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The author does not support the view that there has been an alarming downward trend in agricultural wages since the 1960s or that the contribution of technological change to labour demand has been strong. (ODA)

As the emphasis on evidence-based policymaking in international development increases, so too should the attention paid to the quality of the research on which this evidence is based. One way to encourage this is by archiving research data to enable reanalysis, but this requirement is often ignored or resisted by development researchers. Similarly, ambivalent feelings are expressed about revisits to former research sites to conduct further research by original and other researchers. In this article, we outline why and how researchers archive and reanalyze qualitative data and revisit research sites, and discuss the potential benefits and challenges of these practices for development research.

There is a growing demand for replications of authoritative works in development studies, which reflects recent trends in other social sciences as well as challenges to important quantitative works in development studies where replications have made contested contributions to understanding. At the same time, there is a strong trend within development towards adoption of medical models of evidence-based policy to find out what policies and interventions work. Replication is a key practice of medical (and natural science) research and was advocated frequently over several decades without success. This article addresses the incentives for replication going beyond a narrow focus on extrinsic rewards, reviews some significant examples, discusses behaviour during replication and draws lessons for replicators and replicatees.