Investing in People through Health and Education

Uttam Sharma recently joined the Center for Global Health Equity as an Impact Scholar. Sharma is an expert on the economics of education in developing countries. He has done extensive work on impact evaluations of various development interventions in Bangladesh, Kenya, Mongolia, Nepal, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda, particularly as they relate to educational outcomes.

As an Impact Scholar, Sharma is working on a variety of projects—including the Chitwan Valley Family Study—to apply his economics of education and impact evaluation knowledge and develop additional skills in health science research.

As Sharma continues these intriguing collaborations with colleagues across campus and the globe, we asked him a few questions to learn more about his perspectives on global health and how the intersections of health and education can advance equity.

Where did you grow up and what first got you interested in pursuing a career in health economics?

I was born and raised in a small town in the Western part of rural Nepal. From a young age, it was clear to me that health and education issues are closely related. I developed a strong interest in human capital topics while doing my doctoral research and further deepened it through the professional engagements that followed the completion of my PhD.

What is your main field of study and why did you choose it?

As an economist, I have conducted impact evaluations of diverse development interventions in Bangladesh, Kenya, Mongolia, Nepal, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda. These experiences have reinforced my desire to collaborate with interdisciplinary teams, particularly when addressing complex health issues that do not lend themselves to single-discipline solutions.

I am acutely aware of the contrasting perspectives held by researchers and government officials when it comes to development priorities.

In my view, the path to eradicating extreme poverty and fostering more inclusive societies hinges on investing in people. This includes providing them with proper nutrition and access to quality healthcare, education, and skills.

What is the central driving passion in your work?

Throughout my career, I have focused primarily on examining the impact of educational programs so they can more effectively support disadvantaged groups, such as those based on gender and socio-economic status.

I was part of teams in Nigeria and Uganda that implemented and evaluated education interventions. We interacted extensively with government officials and university researchers in these countries to assess the impact of tablets provided to students (Nigeria) and school facilities grants (Uganda). In East Africa, I’ve worked on programs examining nutritional outcomes. In Tanzania, I looked at livestock and crop production cycles to improve income security and nutrition for smallholder farmers. And in Kenya, we helped assess the impact of providing technology-adoption training to banana farmers to increase crop yields.

And in my home country of Nepal, I’ve worked closely with central and local governments, and with community schools, to improve teacher training and foundational skills in numeracy and literacy.

A central thread through all these initiatives is enhancing local capacity for research that can assess the value of interventions so communities in resource-limited settings can pivot as needed. I am convinced that investing in people—in their education and in their health—is far more cost effective than investing in physical capital to achieve specific economic goals, including improving income and reducing poverty. Teaching basic evaluation methods to local leaders, for example, is a sustainable way to augment a community’s ability to understand and maintain its resources.

How do you describe the impact of your work?

In addition to local capacity-building, I believe in the power of evidence-based policymaking. Whenever possible, I actively strive to bridge the gap between research findings and their translation into practical policies and initiatives. I am acutely aware of the contrasting perspectives held by researchers and government officials when it comes to development priorities.

Researchers tend to employ strictly analytical, evidence-based approaches to development, focusing on the underlying causes of problems and identifying solutions based on rigorous research. They tend to prioritize long-term impacts over short-term gains and often have more appetite for experimenting with new approaches. Government officials typically are constrained by bureaucratic processes and political considerations, often focusing more on implementing policies and programs that can deliver immediate results—especially in areas such as health and education.

The language used by one group may not be understood clearly by the other. But because researchers and government officials have important roles to play in the development process, establishing trust and understanding between them is vital to healthy communities. I am keen to explore how effective collaboration between the two can lead to more informed, impactful policies and programs.

Why Michigan and why the Impact Scholar program?

I am eager to deepen my experience in using research to reduce health inequalities and explore the intersections of health and education in improving the lives of people from disadvantaged groups.

At the University of Michigan, I have many opportunities to work collaboratively with faculty and staff researchers and multiple research centers to share and expand my expertise and experience. I’m particularly glad to be in a setting that is so committed to creating interdisciplinary project teams that want to take on seemingly intractable health problems.

I was also attracted to the many synergies that develop within the Impact Scholar cohort. We are encouraged to pay close attention to each other’s work and to cross-pollinate whenever it makes sense to do so. This program is an unusual opportunity to learn from other scholars’ expertise and experience not only in methodological matters but in figuring out how to better support the translation of research findings into policy and practice.