PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT 2016 The Gender Trust Funds (GENTF) Program comprises all trust funds managed by the Gender Cross-Cutting Solutions Area. This report provides progress and results financed by these trust funds for the period July 2015 – June 2016. The report does not cover gender-specific and multi-purpose trust funds managed by other World Bank Group (WBG) global practices and cross-cutting solution areas. CONTENTS INTRODUCTION...................................................................................1 UMBRELLA FACILITY FOR GENDER EQUALITY.................................3 About the Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality....................................3 Results in 2016......................................................................................4 Delivering Global Knowledge..............................................................13 Supporting Regional Priorities..............................................................19 Engaging the Private Sector.................................................................27 Lessons and Opportunities...................................................................28 Administration and Finance.................................................................29 WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP IN SMALL..................................................47 AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES (WLSME) Progress and Early Findings..................................................................50 Knowledge and Learning....................................................................55 Administration and Finance.................................................................57 Annex 1: Implementation Updates......................................................59 Annex 2: Dissemination Activities........................................................68 Photo this page: Bart Verweij / World Bank Photo cover page: Paula Bronstein / Getty Images ABBREVIATIONS AFR Africa NGO Nongovernmental Organization CCSA Cross-Cutting Solutions Area (in the RAS Reimbursable Advisory Service World Bank Group) RGAP Regional Gender Action Plan CPF Country Partnership Framework SAR South Asia CSC Corporate Scorecard SCD Systematic Country Diagnostic CSO Civil Society Organization SDG Sustainable Development Goals EAP East Asia and the Pacific SGBV Sexual And Gender Based Violence EBRD European Bank for Reconstruction and SME Small And Medium Enterprises Development STEM Science, Technology, Engineering ECA Europe and Central Asia and Math FAO Food and Agriculture Organization UFGE Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality FY Fiscal Year USAID United States Agency for International GBV Gender-Based Violence Development GENTF Gender Trust Funds Program WBG World Bank Group GIL Gender Innovation Lab WDR World Development Report GP Global Practice (in the World Bank Group) WLSME Women’s Leadership in Small and Medium Enterprises IBRD International Bank for Reconstruction and Development IDA International Development Association IFC International Finance Corporation IPV Intimate Partner Violence LAC Latin America and the Caribbean MENA Middle East and North Africa M&E Monitoring and Evaluation MDTF Multidonor Trust Fund Photo: Paula Bronstein / Getty Images INTRODUCTION Fiscal year 2016 was a landmark year for gender equality at the World Bank Group (WBG) and in the international development community more broadly. In December of 2015 the World Bank Group approved the first ever Strategy for Gender Equality, Poverty Reduction, and Inclusive Growth. The strategy recognizes that stronger and better-resourced efforts are needed to address key gaps between females and males in access to jobs and control over productive assets, and seeks to address this challenge by deepening the analytical and operational focus in these areas. The strategy also seeks to maximize the impacts of WBG efforts to close gender gaps in key development outcomes by steering activities and their monitoring towards measurable and meaningful results. In the same year, International Development Association (IDA) donors acknowledged that while progress toward closing gender gaps has been made, significant unfinished business remains. By identifying gender equality as a special theme for the third consecutive replenishment, the IDA Deputies underscored the importance of maintaining focus on gender equality and setting robust, results-oriented targets that are both ambitious and meaningful. During this period, United Nations Member States also reaffirmed and strengthened their commitment to gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls as a critical element for making progress across all 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs aim to achieve gender equality as a goal in and of itself (SDG5), and through specific targets and indicators that are monitored in each of the other 16 goals. This unwavering high-level political support is essential. At the same time, the challenges that must be overcome to achieve these targets and goals should not be underestimated. A common thread running through this discourse over the past year is the call for gender and sex-disaggregated data to inform diagnostics, evidence on what works to address the gaps once they have been diagnosed, and resources needed to invest in solutions that work. The World Bank’s Gender Trust Fund Program (GENTF) is well placed to channel investments in these areas and has a solid track record of contributing to global, regional, and country level knowledge, data, and evidence. As of June 2016, the GENTF Program totaled over $75 million in commitments and comprised two main trust funds (Table 1): The Women’s Leadership in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (WLSME) and the Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality (UFGE). PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 1 TABLE 1. GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM Pledges Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality $72,324,842 Multi-donor Women’s Leadership in Small and Medium Enterprises $3,500,000 Single-donor Total $75,824,842 The GENTF Program provides crucial financial resources that enable World Bank Group staff to engage in areas where investments are much needed, such as new analytical work to better understand labor force behavior of women 45 and over in East Asia, new data on female land ownership in the Western Balkans and forest tenure in China, and new evidence on how to equip female entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses. These resources not only improve the effectiveness of the WBG’s project design and policy advice, they also contribute to expanding the global knowledge base on what works (and what does not work) to close economic gaps between men and women and partners’ take up of this knowledge. Fiscal year 2017 promises to be an exciting year for the GENTF. With a full program of activities underway, new knowledge and evidence can be expected over the coming year. The WLSME program will be developing policy messages regarding support for women entrepreneurs, based on the 12 impact evaluations it is supporting, before the program comes to a close in December 2016. The UFGE will hold its first thematic workshop on care services in low and middle income economies, as well as continue efforts to ensure that its work is reflected in the WBG’s lending, technical assistance, and analytical work. Finally, we will be asking our donors to renew their support for the UFGE so that we can continue to raise the bar higher and push the agenda farther by equipping policy makers and development experts with data, knowledge, and evidence needed to address critical gaps between males and females. In the meantime, this report provides an overview of the work funded by the GENTF program between July 2015 and June 2016. The following sections highlight progress and achievements under the program’s two active trust funds during this period. We hope you will find the resources contained within useful in your work and will share them widely with others in the field. 2 Photo: Charlotte Kesl / World Bank UMBRELLA FACILITY FOR GENDER EQUALITY The Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality (UFGE) is a multi-donor facility designed to strengthen awareness, knowledge, and capacity for gender-informed policy making. The UFGE promotes results by equipping policy makers and development experts with data, knowledge, and evidence. The UFGE was established in July 2012 and has received $72 million in pledges from 13 donors. ABOUT THE UMBRELLA FACILITY FOR GENDER EQUALITY The Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality (UFGE) is an important catalyst for work that pushes frontiers of knowledge on gender equality and promotes smart policy and project design. This is achieved by investing in public goods that maximize returns on development finance and act as a catalyst for innovation and multi-sectoral solutions. The UFGE promotes collaboration and knowledge sharing within the World Bank Group—many UFGE grants are implemented by two or more Global Practices—and promotes external partnerships with UN agencies, multilateral development banks, local organizations, and civil society. Activities are being carried out by 11 of the WBG’s 14 Global Practices1 and the International Finance Corporation (IFC). A total of 85 activities2 in nearly 60 countries across all regions, 34 of which are IDA eligible, have received funding. This includes work that: Improves availability and access to data and advances data collection methodologies. In 46 countries, UFGE • funded activities are measuring access to and ownership of assets, as well as harmonizing indicators that enable new gender-specific analysis of agency, household poverty, and old-age poverty. Energy & Extractives, Water, and Macro & Fiscal Policies are not currently involved in UFGE activities. 1 25 of these have closed out their grants. 2 PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 3 Deepens understanding of the key drivers of gender inequality. Over 30 grants are analyzing under-examined • issues such as unpaid work and care responsibilities, gender-based violence, and forced displacement, and generating lessons on how to operationalize these in the World Bank Group’s work. Rigorously evaluates what works and what doesn’t. 43 impact evaluations of replicable and scalable approaches • are being supported, largely through Gender Innovation Labs (GIL) in five regions. In the past year the UFGE supported the launch of the East Asia and the Pacific Lab (see page 8). The following sections provide an overview of 1) the past year’s results, 2) knowledge and learning outputs, 3) how the UFGE is strengthening delivery of Regional Gender Action Plans, and 4) efforts to engage the private sector. The final two sections reflect on trust fund implementation lessons and opportunities and summarize administrational and financial aspects. RESULTS IN 2016 2016 saw the launch of the first World Bank Group Gender Equality Strategy and renewal of two Regional Gender Action Plans.3 The consultations surrounding these and subsequent priority setting relied to a great extent on UFGE-supported research and evidence, and initiatives often served as examples of work to be adopted more systematically across the institution. We continue to see promising examples of this with World Bank Group lending increasingly integrating prevention and response to gender-based violence, and ways to tackle constraints to women’s labor force participation across the lifecycle, based on solid evidence of what has worked. In the past year, the UFGE results framework was reviewed and strengthened, retaining its original development objective—to strengthen awareness, knowledge, and capacity for gender-informed policy making and programs in three outcome areas: • Better gender-informed policy making at the country level • Improved design of operations and programs • Heightened awareness and demand for gender equality interventions Specific indicators for each of these outcomes were revised and the framework in its entirety can be found on page 33. The following section highlights cumulative results and progress under each of the three outcome areas over the past year. Outputs produced by the UFGE are described in the subsequent section on Delivering Global Knowledge (page 13). BETTER GENDER-INFORMED POLICY MAKING AT THE COUNTRY LEVEL Using new data and analytics, teams are able to strengthen diagnostics and highlight how closing key gender gaps in endowments, economic opportunities, and voice and agency at the country level will boost the attainment of the twin goals of ending extreme poverty and boosting shared prosperity. In fiscal year 2016 teams with completed research presented findings to their government clients and local stakeholders, WBG teams whose operations would benefit from the new knowledge, and teams engaged in the development of Systematic Country Diagnostics (SCD) in an effort to deepen country dialogue.4 Results to-date (2013-2016), outcome indicator 1.  olicy dialogue in 20 countries has been informed by UFGE supported evidence, data, P and/or analytical work. In FY16 RGAPs were finalized in SAR and LAC and work was underway in AFR, EAP, ECA, and MNA. 3  4 In FY16 findings were used to inform diagnostics in 10 SCD countries: Albania, Brazil, Kosovo, Niger, Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, and engagements with Armenia, Georgia, Malawi and Zambia were initiated (to be largely carried out in FY17). 4 Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images Study on maternity leave policies was used as a basis for consultations with the Government of Kosovo on reform of labor law. The analysis provided evidence and benchmarking against other countries that supported efforts to lighten the burden that employers face in financing maternity leave. Study on care in ECA has been used in dialogue with several clients and has informed a Reimbursable Advisory Service (RAS) in Estonia. The study reveals the limited attention paid to informal care and the risk of reducing women’s access to economic opportunities, decelerating future economic growth, as well as undermining achievement of other policy objectives such as increased investment in human capital. New data on the patient-client perspective helps the Lao PDR’s Ministry of Health improve maternal health services. The UFGE supported survey of a nationally-representative sample of 120 public health centers is serving as a baseline to better understand supply-side constraints for health sector reform as the country moves to expand basic health services and attain universal health coverage. Findings identify ways to improve women’s employment opportunities as part of efforts to increase health services utilization. Despite most health workers being female, an unusually high percent of deliveries are performed by male workers which may affect women’s utilization of such services. St. Lucia enterprise survey now includes questions on gender and disaster risk management. As part of a broader engagement on measuring household vulnerability to disasters, UFGE analytical work and capacity building of the Central Statistics Office uncovered new evidence on the differential poverty related impacts of climate disasters on men and women. For example, vulnerable female-headed households demonstrated the highest level of demand for climate adaptation finance, yet were the least able to afford it, maintained the lowest levels of home and land ownership, and relied more heavily on alternative sources of income, namely, remittances. IMPROVED DESIGN OF OPERATIONS AND PROGRAMS The UFGE contributes to better alignment and deepening of approaches in WBG operations to close key gaps between males and females that have been identified through the country engagement framework. This is done through deepening the analysis in Country Partnership Frameworks (CPF), providing technical assistance to projects, and strengthening design and implementation of WBG operations with new data, research, and impact evaluation results. