Professor Ritam Chaurey awarded internal World Bank grant

Assistant Professor of International Economics Ritam Chaurey was awarded the Entrepreneurship for Development internal grant worth $450,000 funded by the infoDev, a multi-trust fund at the World Bank that supports entrepreneurs in developing economies.

The grant will be used to fund a joint project with Yunfan Gu, Gaurav Nayyar, and Siddharth Sharma from the World Bank that will examine the determinants of and barriers to adoption of an energy-efficient technology by Bangladeshi leather goods and footwear producers. Chaurey will also collaborate with Eric Verhoogen from Columbia University to conduct research.

Initially notified of the award last fall, Chaurey stated, “It is very gratifying to receive this grant. With the funding, we hope to be able to inform academic literature and policymakers about the importance of technology adoption by firms.”

Chaurey will balance teaching with conducting research in Bangladesh from May 2020 to summer 2021, and developing an academic paper highlighting the project’s findings by early 2022.