Imagine two government programs—a job training program and a job matching program—that perform equally well in terms of boosting employment outcomes. Now think about which is more cost-effective. If your answer is ‘no idea’ you’re not alone! Most of the time, we don’t have the cost evidence available to discern this important difference.

Today is World Soil Day, so it’s an opportune time to discuss some of the work 3ie has been supporting through our Agricultural Innovation Evidence Programme, which is jointly funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the UK Department for International Development.

Bridging divides, be they across ethnicities, religions, politics or, indeed, genders, is never easy.  There have been many books written about them, including some that made millions – for example, John Gray’s idea that men and women come from different planets, Mars and Venus respectively, is apparently the best-selling hard cover non-fiction book ever. One shouldn’t begrudge them because the payoffs – domestic or planetary peace – are high indeed.

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about (Oscar Wilde). Our recent review of community-driven development (CDD) is certainly being talked about. Sparked off by Duncan Green’s blog on our review, there has been an active debate about CDD on social media.

The last few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind. What I know is that HIV self-testing has finally made it. At this year’s International AIDS Society (IAS) Conference on HIV Science there were an array of posters, oral abstract presentations and satellite sessions on research related to HIV self-testing.