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 5 In FY16 CPF teams in Mauritius, Sri Lanka, and Uganda drew on work supported by the UFGE.5 In the case of Uganda, Africa Gender Innovation Lab supported preparation of the CPF by integrating analysis, evidence from an impact evaluation on the Empowerment and Livelihood for Adolescents (ELA) program, research on factors that allow some women to cross over into male-dominated sectors, and analysis of the gender gap in agricultural productivity. The GIL also supported effective implementation of gender-relevant aspects of the CPF by providing gender clinics for operations staff in the Uganda country office. Results to-date (2013-2016), outcome indicator 2. A total of 12 WBG projects have directly applied UFGE funded evidence, data, analytical work, or approaches. Increasing and strengthening integration of prevention and response to gender-based violence in World Bank lending: In Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, a UFGE-funded qualitative study aimed to strengthen and sustain the impact of an innovative initiative using information kiosks in SuperVia metro stations to give women access to resources and information on services for victims of gender-based violence. The study’s findings are being used to accelerate the installation of informational kiosks, increase usage, improve their impact on access to services, and strengthen the link between information about gender-based violence legislation and local action. Some of the measures include broadening totem content to include services other than those intended for victims of gender-based violence to reduce the stigma associated with using the totem; advertising the offerings of the kiosks on trains and in stations; creating a topic of the month as an incentive for return; and simplifying the language and content focus. In Honduras, the Safer Municipalities Project (P130819) is adapting a successful community-based approach to address intimate partner violence (IPV). SASA! is a well-known community-based intervention that has achieved a 52 percent reduction in physical violence and a 33 percent reduction in sexual violence committed against women by a partner in Uganda. The project draws on a recently published review of evidence and adaptation tool funded by the UFGE (see list of publications, page 16). The lessons from these efforts will be shared in the coming fiscal year to help similar projects adapt multi-sectoral, community-based approaches (see page 25). This is the first country in Latin America that has adapted the SASA! model. The Ministry of Security, the Institute of Community Development, Water and Sanitation (IDECOAS), and Raising Voices have signed a Memorandum of Understanding for implementation. Photo: Juan Arredondo / Getty Images To date nine Country Partnership Frameworks have been informed by UFGE supported work. 5 6 In South Asia, the UFGE-supported GBV program is working with WBG operations in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, and Nepal to integrate prevention and response in areas such as health, tourism, and livelihoods. For example, in Bangladesh, the Northern Areas Reduction of Poverty Project (NARI) has incorporated a focus on GBV in its life skills training. In addition to learning about how to open a bank account, set up a housing contract and how to present themselves to an employer, the young women participating in the garment sector training program also learn about the resources available to them to protect themselves from sexual harassment in the workplace. Opening up new economic opportunities for women through WBG lending: As a result of evidence from the Africa Gender Innovation Lab, more projects are taking a comprehensive approach to improving opportunities for young women. The $63 million Republic of Congo Skills Development for Employability Project builds on evidence from the Liberia Economic Empowerment of Adolescent Girls (EPAG) project by offering the choice of a job track or entrepreneurship track (with more spaces in the latter) and offering additional financial support to young mothers to facilitate program participation. The impact evaluation will also investigate the impact of an information intervention to promote the uptake of non-traditional trades for young women. Lessons from adolescent girls projects in Liberia and Uganda have also contributed to design of the India Tejaswini Socioeconomic Empowerment of Adolescent Girls & Young Women project. The project offers a comprehensive package of activities for girls aged 14 to 24, including community-based social support, life skills education, business skills, and vocational training. The program is based in part on evidence from the Liberia EPAG showing that employment and livelihood programs that provide complementary services and tailored recruitment strategies are more effective in increasing earnings and employment than more traditional approaches that focus only on training. In addition, the ELA evaluation in Uganda demonstrated the positive impacts of combining safe spaces, soft skills training, and hard skills training on girls’ social and economic empowerment. The Tejaswini project intends to reach 400,000 beneficiaries over five years. Nicaragua’s Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure (MTI) is incorporating recommendations from the UFGE funded study Roads to Agency (see publications, page 16) to enhance women’s employment in the IDA-financed follow-up operation, the Rural and Urban Access Improvement Project currently under preparation. Adjustments will address the following: 1) removing barriers to women’s participation as identified by the Nicaragua study – unpreparedness, childcare constraints, and lack of information; 2) reducing gender-segregation in assignment of tasks along with technical training and gender- sensitization for project staff; and 3) enhancing long-term job prospects for women by converting the project’s community- run modules that perform routine road upgrades into small maintenance micro-enterprises. HEIGHTENED AWARENESS AND DEMAND FOR GENDER EQUALITY INTERVENTIONS Results to-date (2013-2016), outcome indicator 3. Four country requests for new or expanded engagement with the WBG have resulted from UFGE work. UFGE-supported pilot to become an integrated helpline for survivors of violence against women in Nepal. In 2016 the Integrated Platform for Gender-Based Violence Prevention and Response in Nepal (P155096) was approved with financing by the State and Peace Building Fund. The project is scaling up an ICT-based pilot, initially developed and tested with UFGE funding, into an integrated helpline. The project’s focus is to create a comprehensive response system with a 24-hour helpline that brings together providers of support services to GBV survivors while keeping information confidential and adopting a do no harm approach for survivors. The original award-winning pilot, Fight Violence against Women (FightVAW), was developed in collaboration with the IFC. Georgia requested a behavioral intervention campaign to tackle son preference. UFGE-supported research on the drivers of the country’s skewed sex ratio helped place the issue on the country’s policy agenda, ultimately resulting in a project using behavioral interventions. The study cautions against direct short-term efforts such as medical bans, recommending to focus policies on addressing aspirations, improving women’s resilience, economic empowerment, PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 7 as well as efforts to change gender stereotypes. The project is being piloted with a rigorous evaluation in cooperation with the United National Population Fund (UNFPA), and further co-financing from the UFGE. The Government of Sri Lanka has requested WBG’s engagement to help improve female labor force participation and other labor market outcomes for women in the country. In response, the South Asia Gender Lab has conducted diagnostic research to update the World Bank’s 2013 AusAID-funded report, Getting In and Staying In: Increasing Women’s Labor Force Participation in Sri Lanka. The updated analysis suggests that women’s participation—which, at 35 percent, remains less than half of men’s participation—will require concerted efforts to address gender norms and other drivers of low FLFP that discourage women from acquiring marketable skills, from seeking work or returning to the workforce after marriage and childbirth, and from taking advantage of unmet labor demand in the private sector. In order to address these multiple drivers, Sri Lanka Country Management has devoted $100,000 in Bank Budget for FY17 to develop a gender platform that uses female labor force participation as an entry point to operationalize research findings in the country portfolio’s relevant sector operations. BOX 1: EVIDENCE ON WHAT WORKS The World Bank Group’s Gender Strategy for 2016-2023 stresses the need to understand what works in closing primarily economic gaps between men and women. Systematically identifying good practices, assessing their effectiveness in different contexts, and building on successful approaches are essential to reduce inequalities between men and women. To address these gaps, the new Gender Strategy supports the establishment of Gender Innovation Labs (GILs) in all six World Bank Group regions. The UFGE currently supports GILs in Africa, South Asia, East Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as stand-alone impact evaluations in all other regions. The GILs have three primary objectives: to build a knowledge base through impact evaluations and inferential research; to identify what works and what does not; and to ensure that lessons are fed back into the design of programs and policies, including the World Bank Group’s lending operations. GILs work with project teams from the beginning of projects to inform project design, to measure progress, and to identify scalable, operational solutions that can be replicated. In addition, the GILs promote learning across countries and regions, build capacity, and make critical contributions to the global knowledge base, by filling knowledge gaps and identifying what works and why. In an attempt to document and monetize the influence of the first GIL that was established in the Africa region in 2011, the team found that for every $1 the GIL spent, $46 of program funds were directly influenced. The Africa GIL has supported more than 50 evaluations in over 20 countries, focused on agriculture, entrepreneurship and employment, and land and property rights. In FY 2016, the lab initiated four new impact evaluations in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Uganda, and Zambia. Given the lack of existing evidence, most of the Africa GIL’s impact evaluations are “proof of concept” studies that test unproven interventions, and confirm the existence of hypothesized constraints. In addition to evaluating the intervention’s intended impact, each impact evaluation generates findings on operational success, areas for improvement, cost-effectiveness, and feasibility to scale-up or to replicate. The Africa GIL also conducts qualitative research to support and complement its impact evaluations. For instance, qualitative research in the context of the Republic of Congo Skills Development for Employability project focuses on underlying causes of occupational sex segregation to document the opportunities, challenges, and strategic choices made by youth when searching for employment, with a special focus on young women seeking to work in male dominated trades. The East Asia and the Pacific GIL (EAPGIL) was launched in FY 2016, with three focus areas intended to improve women’s economic opportunities: (1) removing barriers to productivity for women farmers and entrepreneurs; (2) reducing trade-offs between women’s household and market roles; and (3) enhancing women’s skills. The first call for expressions of interest was announced in September 2016 for impact evaluations on improving women’s 8 economic opportunities, particularly in: i) agricultural productivity; ii) entrepreneurship; iii) skills development; and iv) balancing domestic and market roles. The initial focus of the EAPGIL is on Myanmar, Cambodia, Vietnam, Lao PDR, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, and Timor Leste, but as additional resources come available, the EAPGIL plans to expand to the rest of developing countries in the region. In addition, the EAPGIL’s inferential research program is already underway with four areas of work: gender gaps in agricultural productivity in Cambodia, Vietnam and Timor-Leste; gender gaps in entrepreneurship in Southeast Asia; intra-household bargaining on care and labor market decisions in Indonesia; and aspirations, ability and labor market streaming in Vietnam. The Latin America and the Caribbean GIL has supported 13 impact evaluation in seven countries, focused on exploring strategies to boost and measure women’s voice and agency and improving women’s economic opportunities. In El Salvador, a UFGE-supported qualitative evaluation of the Temporary Income Support Program (PATI) which combines income support with training to develop participants’ skills and enhance their agency to find productive employment. The study found that the program attracted some of its intended population (less educated female household heads) but fewer youth, due to poor incentives for participation. The program increased labor force participation and job readiness perceptions among women, but showed no evidence of sustained outcomes in economic capabilities, likely due to insufficient life skills training. As a result, the importance of the right skills training for youth development programs was highlighted in El Salvador’s 2015 SCD and CPF. Ongoing research on the Productive Inclusion in Rural Areas in Northeast Brazil project aims to determine why women producers do not benefit equally from agricultural extension and poverty reduction programs, and to identify the constraints to women’s productive inclusion in Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil. The Via Lilas program on preventing and mitigating GBV in public transit in Rio de Janeiro is planning a second impact evaluation on segregated car policies, in order to inform future urban transport operations. The South Asia GIL focuses on three thematic areas that reflect the priorities of the SAR RGAP and the WBG gender strategy: tackling gender gaps in access to infrastructure; improving economic opportunities, particularly female labor force participation; and enhancing voice and agency with a focus on GBV. The SAR GIL has nine ongoing impact evaluations of WBG operations in Bangladesh, India, and Nepal, and