AidData Center for Development Policy

The AidData Center for Development Policy—a joint venture of AidData at William & Mary, Brigham Young University, the University of Texas at Austin, Development Gateway, and Esri—is a member of the Higher Education Solutions Network (HESN), a partnership between the U.S. Global Development Lab at USAID and development labs at seven top universities to revolutionize global development through science and innovation. Working in partnership with USAID country missions, host governments, civil society groups, and a network of affiliated researchers, the Center pinpoints the precise geographic locations of development projects and creates new tools and methods, like geospatial impact evaluations, to derive insights from this and other high-resolution spatial data on poverty, disease, violence, environmental degradation, and governance.

Over the past six years, the AidData Center for Development Policy and its network have collaborated with 33 USAID Missions, Bureaus, and Independent Offices to develop new geospatial data systems and technologies; to strengthen capacity to use geospatial data; and to perform innovative geospatial research and analysis. Through 13 different buy-ins to the HESN program, we've conducted geospatial data collection, research, and capacity-building activities worth more than $7.1 million.