Five country studies-on India, Indonesia, China, Thailand, and the Philippines-are edited (mid-2004) versions of papers presented at an internal workshop of the Asian Development Bank Institute, held in Tokyo in 2003. That workshop was part of an Institute project to study the effectiveness of various measures aimed at channeling resources directly at the poor and vulnerable to aid the Asia Development Bank, the Institute's parent organization, in its efforts to reduce poverty in Asia. A final paper on the impact of micro- finance institutions on poverty in Asia was presented at an Institute conference on microfinancing held in Tokyo in December 2003.