six diagnostic studies in Bangladesh, India, and Sri Lanka. In India, the SAR GIL enhanced the 2014 Kerala Migration Survey to include attitudes concerning women’s economic empowerment, gender-based violence, and decision-making in the household. The findings from this work have informed a WBG-supported local governance project in Kerala, and indicate that incidence of domestic violence is higher when measured with list randomization compared to direct questioning, and that returning migrants appear to reflect more conservative views on the role of women than non-migrants. In a study to better understand the low female labor participation in India, the SAR GIL found that labor participation fell by 19.6 million women between 2004 and 2012, with young rural women being most affected. The findings indicate that increases in regular wage earners and declines in casual labor has led to women leaving the workforce and suggest that conventional approaches, such as education and skill development, should be complemented with policies that promote female employment. Photo: Paula Bronstein / Getty Images PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 9 TABLE 2. OUTPUTS AND RESULT HIGHLIGHTS FROM COMPLETED GRANTS 2013-2016 Grants Outputs Results Africa Regional Report on Gender and Agriculture: Report with scalable policy actions to The Western Growth Poles Project Levelling the Field support women farmers in Africa. (P124720) in DRC and IDA-funded Agricultural Support Project (P119308) in Cote d’Ivoire are using impact evaluations to test two policy actions recommended by the report. East Asia and the Pacific Pacific Gender Indicators in Fisheries Data collection and a report titled Toward Informed IFC engagement with SolTuna, Gender-Equitable Fisheries Management in and has led to more data collection and the Solomon Islands analytical work as well as client capacity building by IFC. The report will help to inform the IDA and GEF financed Pacific Islands Regional Oceanscape Program (PROP), specifically in Solomon Islands. It will also help inform the PROP investment program in other participating countries. Female Labor Force Participation Policy Research Working Paper on the Analysis included in a regional flagship and Care in China relationship between long-term care and report Live Long and Prosper and report women's work, and literature review on on China Aged Care and has informed the caring transfers and women's work. Global Monitoring Report on demographics published for the Annual Meetings in 2015, the 2015 EAP Regional Update, as well as the Economic Monitor for Thailand and Vietnam. Informed public dialogue on aging and long-term care in China, which has resulted in a lending request for the China Anhui Aged Care System Demonstration Project (P154716), and a planned multi-province P4R operation on aged care in China. Informal Trade Facilitation A study and survey of small and informal Policy recommendations informed the in the Mekong Subregion traders at border checkpoints between Laos, dialogue with customs departments in Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam. both Lao PDR and Cambodia through the ongoing trade programs. “Hem No Leit Tumas”: Evidence for A report on improved outcomes for women’s Informed policy dialogue in Solomon Improved Outcomes in Women’s literacy program in Solomon Islands. Islands through MEHRD’s facilitation of the Literacy Programs consultative Post-School Literacy Strategy and implementation agenda, and led to the government allocating more funds towards Adult Literacy Programs. Situation Assessment for Men and Youth A study and a situational assessment of Informed the Expanding Community in Conflict-Affected Areas young and adult men impacted by conflict Approaches in Conflict Situations project in southern Thailand. in Thailand (P147089). Generating Evidence on Supply-Side Three policy notes and a consultation Informed the design of the Health Capacity to Inform the National Free workshop on healthcare in Lao PDR. Governance and Nutrition Development Maternal and Child Health Policy in Lao PDR Project (P151425), preparations for SCD, and other analytical work in Lao PDR. 10 Grants Outputs Results Europe and Central Asia Missing Girls in the South Caucasus Working paper and knowledge brief Informed Georgia SCD and CPF and a published with findings and lessons on how follow-up behavioral intervention campaign to tackle norms and behaviors related to son requested by client to tackle son-preference. -preference and to promote gender equality and the value of girls. Gender Aging and Care Issues in ECA Working paper on the role of informal  ackground research and methodology B childcare and eldercare in aging societies in informed RAS in Estonia, Poland, and Chile. the ECA. Main findings included in regional report on aging titled, Golden Aging: Informed the SCD and CPF in Serbia.  Prospects for Healthy, Active, and Prosperous I nformed the ongoing policy dialogue on Aging in Europe and Central Asia. the expansion of childcare services in Kosovo, and aging and care in Poland. Gender Sensitivity in Report and toolkit to better understand Informed policy dialogue in Kyrgyz Republic Energy Investments (ECA) social issues in energy tariff and subsidy and Belarus, and the preparatory process for reforms in ECA. SCDs in Bulgaria, Romania, and Ukraine. Informed eight country-level PSIAs, and WBG projects, such as the Energy Supply Accountability (P133556) and Energy Sector DPO (P152550) in Kyrgyz Republic; Armenia Electricity Supply Reliability (P148102); Belarus Biomass District Heating (P146194); Uzbekistan Impact of Energy Subsidies (P153801); and EU11 Programmatic Energy Affordability (P147497).  eport, key findings, and recommendations R are also part of a WBG Open Learning Campus Institute’s e-Course on Gender and Energy, and informed a regional report, titled Adapting to Higher Energy Costs. Roma Adolescents – Qualitative Research A report on the situation of Roma Informed the design and diagnostics of adolescent boys and girls, compared to the Roma adolescents' initiative (EW) Serbian youth. (forthcoming). Gender Innovation in Finance (Russia) A report on female entrepreneurs and access This report was meant to support a potential to finance in Russia. IFC project on women entrepreneurs in Russia but as the geopolitical environment in Russia worsened, the project was cancelled and the dissemination efforts of the UFGE- funded grant were curbed. A Profiling of Employment Services A policy note and an improved modeling The new modeling tool was delivered to Beneficiaries in Armenia and Turkey with a tool to profile job seekers, with a focus the Public Employment Services of Turkey Focus on Female Workers on women, and to provide them better (the grant was restructured to solely assistance. focus on Turkey). PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 11 Grants Outputs Results Land and Gender: Improving Gender-disaggregated data on Informed policy dialogue in all seven data availability and use in the property ownership for Western countries on how to promote an increase in Western Balkans Balkan countries. the registration of property to women, and in addition, informed SCDs in Albania and Kosovo. nfluenced the project design of a new I WBG land administration project in Serbia, and helped to standardize the practice of reporting gender disaggregated data information as part of land administration projects, for example: Kosovo RECAP (P101214), Serbia REMP (P147050), and Macedonia REC Additional Financing (P119698). The developed methodology for preparing gender disaggregated statistics is part of the measuring and monitoring discussions for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). Land and Leadership in Western Balkans Two working papers and three regional Informed policy dialogue and World Bank conferences to design and present country Group-financed land administration projects action plans to improve women’s land rights in the region, and has created new demand in six countries in Western Balkans. to address gender and property rights in the Western Balkans. Life in Transition Survey III Updated database. Grant closed (financed survey) but analysis ongoing with results to be made available in FY17, along with data and survey tools. Access to Justice for Poor Women Report and data collection (survey and focus Informed SCD and policy dialogue in Serbia, and Men group discussions) on poor women’s and and informed the Government's Chapter men’s access to justice in Serbia. 23 Action Plan for EU accession that will be translated into public policies. Latin America and the Caribbean Text Me Maybe! On Peer-to-Peer Sexual Impact evaluation, data collection, Informed country dialogue about teenage Education and Mobile Texting to Reduce the and report. pregnancy. Risk of Teenage Pregnancy in Ecuador Led to the Chimborazo Development Investment Project (P094784) to adopt an SMS component to improve children’s nutrition; and a project by the municipality of Quito to adopt the peer-to-peer component to work on social issues of at- risk youth. Understanding Agency by Measuring Report and a perception survey on gender Informed SCD, CPF of Bolivia, and a regional Women’s Perception on Exclusion and and ethnicity in Bolivia. flagship report, titled Indigenous Latin Discrimination in Bolivia America in the Twenty-First Century: The First Decade. Migration and the Changing Role of Women Report and survey on the impacts of male- Informed policy dialogue in Guatemala on in Agriculture: The Case from Latin America out migration on agriculture and women’s gender and agriculture. and the Caribbean agency in Guatemala. Strategic UFGE Allocation: Adolescent Impact evaluation, report, and videos on a Informed the LAC regional gender strategy Girls Initiative in Haiti pilot program aimed to foster labor market and the SCD about jobs for vulnerable opportunities for young women in Haiti. groups, gender gaps, and GBV. Informed country dialogue on issues, such as youth inclusion, skill-development, and labor market programs. 12 Grants Outputs Results Advancing Gender Agency in LAC: Roads to Agency report. Informed the policy dialogue in Nicaragua Experiences from the Transport Sector and strengthened the design of a follow- up project titled Rural and Urban Access Improvement Project in Nicaragua (P160359). Developing a Model for Gender-Sensitive A gender-informed household demand Informed the design of a national survey Post-Disaster Response and Gender-Inclusive assessment and a marketing strategy on climate change adaptation and the Climate Adaptation Finance in St. Lucia published in the Operations Manual of development of an outreach plan to finance Climate Adaptation Finance Facility (CAFF). household upgrades. Capacity building for the Central Statistics Office in St. Lucia. Informed the CAFF component of the Saint Lucia Disaster Vulnerability Reduction Project (P127226), and upcoming ACP-EU technical assistance project on the impacts of disasters on poverty. Middle East and Northern Africa Enterprise Revitalization and Employment Data collection and working paper to Outbreak for civil war caused he second Pilot in Yemen evaluate a youth internship program wave of the internship program to be in Yemen. cancelled—based on the limited data, a paper was published but policy dialogue not possible. DELIVERING GLOBAL KNOWLEDGE The UFGE’s main outputs are knowledge-based—research, data, impact evaluations, and client capacity building—which are made available through publications and knowledge sharing events and training. To date, over 30 reports, working papers, and knowledge briefs have been published (see Table 3, page 16), and five regional World Bank Group publications have drawn on these UFGE-funded publications. Findings of these publications have been shared through country-level and regional dissemination, as well as in headquarters and online. Highlights from fiscal year 2016 are given below. Closing knowledge gaps: In fiscal year 2016 the UFGE supported nine published reports and working papers, and four knowledge briefs highlighting new research on frontier issues and persistent gender gaps. These are listed in Table 3, page 16 and include: A new study on the status of women in China’s forest sector reform and the need to improve women’s access to • forestland rights and participation in decision making, partly in light of their greater role when men migrate to cities (see Box 4, page 21). The Case for Community Mobilization interventions to Prevent Intimate Partner Violence: A Review of Evidence (report), • focuses on the promising and tested approaches to the most prevalent form of violence against women globally, and includes a methodological annex on adapting community-based interventions to a particular country context. (see Box 6, page 25).  ender, Mobility and Middle Class in Europe and Central Asia: Insights from Qualitative Research (report) draws on •G interviews with the employed and jobless to understand differences in how these men and women are responding to lacking jobs and the rising cost of living. The report shows women are increasing their economic contribution to households as men face increased hardships, but often through low-end jobs with little protection and potential for mobility. Restrictive norms also push women out of the labor force to meet caretaking needs. The report points to needs for affordable and accessible care services and strategic programs to support women in economic leadership or to enter more productive sectors. