces program to support academic research on remittances

Call for doctoral dissertations, master’s theses and academic papers

The Multilateral Investment Fund today announced a program to foster academic research on the development potential of remittances. The competition is open to authors of doctoral dissertations and master’s theses in universities from the Inter-American Development Bank’s 47 member countries in the Western Hemisphere, Europe and Asia. Unpublished research produced by faculty in universities in Latin America and the Caribbean will also be eligible.

The MIF will award a first prize of $10,000 for the winning dissertation or thesis. Authors of papers with honorable mentions will receive $5,000, as will faculty whose research is selected. Preference will be given to papers that offer policy prescriptions for increasing the development impact of remittances to Latin America and the Caribbean.

Areas of interest include: remittance market structure and firm behavior; public authorities, policy environment and remittances; remittances and technology; productive uses and impacts of remittances; migrant households and remittances; financial inclusion and remittances; and remittances and human development.

A committee of experts from universities, research institutes and multilateral agencies in the United States, Japan, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Jamaica, Italy and Greece will select the winning works. The MIF plans to use these papers as chapters of a peer-reviewed book or as articles for a special edition of a future journal, Remittances and Development.

To be eligible for the competition, doctoral dissertations and master’s theses must have been completed between January 1, 2005 and December 31, 2006. New and unpublished academic research must be submitted on or before December 31, 2006. Papers may be submitted in any of the IDB’s four official languages (Spanish, Portuguese, French and English), although each submission will require a brief executive summary in English.

The MIF, an autonomous fund administered by the IDB, has been a pioneer in the study of remittances to Latin America and the Caribbean. Through its work the fund has helped stimulate competition among remittance service providers, leading to substantial reductions in the cost of money transfers to this region.

The MIF also supports projects to multiply the economic impact of remittances by helping migrants and their families gain access to the formal financial system as well as by assisting workers who wish to return to their homelands to start or invest in small businesses.

Also available in: Español