Different performance monitoring models are appropriate for different funders.
JPAL's Kamilla Gumede speaks at the Tshikululu Social Investments Serious Social Investing 2013 workshop.
2. Impact Investments
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Different definitions, agreed common goal
Produce change in people’s lives (and/or the environment) that
wouldn’t have happened otherwise
J P Morgan 2010 survey: 96% measure impacts
No common metric, evaluation standards
what happened (with the programme) …and
- what would have happened (without the programme)
= IMPACT of the programme
4. Why randomized evaluations?
Standard ways of measuring impact:
Changes over time
How do beneficiaries compare to non beneficiaries
But this does not distinguish impact of program from other
confounding factors
Children learn over time (with or without a program)
First to sign up for a program are not typical (e.g. microfinance)
Randomized evaluation ensures beneficiaries are
nodifferent from non beneficiaries (except for the program)
Many ways to introduce randomization that are
Ethical
Fit the needs of implementing agencies
Randomization is not always appropriate or necessary
5. Measuring and Preventing Corruption
Community Driven Development Program in Indonesia
(KDP)
Communities that had chosen feeder roads as their project
Villages randomized to get 100% chance of external audit
Others got intensified community oversight
Measure of corruption
Dug up small (random) sample of road
Measured how much construction material was used and
compared this to material in accounts
Threat of 100 percent audit reduced corruption
On average corruption fell by 8.5 percent
6. Remedial education
Massive improvements in primary school enrollment
Too many children are in school, but not learning
Grade progression, with basic literacy and numeracy skills
Remedial education can be fast, effective, relatively cheap
Key is to provide children more time to learn at their level
Tracking, holiday camps, some CAL can facilitate same results
Investment opportunity for replication in South Africa
WCED/Molteno holiday literacy camp
50 worse performing schools in Cape Town
30% perform at grade level
7. About us
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Established by 3 Professors of Economics at MIT, now a
network of 70 researchers throughout the world
Specialise in randomized evaluations to help fill
knowledge gap about what works
334 completed or ongoing evaluations, 31 countries
Education, health, labour, finance, governance, environment
We also work closely with policymakers to translate
evidence into policy
Online evidence database
Regional office for Africa, based at UCT
8. Rethinking conventional wisdom
Microfinance to help the poor help themselves
Success stories largely based on cliental numbers
Rigorous evaluation find modest benefits, only few
beneficiaries
Menstruation cups to get girls to go to school
Girls skip schools often, but they do so anytime of
the month
High take-up of menstruation cups, no school effects
Cookstoves and indoor air pollution
WHO estimate 2 million death pa from indoor air
pollution
High improved stove, but continued to use old one
and neglected maintenance
No significant health benefits
9. High impact investments
Mass in-school deworming of young children
Reduce absenteeism by 1/6, cost 50c per child per year
Long term gains into labour market entry
Inform girls about HIV prevalence rates for boys
and men
Cross-generational sexual is important driver of HIV
infections
Reduce teen pregnancies with older men by 65%, $1 per
student.
Smart incentives for farmers
Sell farmers fertilisers immediately after harvest
Strong usage of fertilisers
Female leaders
Reservations for women in India improved service delivery