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 13 Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images  ormalizing Rural Land Rights in West Africa: Early Evidence from a Randomized impact Evaluation in Benin (working •F paper) presents early evidence from the first large-scale randomized-controlled trial of a land formalization program. It examines links between land demarcation and investment in rural Benin in light of insecure tenure. The paper finds female-managed landholdings in treated villages are more likely to be left fallow—an important soil fertility investment. Women further respond to exogenous tenure security changes by moving production away from relatively secure, demarcated land and toward less secure land outside the village to guard those parcels. The UFGE currently supports 43 impact evaluations across all regions, largely through the Gender Innovation Labs. Findings to date have been published and are listed in Table 3. The Africa Gender Innovation Lab records 259 citations of its papers as of June 30, 2016, according to Google Scholar. In fiscal year 2016 the World Bank Group published two regional reports citing UFGE-supported data and research: ndigenous Latin America in the Twenty-First Century: The First Decade, draws on the report Bolivia: Challenges •I and Constraints to Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment which focuses specifically on the intersectionality between gender and ethnicity, based on a perception survey. Live Long and Prosper: Aging in East Asia and the Pacific, includes new research on the demands for care services and • women’s labor force participation. The UFGE also supported a special issue of Feminist Economics on Voice and Agency which was made available to the public for free during the month of March. Promoting knowledge uptake: World Bank Group teams were actively engaged in sharing findings and lessons through client-focused learning events and South-South exchanges, as well as with WBG staff through informal discussions and presentations. From June 2015 to June 2016, Africa Gender Innovation Lab team members shared results with policymakers, academics, international organizations and other stakeholders at 70 events for approximately 3,917 participants. Highlights include: 14 Presentations and panel discussions at the Annual Global Development Conference, the Powershift Conference • at Oxford Business School, the Cost of the Gender Gap in Agricultural Productivity report launch at a side event of the 42nd session of Committee on World Food Security held at the FAO, the Oxford Center for the Study of African Economies Conference, and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs’ Global Food Security Symposium. These events provided access to high-level policymakers not only in finance, but also key line ministries such as agriculture, social development and health. Policymakers, such as ministers of agriculture, often shared the podium with GIL staff, providing a venue for direct discussions on how to use GIL results for more effective policymaking. Four impact evaluation workshops, training approximately 100 policymakers on the basics of impact evaluations. • The EAP Gender Capacity Program on Transport, which in 2016 focused on rural roads projects, brought together transport authorities and project stakeholders, including project directors, managers and engineers from client countries in EAP and SAR for two exchange visits and a regional workshop. South-South exchanges were held in Yunnan Province of China and Lao Cai Province of Vietnam, where clients learned how to institutionalize women’s participation in rural road maintenance and of the resulting benefits to road works and local communities. A regional workshop in Hanoi, Vietnam, provided the opportunity for participants, as well as partners from the Asian Development Bank, International Labor Organization, and World Bank Group, to learn from international good practice on addressing gender gaps in rural transport design, road safety, and job creation. The training has helped clients strengthen the design of rural transport and social projects and has led to more resources being allocated to creating jobs for women in the rural transport sector, e.g. in projects in Laos, Solomon Islands, and Vietnam. The 2015 report, Roads to Agency, which captures lessons and impacts from rural roads projects in LAC, was presented and shared during the Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) Annual Transport Week in Mexico in the fall of 2015. The award winning ICT pilot FightVAW, funded by the UFGE, was featured as part of the exchange between Nepal, Congo and Rwanda during a South-South learning study tour on how to end sexual and gender-based violence. The South-South exchanges with Rwanda and Fiji also featured the UFGE supported social media program WEvolve—a partnership with creative industries to change youth perceptions on gender-based violence and social norms. The paper Why should we care about care?: the role of informal childcare and eldercare in aging societies in the ECA region on availability of and household demand for care services was presented at the international careers’ conference in Sweden in September 2015. Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 15 TABLE 3. UFGE PUBLICATIONS Fiscal Year 2016 As Good as the Company They Keep? Improving Farmers’ Social Networks (World Bank Policy Brief, 2016) Breaking the metal ceiling: female entrepreneurs who succeed in male-dominated sectors (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, 2015) Community-Based Approaches to Intimate Partner Violence: A Review of Evidence and Essential Steps to Adaptation (World Bank Report, 2016) Ethiopia: Women agribusiness leaders network impact evaluation (Baseline Survey Report, 2015) Female Entrepreneurs Who Succeed in Male-Dominated Sectors in Ethiopia (World Bank Policy Brief, 2016) Formalizing Rural Land Rights in West Africa: Early Evidence from a Randomized impact Evaluation in Benin (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, 2015) From Cash to Accounts: Switching How Women Save in Uganda (World Bank Policy Brief, 2016) Gender-Dimensions of Collective Forest Tenure Reform in China (World Bank Working Paper, 2016) Gender, Mobility and Middle Class in Europe and Central Asia: Insights from Qualitative Research (World Bank Report, 2015) Intra-household dynamics and the design of social protection programs: the case of polygamous households in North Burkina Faso (World Bank Policy Brief, 2016) Lao PDR health center workforce survey: findings from a nationally representative health center and health center worker survey (World Bank Report, 2016) Supply and Demand for Child Care Services in Turkey (World Bank Report, 2016) Women’s Empowerment, Sibling Rivalry and Competitiveness – Evidence from a Lab Experiment and Randomized control Trial in Uganda (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, 2016) Previous Years Bolivia: Challenges and Constraints to Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment (World Bank Report, 2015) Europe and Central Asia: Why should we care about care? The role of informal childcare and eldercare in aging societies in the ECA region (World Bank Working Paper, 2015) Exploring the Phenomenon of “Missing Girls” in the South Caucasus (World Bank Knowledge Brief, 2015) Bolivia: Challenges and Constraints to Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment (World Bank Report, 2015) Europe and Central Asia: Why should we care about care? The role of informal childcare and eldercare in aging societies in the ECA region (World Bank Working Paper, 2015) Exploring the Phenomenon of “Missing Girls” in the South Caucasus (World Bank Knowledge Brief, 2015) Fertility Transition in Turkey: Who Is Most at Risk of Deciding against Child Arrival? (Greulich, Dasre, and Inan, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 7310, 2015) Gender Informed and Inclusive Land Service Delivery: How the Client-Led Regional Platform Turned into Piecemeal (Tonchovska, Kelm, Anand and Unaki, Conference Paper, 2015) Hem No Leit Tumas: Evidence for Improved Outcomes in Solomon Islands Women's Literacy Programs (World Bank Report, 2014) 16 Previous Years (Cont.) How Costly Are Labor Gender Gaps? Estimates from the Balkans and Turkey (Cuberes and Teignier, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 7319, 2015) ICT in Support of Evidence Based Policy Making: Land and Gender in the Western Balkans (Tonchovska, Kelm and Giovarelli, Conference Paper, 2014) Levelling the Field: improving Opportunities for Women Farmers in Africa (World Bank Report, 2014) Migration and Women’s Agency in Agriculture - Women in Agriculture: The Impact of Male Out-Migration on Women’s Agency, Household Welfare and Agricultural Productivity (World Bank, Report AUS9147, 2015) “Missing Girls” in the South Caucasus Countries: Trends, Possible Causes, and Policy Options (Das Gupta, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 7236, 2015) “Missing Women" in the South Caucasus: Local Perceptions and Proposed Solutions (World Bank Report, 2015) Roads to agency: effects of enhancing women’s participation in rural roads projects on women’s agency - a comparative assessment of rural transport projects in Argentina, Nicaragua, and Peru (World Bank, Report 99173, 2015) Serbia: Access to Justice for Poor Women and Men (World Bank Report, 2015) Tools to understand social issues in energy tariff and subsidy reforms in Europe and Central Asia (World Bank Report 97388, 2015) Toward Gender-Equitable Fisheries Management in the Solomon Islands (World Bank Report, 2015) Toward Gender-Informed Energy Subsidy Reforms: Findings from Qualitative Studies in Europe and Central Asia (World Bank Report 96945, 2015) All publications can be accessed on the UFGE web site, www.worldbank.org/gender/ufge Photo: Ngan Hong Nguyen / World Bank PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 17 BOX 2: PUSHING THE FRONTIERS OF THE WORLD BANK GROUP’S TRANSPORT WORK Transport is the largest of the World Bank Group’s sectors, representing 20 percent of overall lending. The UFGE currently supports seven grants that generate lessons on how to strengthen rural and urban transport projects to better address key gaps between men and women, such as access to economic opportunities and safety in transit. In East Asia and the Pacific, the Transport and Gender Capacity Building Program trains transport authorities and project stakeholders in the implementation of gender-smart transport operations. This program grew out of the interest of World Bank Group clients who wanted to learn more about approaches that are inclusive of both women and men. The program’s first phase, in which 11 World Bank Group projects from countries as diverse as China and Tonga participated, focused on rural transport and specifically job creation for poor women in rural road maintenance. The next phase of the program will include urban transport. Highlighting the transformative impact that participating in a rural roads project can have on the lives and aspirations of rural women, a UFGE-funded comparative assessment of projects in Argentina, Nicaragua, and Peru, titled Roads to Agency6, demonstrates how rural road construction and maintenance projects can benefit poor rural women. In addition to providing employment for rural women who otherwise have few income generating opportunities, these efforts can promote and enhance women’s agency and decision-making power, and challenge prevailing social norms. Importantly, the study shows how constraints to women’s participation and agency can be tackled through proactive measures, such as providing childcare, conducting community outreach and sensitization, providing sufficient training, and preventing gender-segregation of tasks. Building on this work, an upcoming UFGE-funded study aims to deepen our understanding of the linkages between women’s mobility, agency, and labor market outcomes and the factors that either constrain or facilitate poor women’s mobility in urban centers in Latin America. The findings will help to design interventions and diagnostics tools that promote urban women’s increased mobility and thus improved access to economic opportunities. The UFGE is also supporting initiatives that aim to improve safety and personal security in transport. In ECA, a global road safety review seeks to understand the gender dimensions of the causes and consequences of road traffic accidents, and to reduce the high mortality of men in transport. In Brazil, the safety of women is tackled by a project that aims to prevent and mitigate GBV in public transit in Rio de Janeiro (see page 6). The Gender Impacts of Intelligent Transport System (ITS) project in China aims to maximize the benefits of ITS, by improving safety of private cars, often driven by men; and by improving personal security in transit, a concern often voiced by women. In Morocco, a survey is enhancing local understanding of the challenges faced by men and women in urban transport, and will be used as in the design of future transport operations. Together these initiatives are building an evidence base for gender-smart transport operations that give equal opportunities for both men and women and that respond to both men and women’s different mobility needs. By demonstrating the benefits of enhancing women’s agency through transport operations, the UFGE is helping to make women’s equal participation in rural road construction and maintenance projects a standard practice.  6 Casabonne, Ursula; Jimenez Mota, Bexi Francina; Muller, Miriam, Roads to Agency: Effects of Enhancing Women’s Participation in Rural Roads Projects on Women’s Agency - A Comparative Assessment of Rural Transport Projects in Argentina, Nicaragua, and Peru, Working Paper, World Bank Group, http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/666721468185041902/pdf/99173-WP-P123447-PUBLIC-Box393190B.pdf. 18 Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images SUPPORTING REGIONAL PRIORITIES AFRICA The UFGE pursues three main priorities in the Africa region: Generate evidence on successful approaches to close gender gaps in economic opportunities. • Better understand constraints on women’s economic activity and empowerment in environments affected • by conflict and fragility.  cale up effective programs or scale down ineffective programs, based on emerging evidence. •S The majority of UFGE funding in Africa has been allocated to the Africa Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) that, in response to priorities 1 and 3, conducts impact evaluations on development interventions in Sub-Saharan Africa. The objective of this work is to generate evidence on how to close gaps between men and women in earnings (see Box 1), productivity, assets, and agency, with the ultimate objective of identifying scalable solutions for women’s economic empowerment. To date, the Africa GIL has supported more than 50 evaluations in over 20 countries, focused on agriculture, entrepreneurship and employment, and land and property rights. For a complete list of UFGE-supported evaluations see Table 8, page 42. Liberia’s Economic Empowerment of Adolescent Girls and Young Women (EPAG) project further demonstrates the linkage between priorities 1 and 3 and shows how results from impact evaluations can be used to learn and adapt project design and to scale up what works in other projects. The EPAG project has been adapted to expand the program to boys, strengthen literacy and numeracy training, provide additional psychosocial services in the wake of the Ebola epidemic, and pilot the delivery of an early childhood development training. Research findings and lessons from EPAG are being scaled up in the broader youth development program in Liberia and have informed the design of the Republic of Congo Skills Development for Employability project (P128628) and other programs. Using the data and research from the Africa GIL and its partners, synthesis reports identify larger trends, and recommend effective policy, making the work of the Africa GIL more accessible to policy makers and practitioners. The first two of these synthesis reports, Levelling the Field 7 and the Cost of the Gender Gap in Agricultural Productivity in Malawi, Tanzania and Uganda8, address gender gaps in agriculture. The third report, to be released in FY17, is a joint study by the office of the Africa Chief Economist and the Trade and Competitiveness Global Practice and focuses on entrepreneurship in Sub- Saharan Africa. This report will present a framework for understanding gaps in female entrepreneurship and, using new analytical findings, propose actionable recommendations to guide policy dialogues on private sector development in Africa. In response to priority 2, a first call for proposals will be held in FY 2017 for the Africa region with a focus on constraints to women’s economic empowerment, particularly in fragile and conflict-affected settings. 7 O’Sullivan, Michael; Rao, Arathi; Banerjee, Raka; Gulati, Kajal; Vinez, Margaux. 2014. Levelling the field: improving opportunities for women farmers in Africa. Washington DC; World Bank Group. 8 World Bank. 2015. The cost of the gender gap in agricultural productivity in Malawi, Tanzania, and Uganda. Washington, D.C.: World Bank Group. