Related papers: High-Resolution Poverty Maps in Sub-Saharan Africa
We provide systematic evidence on the potential for estimating household well-being from mobile phone data. Using data from four countries - Afghanistan, Cote d'Ivoire, Malawi, and Togo - we conduct parallel, standardized machine learning…
High resolution datasets of population density which accurately map sparsely-distributed human populations do not exist at a global scale. Typically, population data is obtained using censuses and statistical modeling. More recently,…
Developing countries usually lack the proper governance means to generate and regularly update a national rooftop map. Using traditional photogrammetry and surveying methods to produce a building map at the federal level is costly and time…
Can mobile phone data improve program targeting? By combining rich survey data from a "big push" anti-poverty program in Afghanistan with detailed mobile phone logs from program beneficiaries, we study the extent to which machine learning…
Wide coverage and high-precision rural household wealth data is an important support for the effective connection between the national macro rural revitalization policy and micro rural entities, which helps to achieve precise allocation of…
The present study uses domain experts to estimate welfare levels and indicators from high-resolution satellite imagery. We use the wealth quintiles from the 2015 Tanzania DHS dataset as ground truth data. We analyse the performance of the…
Recently, mobile operators in many developing economies have launched "Mobile Money" platforms that deliver basic financial services over the mobile phone network. While many believe that these services can improve the lives of the poor, a…
African agriculture is undergoing rapid transformation. Annual maps of crop fields are key to understanding the nature of this transformation, but such maps are currently lacking and must be developed using advanced machine learning models…
Road networks are among the most essential components of a country's infrastructure. By facilitating the movement and exchange of goods, people, and ideas, they support economic and cultural activity both within and across borders.…
In many autonomous mapping tasks, the maps cannot be accurately constructed due to various reasons such as sparse, noisy, and partial sensor measurements. We propose a novel map prediction method built upon the recent success of Low-Rank…
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aim to resolve societal challenges, such as eradicating poverty and improving the lives of vulnerable populations in impoverished areas. Those areas rely on road infrastructure construction to…
High-resolution satellite-based crop yield mapping offers enormous promise for monitoring progress towards the SDGs. Across 15,000 villages in Rwanda we uncover areas that are on and off track to double productivity by 2030. This machine…
The Nested Error Regression Model with High-Dimensional Parameters (NERHDP) is extended to address challenges in small area poverty estimation. A robust and flexible framework is proposed to derive empirical best predictors (EBPs) of small…
Urbanization is a common phenomenon in developing countries and it poses serious challenges when not managed effectively. Lack of proper planning and management may cause the encroachment of urban fabrics into reserved or special regions…
Machine learning-based estimates of poverty and wealth are increasingly being used to guide the targeting of humanitarian aid and the allocation of social assistance. However, the ground truth labels used to train these models are typically…
Detailed population maps play an important role in diverse fields ranging from humanitarian action to urban planning. Generating such maps in a timely and scalable manner presents a challenge, especially in data-scarce regions. To address…
With the rapid expansion of mobile phone networks in developing countries, large-scale graph machine learning has gained sudden relevance in the study of global poverty. Recent applications range from humanitarian response and poverty…
Satellite-based slum segmentation holds significant promise in generating global estimates of urban poverty. However, the morphological heterogeneity of informal settlements presents a major challenge, hindering the ability of models…
Cell phone coverage and high-speed service gaps persist in rural areas in sub-Saharan Africa, impacting public access to mobile-based financial, educational, and humanitarian services. Improving maps of telecommunications infrastructure can…
In many rural areas of low- and middle-income countries, weekly gatherings of buyers and sellers are the most tangible manifestation of the market economy. Knowing these markets' whereabouts and activity over time could provide insights in…