This study collects and systematizes detailed, updated and comparable information about the design, management, funding and quality of child development services in Latin America and the Caribbean. It focuses on two types of programs serving children from 0 to 3 years of age and their families: (a) those that provide child care through institutional and community modalities and (b) parenting programs.
This report details a comparative analysis of early learning guidelines (ELGs) for infants and toddlers less than 3 years of age in Latin America and the Caribbean. The 19 ELGs evaluated are utilized by 12 national and 7 regional programs located in 13 countries in the region. Three types of programs are included in this report: parenting programs (n=3), community centers (n=4) and child development centers (n=12). Two of the twelve child development center programs fall beyond the age range of this research (0-3 years) and are included as case studies.
The study reports on a randomized trial of 1,200 young adults enrolled in an employment training program, to determine the most cost-effective and appropriate interview mode for measuring youth risk behaviors. Four different survey administration modes -two interviewer-assisted (FTFI and CATI) and two self-administered modes (SAI and ACASI)-were randomly assigned.
This report systematizes existing knowledge of effective interventions in the area of juvenile sexual and reproductive health. Its goal is to provide information for designing effective programs, particularly those related to teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases and risky sexual behaviors in Latin America and the Caribbean. Drawing on rigorous evidence, this innovative tool provides background information on key characteristics and operational components of the various chosen interventions.
Guatemala is facing a health paradox. On the one hand, chronic child malnutrition rates are worse than those in Africa, and are quadruple the average rates for Latin America. On the other hand, obesity and overweight affect half of the country's women, and anemia has also increased at an alarming rate. The study addresses the topic of malnutrition in an innovative and pragmatic way and provides key recommendations for implementing much-needed nutrition interventions in Guatemala.
The Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region has experienced dramatic gains in health and life expectancy in the past century. Yet hundreds of millions of people in the region are still at risk of contracting at least one Neglected Tropical Disease (NTD), a class of diseases that cause chronic suffering and disabilities, impede physical and social development, and result in stigmatization of people living in poverty.
Social Pulse describes the trends in a comprehensive set of key social indicators and highlight findings that warrant attention by policymakers. The report includes information from 22 countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. In the first section of the document, "Reality and perspective of social conditions", the analysis of social indicators follows a life cycle framework. This section highlights that since before the global financial crisis erupted in 2008 the region ceased to be predominantly poor while the number of middle class people almost doubled in the last decade.
The advent of the knowledge society has highlighted the growing importance of innovation and intellectual assets as sources of competitiveness and long-term economic growth. This book examines human capital and financial inputs into innovation systems, scientific and innovation outputs, innovative behavior by firms, the links between changes in economic structure, technological intensity, and growth, institutional development and public policy, and the status of one key crosscutting and enabling technological revolution: information and communication technology.
In 2010, the IDB published The Imperative of Innovation, a survey of the status of science, technology, and innovation in the Latin American and Caribbean region. The regions technological progress was found to be uneven and insufficient, especially in relation to other regions of the world. The main purposes of this document are to present updated information and to introduce some of the new research and policy know-how accumulated in the course of IDB lending and technical assistance operations in science, technology, and innovation.
This document reviews the conditions for innovation in Latin America and the Caribbean and tackles the question of how innovation and technology can contribute to creating increased prosperity in these countries. The document is a contribution from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to the process of policy dialogue and identification of priorities to boost cooperation in science, technology and innovation between the European Union (EU) and Latin America and the Caribbean.