"Extreme poverty cannot be eradicated with good intentions alone: research is needed to find effective solutions". This was the opinion expressed by the Andalusian Full Professor of Economics Luis Ravina, at the presentation in Seville of the Institute for Culture and Society (ICS) of the University of Navarra. The event was attended by around 80 people.

Professor Ravina mentioned as an example a study carried out in Kenya that seeks to increase the issue of schools to increase the schooling rate of children: "It was shown that to get more children to go to high school the priority was not to allocate funds to build more schools, but to fight against diarrhea, as these serious stomach problems were one of the main reasons for absenteeism".

South Africa, Kenya and the Philippines

In its exhibition, the Full Professor has presented the main lines of the Navarra Center for International Development of the ICS, of which he is director. As he explained, the team focuses on three aspects that favor the development of peoples: migration, technology transfer (innovation) and the quality of institutions (corruption).

"So far we have focused on South Africa, Kenya and the Philippines, where there are cases of real need. Soon we want to go to Central America because poverty is closely related to problems of violence and drugs, and we want to contribute to the fight against them through science," he said.

Jaime García del Barrio, director general of the ICS, also spoke at presentation . He explained the keys to high school, in which fifty specialists of 17 nationalities are researching. He explained the eight lines of research of the ICS, which are grouped into four areas: Contemporary art; Family, Education and society; Globalization, human rights and interculturality; and Poverty and development.