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 19 BOX 3: SUPPORTING FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS IN MALE-DOMINATED SECTORS The Africa GIL study Female Entrepreneurs Who Succeed in Male-Dominated Sectors in Ethiopia examines why more women do not cross over to more profitable male-dominated sectors in Ethiopia. In 2011, an Africa GIL study in Uganda found that firms owned by women who cross over to more profitable male-dominated sectors are as profitable as businesses owned by men, and about three times more profitable, in average, than firms owned by women in female-dominated sectors. Building on this work, the Ethiopia study analyzed quantitative data of 790 entrepreneurs collected in 2014 for the Women’s Entrepreneurship Development Project (WEDP). Similar to Uganda, the study found that women who work in more male-dominated sectors earn significantly more than those who do not. Female-owned enterprises in male-dominated sectors perform better – they are larger and have higher profits – than those in traditionally female-dominated sectors. The study also finds that women are more likely to cross over when their parents and husbands support them and when they are aware of the earnings potential in male-dominated sectors. Recommendations to support women entrepreneurs to cross over include: providing information to youth and women business owners about business sector profitability; encouraging male business owners to introduce women to their networks, pass on key technical skills, and help them access start-up capital; enhancing business networks and providing training on overcoming discrimination and negotiation skills; and facilitating access to credit. To read the full policy brief, visit the Africa GIL website. EAST ASIA AND THE PACIFIC UFGE-funded activities in the region are aligned with the priorities identified in the EAP companion report to the WDR, Toward Gender Equality in East Asia and the Pacific and in the Country Gender Action Plans. These regional priorities include fostering opportunities and managing emerging risks that are associated with globalization, migration, transport (see Box 2), and aging populations; and closing gaps in human endowments such as health and education. The EAP portfolio consists of 18 grants, of which 12 are active. In FY 2016, the UFGE also supported the launch of the EAP Gender Innovation Lab to build on the knowledge base on what works in closing gender gaps in the region (see Box 1). To respond to emerging opportunities and risks in the region and to improve the design of operations, five activities addressing women’s labor force participation, GBV, and displacement were added to the EAP portfolio in FY 2016. Building on previous work on aging and elder care in China, data collection and analytical work in Anhui Province in China will deepen our understanding of the impacts of long-term elderly care on women’s labor market participation and inform a WBG investment project on aged care. In Mongolia, a qualitative tool will identify constraints to gender parity in the labor market and evaluate how effective services and policies are in addressing these constraints. In Papua New Guinea, a project will assess the effectiveness of current and planned GBV programs and inform strategic investments for community safety. To manage risks in the context of resettlement, a knowledge platform on gender-informed resettlement is being developed. Similarly, analysis on the gender dimensions of forced displacement is being conducted to build preparedness, resilience, and adaptive capacity in countries and communities. Ongoing work in EAP also addresses gaps in human endowments, such as maternal health in countries and regions that are lagging. Building on two maternal health projects in Lao PDR and Cambodia, the UFGE is supporting evidence-based decision making in Indonesia to tackle persistently high maternal mortality in selected provinces. This grant will assess the capacity of the Indonesian health care system to provide maternal health services and supports the government’s priority to reduce maternal mortality. Upcoming work in EAP will focus on the priority areas identified in the Country Gender Action Plans, which are currently being updated. The country priorities are expected to have a stronger emphasis on women’s economic empowerment, and fall in the following activities: taking active measures to close gender gaps in economic opportunity and strengthen women’s voices and influence; promoting gender equality in endowments; and fostering new opportunities and managing emerging risks. In addition, the EAP UFGE will continue to support GBV and maternal mortality. 20 Photo: Wu Zhiyi / World Bank BOX 4: INCREASING OPPORTUNITIES FOR WOMEN IN THE FOREST SECTOR REFORM IN CHINA China’s forest sector reform is the largest land reform undertaken in modern times. As a result of the reform, rural households have more opportunities to increase incomes, and more incentives to cultivate, conserve, and manage forests. A recent study, titled Gender Dimensions of Collective Forest Tenure Reform in China9, finds that women are disadvantaged in the reform process and highlights the need to improve women’s access to and participation in decision-making on forestlands as part of the reform process. The survey of 3,500 households in seven provinces shows that 95 percent of the land tenure certificates are signed by male heads of households. In addition, more than half of the decisions are made by men, with 45 percent made jointly and only five percent made solely by women. A woman is also likely to lose her share of forestland if she moves to another village after marriage. Women, however, are expected to gain a greater role in China’s forest sector, as more men migrate to cities for jobs. The study identifies income generating options for women in the forestry and related sectors, and recommends policy actions to improve the property rights, income security and status of women in the rural areas. The report includes recommendations to: Improve the household contractual system for forestlands by adopting multi-signatory forestry tenure • certificates, using secret ballots in the new allocation of forestland, and ensuring through village codes that women retain their share of forestland despite civil status change. mprove forestry policies, incentives and services, including by developing a legal framework for transfer •I of forest tenure and a standardized contract and an information disclosure system. mprove the sensitivity of policy making, dissemination and monitoring, by recognizing the different •I constraints men and women face in the forestry sector and how they are affected differently by reform measures; raising awareness of these differences among forestry sector employees; reviewing the major national forestry policies from this perspective; and integrating these considerations into the monitoring program of the forest reform. Visit the UFGE website to read the full report. Ren, Xin, Gender-dimensions of collective forest tenure reform in China, Working Paper, World Bank Group, http://documents.worldbank.org/ 9 curated/en/232221468260935761/pdf/ACS18496-WP-PUBLIC-Final-Output-has-been-approved-P150286.pdf. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 21 EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA The UFGE in ECA has focused on second generation issues related to reducing and closing gender gaps in labor force participation, entrepreneurship, occupational segregation, and access to and ownership of assets such as credit, land, and other productive resources. In order to close gaps in labor market participation and earnings, addressing norms and behaviors that constrain women’s economic opportunities and labor market outcomes is a priority for the region (see Box 5). In FY 2016, five activities were added to the ECA portfolio. Three of the new activities aim to remove barriers to more and better jobs and ownership of assets by tackling occupational and educational segregation in STEM fields (see Box 5); addressing constraints to rural labor market participation in Uzbekistan, and improving rural women’s land rights in Kosovo. The remaining two aim to enhance women’s voice and agency by changing gender norms, with regard to women’s civic participation in the Kyrgyz Republic and son preference in Georgia. The latter builds on UFGE-funded analytical work in the South Caucasus which has ignited public dialogue on ‘missing girls’ – a phenomenon due to son-preference and sex-selection. A new communications campaign in Georgia will help influence attitudes related to son preference, and sex selection, and promote gender equality and value of girls. With 43 million emigrants and 3.6 million refugees or internally displaced people residing in the region, migration and forced displacement have strong implications for the livelihoods of men and women in ECA. In response, the UFGE is investing in improving economic opportunities for migrants, displaced persons, and ethnic minorities. Through research and data collection efforts, the UFGE is shedding light on the differential experiences of women refugees in Turkey, and internally displaced populations in the South Caucasus. To ensure shared prosperity and more inclusive development, the UFGE is also supporting a new round of the 2011 Regional Roma Survey, developed in partnership with the World Bank, UNDP, and the European Commission. Looking forward, the UFGE will continue to support knowledge creation, availability of gender data, and innovation, with a focus on market discrimination, barriers to formal labor participation, and youth unemployment. To improve the design of operations, the UFGE will continue to fund behavioral interventions and accompanying evaluations in areas in which traditional policy-design has been unable to intervene. The emphasis will be on proof of concept trials, pilots, and expanding the knowledge base on how to affect norms, beliefs, and behaviors to enhance women’s agency in the region. Photo: Maxim Zolotukhin / World Bank 22 Photo: World Bank BOX 5: CHANGING BEHAVIORS AND NORMS TO IMPROVE WOMEN’S LABOR MARKET OUTCOMES IN EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA Awareness of the importance of changing norms and behaviors to advance women’s labor market outcomes has increased in recent years and is reflected in the ECA region’s work on improving women’s economic opportunities. Ongoing research and data collection is expected to deepen our understanding of these linkages and provide lessons on how to change social norms and behaviors to improve women’s educational outcomes, and subsequently their economic opportunities. Women’s low labor force participation and occupational sex-segregation are costly. A UFGE-funded study in seven Balkan countries and Turkey10 finds significant losses in income per capita, 17 percent on average, from gender inequalities in the labor market. Two-thirds of this loss is due to women’s low participation in the labor force, and one-third to distortions in the choice of occupations between men and women. The Beyond Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) study aims to address the latter by increasing data and evidence about the factors behind the under-representation of women in STEM fields of study and employment in ECA countries. The study aims to deepen our understanding of the linkages between educational and occupational choices and labor market outcomes for women, and will propose policy interventions to increase gender equality in economic opportunities and outcomes. Socio-emotional skills are highly valued in the job market in ECA and can also be taught. Early findings from the Gender Employability and Soft Skills grant indicate that signals of socio-emotional skills on CVs are as memorable or, in some cases, more memorable than other qualifications such as technical skills. The project pilots and assesses ways in which job seekers, particularly young and older women and men, can demonstrate the socio-emotional skills that are most valued by ECA employers. In Macedonia, the WBG is working together with the Ministry of Education to teach middle school children a key socio-emotional skill, grit, helping them improve themselves through constant and deliberate practice. The project aims to improve children’s academic performance, school progression and future aspirations, with a focus on girls and ethnic minorities. An impact evaluation on the project is underway and the lessons learned will inform plans to scale the program up nation-wide. Ethnic minorities often face special challenges with respect to accessing quality education and, consequently, the job market. The ABSENTEE program in Bulgaria is deepening our understanding of the underlining factors of Roma girls’ education and labor market outcomes. Early findings of this program indicate that a lack of information on benefits and returns from education and biases against life outside the community play key roles in early drop-out for Roma girls. Next steps for the program will include designing interventions that aim to change gender roles and social norms within Roma communities to encourage Roma women to study and work.  10 Cuberes, David; Teignier, Marc. 2015. How costly are labor gender gaps? Estimates for the Balkans and Turkey. Policy Research working paper; no. WPS 7319. Washington, D.C.: World Bank Group. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 23 Photo: Maria Fleischmann / World Bank LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN The overarching objective of the UFGE in LAC is to advance evidence and knowledge on how to enhance equitable economic outcomes and generate policy- and program-relevant lessons that can be translated into impacts on the ground. To achieve this, the UFGE supports the LAC GIL to conduct impact evaluations (see Box 1) and awards grants through competitive calls for proposals. The UFGE portfolio in LAC currently includes 11 ongoing activities. Five new activities focusing on women’s access to economic opportunities were funded in FY16. Building on the UFGE-funded Roads to Agency report,11 a new study will analyze how women’s agency can constrain or promote urban women’s mobility, and access to economic opportunities (see Box 2). In Colombia, where women’s labor force participation is constrained by care for multiple generations, key analytical work will calculate the value of unpaid work, assess existing programs, and recommend the scaling-up of effective programs to compensate and redistribute unpaid care work. In Argentina, the UFGE is supporting work by the Ministry of Labor to adapt a youth employment program to make it more inclusive of young women and LGBTI youth. Finally, two impact evaluations will assess: 1) the impact of non-inclusive vs. all-inclusive tourism development on jobs for youth and women in Grenada and St. Lucia; and 2) the impact of different interventions on women’s agency and economic outcomes in producer organizations in Brazil. Preventing and responding to GBV is an ongoing priority for the LAC region and the theme of several UFGE-funded activities. In Jamaica, the Next GENDERation awareness campaign aims to reduce violence by promoting a positive dialogue around gender roles and raising awareness of the link between perceived gender roles and violence among youth. In Brazil, a longitudinal dataset on GBV will provide unprecedented information on the determinants and policy entry points for GBV. Finally, a UFGE-funded study highlights successful community mobilization interventions to prevent intimate partner violence (IPV) and provides six essential steps to adapt these programs to another context (see Box 6).  