07/06/2017 Migration Seminar with Dr. Theresa Beltramo

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Date/Time
Date(s) - 07/06/17
1:00 pm - 2:00 pm

Location
UNU-Merit, Boschstraat 24, Maastricht (Room 1.23)

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Next Wednesday, 7 June, we are very fortunate to welcome Dr. Theresa Beltramo as the next migration seminar speaker. The migration seminar series, which is offered jointly by MGSoG/UNU-MERIT in collaboration with MACIMIDE, features researchers and practitioners whose work addresses human mobility.

In the upcoming seminar, Dr. Theresa Beltramo (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) will present Reaching the Poor- Targeting Food and Multi-Sectoral Cash Transfers in Niger”. The seminar will be held from 13:00-14:00 in room 1.23 of the UNU-MERIT building at Boschstraat 24. A sandwich lunch will be provided.

Abstract: In order to prioritize a limited and shrinking budget in the face of increasing numbers of forcibly displaced peoples in Niger, UNHCR and WFP agreed to come up with a joint approach to target beneficiaries for cash, general food assistance, and livelihoods programming. As part of the technical support to the UNHCR Niger operation, we test different econometric methods- WFP’s existing methods, Prinicipal Components Analysis, and Proxy Means Testing- to apply to a census level data for all households in two sites in Niger. The results of this work have informed the nationwide strategy for targeting of assistance for more than 280,000 forced displaced peoples in Niger.

Speaker biography: Theresa Beltramo is the Senior Economist at UNHCR in the technical units which covers Energy, Environment, Livelihoods, and Durable Solutions. Some key responsibilities at UNHCR include providing technical support on assessment of impact of technical programs, designing methods for socio-economic assessments for targeting, and operationalizing UNHCR’s work towards a regional area based approach for forcibly displaced and the surrounding host communities. In her research she seeks to understand the economic lives of the poor, with the aim to help design and evaluate social and economic policies. She has worked on conditional cash transfers, employment generation, energy, environment, and health programs. Theresa’s first degree was in Anthropology followed by a Masters degree from Johns Hopkins SAIS in both Quantitative Economics & International Economics and a Ph.D. in Economics from Ca’ Foscari University.