Course teached as: B019129 - AGRICULTURAL AND ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY EVALUATION LAB. Second Cycle Degree in ECONOMIC SCIENCES Curriculum SISTEMI PRODUTTIVI TERRITORIO SOSTENIBILITA'
Teaching Language
English
Course Content
This lab deals with common quantitative approaches for ex post policy analysis. The content focuses on causality and provides students with a statistical toolkit which will allow them to plan and conduct their own independent research using the main techniques of impact assessment from randomized experiments to instrumental variables. Students will learn how to use quantitative techniques in a very practical manner by solving assignments in Stata and writing referee reports.
• Gertler, P.J., Martinez, S., Premand , P., Rawlings, L.B., and Vermeersch, C.M.J., 2011. Impact Evaluation in Practice. Washington, D.C.: The World Bank.
• Khandker, S.R., Koolwal, G.B., and Samad, H.A., 2010. Handbook on Impact Evaluation. Quantitative Methods and Practices. Washington, D.C.: The World Bank
• Martini A., Sisto M. 2009. Valutare il successo delle politiche pubbliche, Bologna: Il Mulino
Learning Objectives
After attending the course students should be able to identify the main techniques of impact assessment and to understand and assess a technical report about the impact analysis of programmes or policies
Prerequisites
Basic statistics and econometric knowledges as well as some information about the Stata software are welcomed although not strictly necessary
Teaching Methods
This lab is taught once a week in standard classes, once a week in the lab with relatively simple examples in stata. Small group activities will be arranged as well such as reading and discussing papers, solving and discussing casual analysis or conterfactual exercises.
Standard classes: 16 hours
Small group activities: 8 hours
Practicals in the pc lab : 24 hours
Further information
All module materials (handouts, guidelines for small group activities, stata codes) are available on the Moodle platform. Please ask the convenor for the password
Type of Assessment
Course work (60% only for attending students) in small groups ( max 4 people):
a) give a small presentation of a referee report on a policy evaluation paper (pointing out the intervention logic, the main indicators used, the methods used to evaluate the impact, strengths and weaknesses of the evaluation exercise)
b) Solving a problem set with Stata
Final (40% for attending students, 100% for non attending students): with 2 open ended questions and a problem sets to be solved with stata ( time: 2 hours)
Course program
This lab deals with common quantitative approaches for ex post policy analysis. The content focuses on causality and provides students with a statistical toolkit which will allow them to plan and conduct their own independent research using the main techniques of impact assessment from randomized experiments to instrumental variables. Students will learn how to use quantitative techniques in a very practical manner by solving assignments in Stata and writing referee reports.