11 Casabonne, Ursula; Jimenez Mota, Bexi Francina; Muller, Miriam. 2015. Roads to agency: effects of enhancing women’s participation in rural roads projects on women’s agency - a comparative assessment of rural transport projects in Argentina, Nicaragua, and Peru. Washington, D.C.: World Bank Group. 24 BOX 6: TOOLS TO COMBAT INTIMATE PARTNER VIOLENCE A new review Community-Based Approaches to Intimate Partner Violence - A Review of Evidence and Essential Steps to Adaptation highlights several examples of effective community mobilization interventions to prevent intimate partner violence (IPV), and underscores the basic components that must be considered to adapt successful interventions to different contexts. IPV is the most prevalent form of violence against women: globally, approximately one third of women will experience violence at the hand of their partner or ex-partner at some point in their lifetime. Community-based interventions to prevent IPV, such as SASA! by Raising Voices, have proved to be successful at reducing violence because they permeate multiple levels of society, engaging key stakeholders and fostering collective action to challenge gender norms within entire communities. Community-based, multi-sectoral, and culturally adapted interventions increase ownership of outcomes, thereby securing longer-term involvement of differing levels of stakeholders. This note presents six essential steps on how practitioners can adapt and effectively implement previously proven community-based IPV prevention programs to a different country context. Visit the UFGE website to read the full report. The UFGE-funded activities in LAC are aligned with the new LAC RGAP, which stresses that agency and human endowments are instrumental in overcoming constraints to economic opportunities. UFGE-funded activities in LAC will focus on generating knowledge, evidence and lessons learned on women’s economic empowerment. For example, building on the lessons learned from the WDR 2015 Mind, Society, and Behavior12, UFGE-funded projects will be encouraged to use behavioral interventions to change social norms and behaviors in order to advance women’s economic opportunities. MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA Uprisings and civil conflict have intensified in several MNA countries since 2011, having a profound effect on the region. In particular, the civil conflict in Syria has led to the largest displacement crisis since early 1970s and caused a massive influx of refugees and internally displaced persons, many of them women and children living in precarious situations. Another persistent challenge for the region is ensuring equal access for men and women to economic opportunities and productive resources—such as property, land, and natural resources—which is more difficult in fragile and conflict-affected situations. In response to these challenges, the MNA UFGE has focused on two priorities: 1) interlinkages between gender and conflict, and more specifically radicalization, coping mechanisms, refugees, and internally displaced persons; and 2) increasing women’s labor force participation and entrepreneurship, particularly in the private sector. UFGE-funding will support the MNA Regional Strategy by strengthening inclusive social contracts, enhancing the resilience of host and refugee communities, and supporting recovery and reconstruction efforts. To-date, the UFGE in MNA has eight active grants and one completed activity. In FY 2016, four activities were awarded funding to improve women’s economic opportunities. In Tunisia, a randomized control trial of a public works program assesses support to women entrepreneurs, strengthening their leadership, and sustaining their livelihoods. Regional analytical work aims to better understand how displacement changes social norms related to women’s labor market participation, the school to work transition, and family formation. Similarly, research and data collection with Syrian refugees living in Turkey will estimate the impact of the Syrian war on the social capital of women and their children. In the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, analytical work aims to determine the impact of the ongoing conflict on women’s educational and professional status to inform policy dialogue on social cohesion and inclusive development. This complements ongoing work that aims to shed light on the broader impacts of large refugee flows on receiving countries. In the context of the civil conflict in Syria, the neighboring countries now host nearly four million Syrian refugees. In partnership with UNHCR, a UFGE-funded qualitative survey will assess the situation in Jordan, Lebanon, and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) to understand the risks and impacts experienced by male and female refugees. Early insights from Lebanese qualitative data suggest that risky coping strategies, such as dangerous or illegal work, by refugee households World Bank. 2015. World Development Report 2015: Mind, Society, and Behavior. Washington, DC: World Bank. 12 PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 25 Photo: Priya’s Shakti / World Bank could disproportionately impact refugee women and children. Detailed analysis and evidence across these three countries will provide valuable evidence for policies that aim to mitigate impacts of refugee inflow in these countries and improve the conditions of refugees. Going forward, the UFGE will continue its focus in MNA on gender and conflict, and economic opportunities. In addition, it will offer competitive matching grants for showcasing and disseminating innovative activities that have been successful in reducing or closing gender gaps in countries in the region. SOUTH ASIA Low female labor force participation and high prevalence of GBV in South Asia remain priorities in the SAR RGAP. In response, the UFGE continues to support a multi-faceted GBV program, Addressing Gender-based Violence in South Asia, and analytical work to understand constraints to labor force participation. Some of this work is carried out by the South Asia Gender Innovation Lab (GIL), which addresses gender gaps in labor force participation and economic opportunities, access to infrastructure; and women’s voice and agency (see Box 1). The region has made considerable headway in developing a comprehensive, multi-faceted program on GBV, which was launched in 2013. The SAR GBV program is supporting the integration of GBV prevention and response measures in a poverty reduction project in Bangladesh, a health sector project in Sri Lanka, and in agriculture and urban development projects in India. In addition, based on data collection and analytical work, several recommendations have been given to strengthen the self-help group structure to address GBV for rural livelihoods projects in Andrah Pradesh (P100789) and Telengana (P143608) in India. The WEvolve program – an innovative partnership with creative industries to raise awareness and change unequal gender norms by targeting youth – continues to build on its social media campaign in India and beyond. In partnership with Elle India, WEvolve is producing a second series of short videos to change gender stereotypes and norms. WEvolve in India also initiated a collaboration with an artist Ram Devineni to produce a second chapter of Priya’s Shakti, an innovative comic book about a female superhero and rape survivor, aiming to break down the stigma of GBV survivors. Priya’s Shakti, honored by UN Women as Gender Equality Champion, has contributed to a national debate in India about the treatment of rape survivors, and has been featured in a series of murals in Mumbai and in more than 400 news articles worldwide. Research is under way to better understand the factors that influence women’s labor force participation in India where rates are among the lowest in the world and declining. This work draws from perspectives of urban women in Bhopal and Indore, in the state of Madhya Pradesh. Going forward, the UFGE will focus on addressing gender gaps in quality secondary education and economic opportunities. Initiatives will include data collection, analytics, and mobilizing knowledge in order to reduce inequalities between men and women, and support the priorities in Country Gender Action Briefs. The data collection will focus on areas of informal employment, entrepreneurship, earnings, unpaid care work, assets, and GBV. 26 ENGAGING THE PRIVATE SECTOR The UFGE Private Sector Window supports work that closes gaps between men and women in the private sector such as development of tools and cost-benefit analyses that help firms look closely at their workforces, procurement, and value chains and identify steps to sustainably integrate women into their business operations. All activities are under implementation; findings and early results are expected in the coming year. Agribusiness A global agribusiness project is partnering with five companies13 in Africa, East Asia and the Pacific, and Latin America to develop the business case for investing in women as employees in the sector. The final report, to be launched in FY17, will highlight the business benefits of increasing employment opportunities and working conditions for women. A tool will be developed so that other agribusiness companies can analyze the benefits for their own business. The employment focus adds an important new dimension to work in agriculture, which has focused predominantly on the role of small- scale women farmers. In Mozambique, Enhancing Women’s Market Access in Agribusiness looks at whether investments in rural roads on its own help women farmers adopt market-oriented crops and strategies and if impacts can be bolstered by providing entrepreneurial and non-cognitive skills training and transportation vouchers. Extractive Industries Work is underway to demonstrate how existing gender biases affect extractive industries, how addressing those biases could positively influence the sector’s development effectiveness and sustainability, and how activities can ultimately benefit men and women more equally. A diagnostic tool will be developed for Infrastructure & Natural Resources (INR) Investment Officers, along with a toolkit for companies to improve economic opportunities for women, to ensure men and women benefit equally from extractives investments. ICT Sector To address the estimated $86 billion credit gap for women-led small and medium sized enterprises (SME) in LAC, an analytics tool will be developed to analyze how serving female entrepreneurs and retailers impacts financial institutions’ portfolio performance. In India, support is being provided to an online marketplace to increase the number of women in its supply chain to help narrow gaps in women’s access to economic opportunities and to provide services, such as financial literacy, to help increase women entrepreneurs’ access to formal finance. Finance and Markets In Bangladesh, efforts to improve women’s access to formal financial services through mobile technology was launched on March 22, 2016. The event, attended by Bangladesh Bank’s Deputy Governor, the IFC Country Manager for Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal, and representatives from 12 of the leading Bangladeshi mobile financial service (MFS) providers, was widely covered by national news outlets. A market study will launch in FY17, which will help size the women’s MFS market and identify products and delivery channels for providers. Work is also underway in Bangladesh to help ready-made garment factories transition cash based payment system to MFS salary disbursements. Women will be assisted in opening MFS accounts through which they will receive their salary and be connected to a formal financial system. A partnership with the Global Banking Alliance (GBA) for Women intends to enable financial institutions in developing countries to provide innovative financial and non-financial services to women- owned SMEs by developing new tools on financing and data analytics, increasing GBA’s membership base to include financial institutions that provide financial services to women owned SMEs, and strengthening member banks’ capacity to serve women SME clients. The Gender Housing Finance Initiative aims to demonstrate the business case for housing finance for women by developing guidance for lenders on how to assess market opportunities for such products and by working with finance providers in Egypt, India, and Panama to pilot these. Afrifresh (South Africa), Biosev (Brazil), Country Bird (Southern Africa), PanPacific (Vietnam), and SolTuna (Solomon Islands). 13 PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 27 Get2Equal Get2Equal partners with the private sector, research institutes, academia, governments, and development partners to grow demand for gender-smart interventions. Through targeted studies the program seeks to understand binding constraints to more and better jobs for women and to test solutions through client engagement. The program engages with individual firms as well as develop networks of businesses to share solutions, encourage change, and ensure ongoing service delivery. The program is composed of three components: Component one is focused on women’s quality employment and funds three sub-components: 1) Providing Quality • Employment for Women using the Women’s Employment Diagnostic Tool; 2) Increasing opportunities for women in non-traditional jobs; and 3) Demonstrating the Business Case for Private Sector-Supported Care Services. Projects under this component work with the private sector in selected Southeast Asian countries to help businesses better analyze and understand their workforce from a gender perspective and adopt measures to better integrate, retain, and promote women in their business operations. Component two (Enabling Women in Leadership & Gender Diversity on Boards) helps IFC clients understand and • address the challenges to improving gender diversity on Corporate Boards of Directors. Component three (Piloting Women Entrepreneurship Training in collaboration with financial institutions clients) is • developing supply/distribution chain finance solutions, and non-financial services, to strengthen the capacity of women entrepreneurs to run and grow their businesses, and to increase their access to financial products and services. LESSONS AND OPPORTUNITIES In FY17 most of the early grants will close and efforts to capture their lessons and promote uptake in the WBG’s operations and by clients be intensified. Meanwhile, lessons to date are being applied as a second round of regional block grants is launched to support Regional Gender Action Plans, along with a WBG-wide call for multi-sectoral activities that will help advance implementation of the new Gender Strategy. These lessons include: Maintain a strong focus on public goods. UFGE-supported work is demonstrating how to catalyze client country interest while also creating spill over effects in other regions, promoting innovative approaches and closing global knowledge gaps. Promote operationalization of frontier work. The UFGE aims to advance the WBG’s gender strategy by helping it deepen the impact of its operations. Examples include strengthening the economic impact of transport projects by considering direct economic opportunities in addition to improved mobility, and challenging social norms, discrimination, and violence which inhibit projects from reaching their potential. Making the case for task teams and clients with limited resources to adopt such approaches require compelling evidence as well as opportunities for WBG staff and clients to learn from peers and partners how to operationalize such frontier issues. Facilitate coordination and learning across regions and Global Practices to identify solutions to common challenges. Differing regional priorities and need for selectivity result in a more heterogeneous portfolio. Efforts therefore need to center on identifying common challenges and solutions and testing these in a range of contexts. For example, efforts are underway to create a federation of Gender Innovation Labs to coordinate and guide their research questions, and promote cross-regional learning. Research and lessons around common topics will also be synthesized in thematic reports, and dialogue with other partners facilitated through associated workshops. The first such report and workshop will be on care services in low- and middle-income countries. Adopt a more focused approach for regional block grants, strengthen ownership and learning from their activities, and transition toward a separate funding stream for Gender Innovation Labs. The majority of the UFGE’s activities are funded through regional multi-year block grants and in FY17 the UFGE will launch its second round. Demand for funding remains high in all regions and the work would otherwise not have been funded. As shown in this and past years’ results, these activities are gaining traction at the country level. Decentralized allocation decisions have 28 Photo: Dominic Chavez / World Bank allowed regions to invest in activities that are aligned with their priorities and client demand, which while leading to a more diverse portfolio of activities, increases the likelihood of sustained impacts. For the next round of regional block grants matching funding will be a selection criteria as this seems to improve the likelihood of ownership and uptake. Given that it is easier to raise funds for some regions relative to others, some have had to make a choice between using their block grants to fund Gender Innovation Lab activities versus innovative and frontier analytical work. Going forward, the UFGE will seek to fund the GILs through a strategic allocation to help the more nascent Labs get off the ground and at the same time continue other important activities. ADMINISTRATION AND FINANCE Partnership Council Meeting and Community of Practice for Finance Ministers A half-day technical-level event of the Community of Practice for Finance Ministers in the lead up to the WBG’s 2016 Spring Meetings, brought together representatives from 14 countries to discuss concrete policy options proven effective in closing economic opportunity gaps between men and women. The discussion was grounded in evidence and research funded by the UFGE, such as work to employ women in rural roads rehabilitation in Nicaragua, provision of childcare in Turkey, job training programs in Jordan, Liberia, and Nepal, and that of the Africa Gender Innovation Lab on ways to close gender gaps in business. This was an opportunity for UFGE partners to directly engage in policy-level discussion on these topics. The UFGE Partnership Council Meeting convened on April 14, 2016 to engage partners in a discussion on how the UFGE can best support implementation of the new World Bank Group Gender Equality Strategy, as well as identify priorities going forward. The meeting was also an opportunity to discuss how the UFGE can serve as a community of practice for its donors. To this end, a larger emphasis was placed on allowing meeting participants to learn more about individual activities and their impacts. Findings from a study on missing girls in South Caucasus and the impact on policy dialogue was presented along with findings of the regional Roads to Agency report and its impact on project design in Nicaragua. Participants were also invited to join task teams during a reception to ask questions and share experiences. Finances As of June 30, 2016, $72 million had been pledged to the UFGE by 13 donors14, of which $1.5 million was pledged in FY16. Of the pledged amount, $62.5 million had been received as of June 30, 2016. The Gender CCSA manages $2.2 million for knowledge management, partnerships, and administration, while remaining funds have been allocated through regional block grants and strategic allocations, as follows: Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the United States. 14 PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 29 Regional block grants From FY13 to the end of FY16 the UFGE allocated $15.6 million to the first round of regional three-year block grants. In FY16 $2,080,000 were allocated through competitive calls in ECA (five grants for a total of $680,000), LAC (five grants for a total of 600,000), and MNA (four grants for a total of $800,000). Funds were allocated to strategic activities in AFR and SAR. With this, all regional funds have been allocated and fully committed, and activities initiated under this round are to be completed by December 2017. In 2016 the Gender Leadership Council approved $7 million for allocation through a second round of block grants for which proposals will be submitted and approved in the first half of fiscal year 2017 (see Table 5 below). Strategic allocations As of June 30, 2016, $47 million had been allocated strategically to country programs in Haiti, Liberia, Turkey, and the Western Balkans; to Gender Innovation Labs in Africa and East Asia and the Pacific; and to private sector window, managed by the IFC. In FY16, the private sector window allocated $1.12 million to five new grants and an additional $3.4 million to a Southeast Asia private sector program, Get2Equal. In December of 2016, the final allocation of available funds will be made through the strategic funding window. These funds are aimed at multi-sectoral and multi-country work of strategic importance with potential for high impact in an area aligned with the WBG gender equality strategy. A proposal for replenishment of the UFGE will be submitted for consideration during the Partnership Council meeting in the spring of 2017 so that the UFGE can build on its successes and continue to raise the bar higher and push the WBG agenda farther by equipping policy makers and development experts with data, knowledge, and evidence needed to address critical gaps between males and females. Photo: Dominic Chavez / World Bank 30 TABLE 4. UFGE CONTRIBUTIONS (US$) Donors Pledges Receipts To be received* Australia 12,682,325 12,682,325 - Canada 152,633 152,633 - Denmark 1,061,571 1,061,571 - Finland 145,568 145,568 - Germany 6,458,029 6,458,029 - Iceland 1,146,407 946,407 200,000 Netherlands 6,756,757 4,054,054 2,703,702 Norway 5,665,564 5,665,563 - Spain 551,151 551,151 - Sweden 11,695,277 10,408,147 1,166,671 Switzerland 4,260,480 4,260,480 - United Kingdom 18,399,080 14,777,354 2,593,584 United States 3,350,000 1,400,000 1,950,000 Total 72,324,842 62,563,281 8,613,957 All publications can be accessed on the UFGE web site, www.worldbank.org/gender/ufge PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 31 TABLE 5. UFGE ALLOCATIONS (US$) Allocations Total As of FY16 FY17 REGIONAL BLOCK GRANTS Africa 6,200,000 4,200,000 2,000,000 East Asia and Pacific 3,400,000 2,400,000 1,000,000 Europe and Central Asia 3,400,000 2,400,000 1,000,000 Latin American and Caribbean 3,400,000 2,400,000 1,000,000 Middle East and North Africa 2,881,200 1,881,200 1,000,000 South Asia 3,400,000 2,400,000 1,000,000 Regional block grant total 22,681,200 15,681,200 7,000,000 STRATEGIC ALLOCATIONS Africa Gender Innovation Lab 21,417,345 14,663,850 6,754,289 Bosnia Herzegovina, FYR Macedonia, 2,085,850 2,085,850 - Kosovo, and Serbia South-East Asia Gender Lab 7,550,000 7,550,000 - Haiti 581,210 581,210 - Liberia 3,600,000 3,600,000 - Private Sector Engagement 6,013,900 6,013,900 - Turkey 4,275,000 4,275,000 - Strategic call for proposals 1,600,000 - 1,600,000 Strategic allocations total 47,123,395 38,769,106 8,354,289 Knowledge management partnership 2,225,000 2,225,000 - and coordination Total allocation 72,029,595 56,675,306 15,354,289 Total pledges to date 72,324,842 2% deducted for administrative fee and 216,355 - projected investment income Net available for distribution 72,108,487 Funds available for allocation when all current 78,892 pledges are received 32 TABLE 6. UFGE RESULTS FRAMEWORK Development Objective The objective of the Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality is to strengthen awareness, knowledge, and capacity for gender-informed policy making and programs. The UFGE equips policy makers and development experts with data, knowledge, and evidence needed to design programs and policies that help close gender gaps. It contributes to results in the following three outcome areas: • Better gender-informed policy making at the country level • Improved design of operations and programs • Heightened awareness and demand for gender equality interventions Outcome: Better gender informed policy making at the country level Alignment with Gender Strategy Outcome Indicators Output Indicators N  umber of countries in which policy dialogue has Number of activities in which new or improved Deepening the Country been informed by UFGE supported evidence, data, gender data has been produced or made available Driven Approach and/or analytical work.  More and Better Data Number of analytical reports covering frontier issues Number of Systematic Country Diagnostics and persistent gaps Enhanced diagnostics in which understanding of gender equality Number of case studies on integrating women into Developing a better gaps has been deepened by drawing on business operations understanding of UFGE supported evidence, data, and/or what works analytical work. Number of impact evaluations providing new evidence (in progress/complete) Regional Gender Innovation Labs Outcome: Improved design of operations and programs Alignment with Gender Strategy Outcome Indicators Output Indicators Number of projects which have applied UFGE funded Number of Country Partnership Frameworks Deepening the Country evidence, data, analytical work, or approaches informed by UFGE activities Driven Approach Aligning country planning Number of private sector companies that incorporate Number of dissemination and learning events with scalable/replicable models task teams. Building on what works Making gender-smart Number of projects receiving design, implementation practices the norm and/or M&E support based on UFGE evidence and lessons Number of client advisory products developed Number of tools developed (private sector) Outcome: Heightened awareness and demand for gender equality interventions Alignment with Gender Strategy Outcome Indicators Output Indicators Number of country requests for new or expanded Number of global reports informed by analytical and Building on what works engagement with the WBG resulting from UFGE data work funded Better disseminating results work Number of regional reports informed by analytical Leveraging partnerships N  umber of client advisory requests (IFC) resulting and data work funded Increasing capacity from UFGE work Number of dissemination and learning events with country stakeholder participation Number of South-south learning exchanges PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 33 TABLE 7. UFGE GRANT LIST Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description AFRICA Regional Report on Gender Regional 300,000 Regional report using nationally representative and Agriculture: Leveling micro-econometric evidence from several African the Field countries to uncover the factors that drive productivity gaps between male and female farmers. Regional Report on Gender Regional 200,000 Regional report to provide additional evidence on and Entrepreneurship differences between men and women in underlying constraints to entrepreneurship in Africa and provide a set of recommendations on critical areas of policy intervention to address the gender gaps in firm performance. Gender-informed mobile Regional 1,000,000 Collection of high-frequency welfare statistics phone surveys in Africa surveys using mobile phones. This will yield a large amount of gender-disaggregated panel data on standard household information. Strategic UFGE Allocation: Liberia 1,906,325 Evaluation of skills (life and technical) provision Economic Empowerment of for improved employment and entrepreneurship Adolescent Girls and Young outcomes for adolescent girls and young women. Women (Round 3) Strategic UFGE Allocation: Regional 21,417,345 The Lab designs, launches, and oversees impact Africa Gender evaluations of new interventions to generate Innovation Lab knowledge on which policies work (or not) for closing gender gaps in the economic sectors (see Table 6 for a full list of its UFGE-supported impact evaluations) EAST ASIA AND THE PACIFIC Informal Trade Facilitation in Cambodia, Peoples 80,000 The activity investigates informal trade facilitation the Mekong Subregion Republic of Lao in the Mekong region by exploring whether border and customs reforms benefit female entrepreneurs engaged in cross-border arbitrage trade in terms of reduction in harassment, corruption, and other challenges they face. Effect on female knowledge Cambodia 100,000 Evaluation of a pilot providing a monthly cash and empowerment of a stipend to promote investment in health and maternal and child nutrition services. Additional cash bonuses are health & nutrition contingent on attending nutritional literacy cash transfer pilot workshops, use of services during pregnancy, delivery, and the first two years of the child’s life. Meeting Needs for Long- China 200,000 This activity will support analytical and operational Term Care and Implications work examining households’ arrangements for the for Female Labor Supply provision of care to the elderly and the labor supply – Evidence from Anhui of working-age women, by collecting matching Province in China data on households with needs for elder care and on public and private elder care service providers in Anhui Province in China. 34 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description EAST ASIA AND THE PACIFIC (CONT.) Gender Impacts of Intelligent China 98,000 Evaluation of whether and how intelligent transport Transport System systems (e.g. travel info systems, CCTV monitoring, bus dispatching systems) benefit women. The grant will result in technical guidelines on how to better incorporate gender into ITS. Gender-Dimensions of China 100,000 Expansion of an annual survey on forest tenure Collective Forest Tenure among 3,500 households in seven provinces, to Reform better understand women’s access to and de facto control over forestland and their participation in decision making. In-depth case studies and interviews will complement the survey. Female Labor Force China, Indonesia, 140,000 Analytical work to better understand the labor Participation and Care Thailand, Vietnam force behavior of women 45 and over, including vulnerability in the absence of old age support, and the labor supply of working-age women taking into consideration eldercare. Gender Dimensions of China, Vietnam 100,000 Uncovering the gendered challenges of land Urbanization conversion and urbanization in Vietnam. Exploring the social and economic impacts of urbanization on women in China and Vietnam Improving Maternal Health Indonesia 50,000 Understanding the supply-side of maternal health services by expanding a health facility census to include private facilities, where a significant proportion of maternal health services are utilized, and conduct qualitative analyses on constraints to improving service readiness for maternal health services. Pacific Gender Indicators Kiribati, Rep. of 75,000 Value chain analysis of the Solomon Islands fisheries in Fisheries Marshall Islands, sector through literature review and primary Solomon Islands, qualitative data collection to get an overview of Tuvalu women's involvement in the sector as well as key areas of opportunities for women's involvement. Generating Evidence on Lao, People's 60,000 The grant aims to inform the scale-up of the Supply-Side Capacity to Republic of national free maternal and child health (MCH) Inform the National Free policy, by answering “what it would it take” to Maternal and Child adequately bolster the supply-side and to increase Health Policy demand for these health services in a gender- sensitive manner, to attain the objective of reducing maternal mortality. Constraints Underlying Mongolia 130,000 Launch of a qualitative tool to identify underlying Gender Disparities in constraints to gender parity in the labor market Mongolia’s Labor Market: and to evaluate how effective labor market Launch of a Piloted intermediation services and active labor market Qualitative Tool policies are in addressing these constraints. Collect data and conduct analyses that will directly influence policy and project design in Mongolia. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 35 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description EAST ASIA AND THE PACIFIC (CONT.) Stopping gender-based Mongolia 86,000 The grant aims to understand the underlying violence by engaging issues that lead Mongolian men and boys to adopt with men detrimental behaviors (e.g., GBV, alcoholism, school dropout), and pilot Men-Care approaches through media and “men support groups.” Gender Based violence in Papua New Guinea 175,000 The project will fill gaps in knowledge about Urban Papua New Guinea: existing pathways of resort for women survivors of Improving Knowledge, gender-based violence (GBV) and the effectiveness evaluation and interventions of urban settlement authorities responsible for GBV; evaluate current and proposed government, civil society and donor supported GBV programs; and inform strategic investments for community safety and GBV in Papua New Guinea Regional Fund for In-Country Regional 450,000 Strengthening in-country capacity to implement Capacity Building and M&E and measure strategic and innovative gender work and policy, as well as to strengthen regional stakeholders' understanding of key gender issues. Analyzing Forced Regional 40,000 Analyze forced displacement and large-scale Displacement through displacement from conflict, natural disasters and a Gender Lens climate change in East Asia and the Pacific (EAP) through a gender lens, and draw lessons for application and dissemination in EAP and globally Hem No Leit Tumas”: “ Solomon Islands 65,000 Develop a compendium of financial literacy Evidence for Improved providers/programs with good practice examples, Outcomes in Women’s lessons, M&E systems, and evidence of outcomes. Literacy Programs With the Literacy Network, agree on features of good practice and a replicable monitoring framework. Situation Assessment for Thailand 70,000 Understanding the socio-economic profile, needs Men and Youth in and aspirations of men in conflict zones and how Conflict-Affected Areas to support male confidence, decision-making and empowerment in these situations. The work will identify measures to ensure affected men are systematically included in relevant programs. Making Resettlement Vietnam 195,000 Creation of a knowledge platform on gender- Gender Informed: Handling informed resettlement in development projects with the Intersections Between three focus areas: experience in mainstreaming Practitioners, Policy Makers gender in resettlement activities in large and Development Partners infrastructure projects; dynamics of gender roles in household decision making; and technical guidance. EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA Land and Leadership Albania, Bosnia 120,000 Innovative leadership training for local land reform and Herzegovina, teams in the region on how to address gender Kosovo, Macedonia, inequality in land rights, along with a one-year Montenegro, Serbia follow up on developed action plans to improve ongoing land administration programs. 36 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA (CONT.) Land and Gender: Improving Albania, Bosnia 40,000 Increase the capacity to use gender disaggregated Data Availability and Use and Herzegovina, data to raise awareness of the benefits of improved Kosovo, Macedonia, gender equality in immovable property ownership Montenegro, Serbia and inform policy dialogue. Gender Evaluation of Child Armenia 20,000 Measurement of the impact of the recently Related Benefits introduced child birth allowance program on fertility rates of eligible women, sex-ratio imbalance at birth, work (dis)incentives, and social assistance dependence. A Profiling of Employment Armenia & Turkey 35,000 Improving targeting and design of active labor Services Beneficiaries with a market programs for women. Focus on Female Workers Can Communication Georgia 150,000 Analysis on the prevailing attitudes related to Campaigns Change Son son-preference, perceived value of daughters and Preference and Raise Value sex selection in Georgia. Measurement of if and of Daughters? Evidence from how the prevailing attitudes can be influenced by a a Pilot in Georgia communication campaign, including an assessment of the impact of such campaigns on sex ratios at birth. New Technology to Secure Kosovo 150,000 Develop a methodology to use new technology Rural Women’s Property to record the property rights of rural women in Rights and Livelihood Kosovo. Further develop a low cost solution to use customizable open source software to produce maps and to record property rights with strong community engagement. Changing Gender Norms Kyrgyz Republic 80,000 Better understanding of changing gender norms in Central Asia: An initial and constraints to gender parity in the Kyrgyz investigation in Kyrgyz Republic to inform Bank operations on how to Republic enhance gender equality and citizen engagement Beyond women in STEM Regional 150,000 Examination of women’s participation in Science, fields: Gender differences in Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) field of study and the labor fields of study and sectors of employment in Europe market in ECA countries and Central Asia, including causes of gender gaps and effective interventions to address them. ECAGEN database Regional 130,000 A new database module will provide convenient access to gender-relevant data extracted from household level data used for regional poverty monitoring in the extensive ECAPOV database. Gender Aging and Regional 85,000 Research on the interactions between female labor Care Issues in ECA force participation and different models for care demands (child- and eldercare), including the role of social norms. The grant also looks at the drivers of excess adult male mortality in the region. Gender Employability Regional 80,000 The grant contributes to the understanding of and Soft Skills the role of behavioral skills and conscious or unconscious labor market discrimination in ECA. Various experiments aim to reveal hidden gender- based hiring biases among employers. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 37 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA (CONT.) Gender Informed Road Regional 220,000 Addressing excess adult male mortality by Safety Strategies advancing gender sensitive approaches to road safety. The work seeks to understand the gender dimensions of the causes and consequences of road traffic accidents through a global road safety and gender review, and piloting gender sensitive road safety actions. Gender Sensitivity in Energy Regional 200,000 Cross-sectoral collaboration to understand how Investments proposed energy reforms and increasing energy tariffs in the region could differentially affect men and women, and how investments can be designed to ensure gender equity in project benefits. Jobs and Shared Prosperity Regional 100,000 A mixed-methods approach exploring the links between jobs and shared prosperity and how to improve economic opportunities and make labor markets more inclusive for both men and women in ECA. Missing Girls in the South Regional 140,000 Research uncovering the causes and consequences Caucasus of skewed birth ratios and sex selection in the South Caucasus. Life in Transition Survey III Regional 220,000 Inclusion of new module on gender and assets and improved quality of sampling to better capture female respondents and intra-household dynamics in the third round of the EBRD and World Bank Life in Transition Survey. Gender Innovation in Finance Russia 200,000 Enhancing access to finance for women entrepreneurs in Russia. Access to Justice for Poor Serbia 50,000 Collection of new evidence from users of the justice Women and Men system to help inform engagement with the justice sector. Roma Adolescents - Serbia 25,000 The objective of the proposed activity is to Qualitative Research understand what projects and activities can promote the social and economic integration of adolescent Roma boys. Assessment of barriers Uzbekistan 150,000 A study of the main barriers and enabling factors for formal labor market for rural women in Uzbekistan to enter formal labor participation and market, secure assets, and access financial and entrepreneurial activity for labor services, to inform World Bank operations rural women in Uzbekistan aiming to create livelihood opportunities for rural women. Strategic UFGE Allocation: Turkey 4,240,148 Multi-sectoral work on women’s economic Increasing access of women opportunities by looking barriers to employment to economic opportunities such as childcare supply and other work-life policies. The grant will also pilot women's cooperatives to help increase female labor force. Strategic UFGE Allocation: Bosnia and 2,085,850 Analytical work on care services, the degree of labor Promoting Gender Equality Herzegovina, Kosovo, market inequality and its associated productivity in the Western Balkans Macedonia, Serbia losses, mapping the potential skills mismatch in Serbia, and barriers to mobility in Bosnia. Innovative leadership training will also be delivered to officials to improve labor reform. 38 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN Gender-smart Interventions Argentina 120,000 Support Argentina’s Ministry of Labor to revise in Employment Programs for tools and procedures to make Youth Employment NEET Youth Program more inclusive of women and LGBTI youth. Identify 5 municipalities for a pilot of gender-smart practices. Women’s Mobility in LAC Argentina, Brazil, 120,000 Building on Roads to Agency report, analytical work Cities – Constraints and Colombia to study how factors related to women’s agency can Facilitators Related to constrain or promote women’s mobility and thus Agency access to economic opportunities in urban areas. Case studies in Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, and Bogota. Understanding Agency Bolivia 120,000 Perception survey on violence against women, by Measuring Women’s workplace discrimination and exclusion, with a Perception on Exclusion and focus on indigenous groups. Discrimination Expanding Women’s Agency Brazil 110,000 Analytical work to better understand gender roles through Productive Inclusion and rural women’s agency within key productive in Rural Areas clusters, and piloting interventions to enhance and better measure their agency. Urban Mass Transport: Brazil 150,000 Piloting the use of existing urban mass transport Gender Agency and Inclusion systems to increase access for women to specialized legal and social services through electronic information kiosks and campaigns. Expanding Women’s Brazil 120,000 Impact evaluation to measure the efficacy Agency through Productive of interventions on economic impact and Inclusion in Rural Areas of empowerment of women in producer Northeast Brazil organizations, using the adapted Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index (from UFGE round 1). Women’s Economic Colombia 120,000 Calculate the value of unpaid work and provide Empowerment: mechanisms to compensate and redistribute Challenges of the unpaid work, which falls mainly on women. Care Economy Activities: profiling of households that benefit in Colombia from provision of care services as part of national system; stocktaking of existing public programs and services; recommendations on the inclusion of existing programs to the national level program. Text Me Maybe! On Peer-to- Ecuador 65,000 Evaluation of school-based peer-to-peer education Peer Sexual Education and combined with text message reminders to reduce Mobile Texting to Reduce the teen pregnancy. Findings aim to increase knowledge Risk of Teenage Pregnancy on how aspirations, empowerment, and gender norms affect agency. Expanding Labor Market El Salvador 60,000 An evaluation of whether income support Opportunities of Women and training programs can be potent tools for enhancing women’s agency for better economic outcomes. The work will also provide lessons on how to best measure agency. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 39 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN (CONT.) Evaluating the Impact Grenada, St. Lucia 120,000 Evaluation of the impact of non-inclusive vs. all of the Non All-Inclusive inclusive tourism development on jobs for youth versus All-Inclusive Tourism and women (as employees and self-employed). Development Migration and the Guatemala 114,000 Research on the impact of male outmigration Changing Role of Women on women left in charge of the farm in terms of in Agriculture: The Case productivity, decision-making, and constraints, from Latin America and the taking into account the role of remittances. Caribbean Testing Evidence-Based Guatemala, Honduras 110,000 Adapt, test, and monitor progress of a community- Approaches to Foster based program that fosters collective action to Collective Action in prevent intimate partner violence. Addressing Intimate Partner Violence Piloting the Delivery of Haiti 130,000 Testing provision of skills training (including Agency in Haiti non-traditional technical ones) for improved employment and entrepreneurship outcomes for young women. Regional Knowledge Regional 600,000 Expand and share operationally relevant knowledge Management aimed to improve gender equality in the region. Activities include regional knowledge contests targeting government agencies, civil society, and academia, as well as dissemination around agency related topics. Advancing Gender Agency Regional 150,000 Expand data and evidence on impacts of in LAC: Experiences from the transportation projects on women’s agency, as well Transport Sector as analyzing the replicable and scalable nature of those activities. Developing a Model for St. Lucia 90,000 Promoting awareness, designing a financing Gender-Sensitive Post- scheme, and developing disaster risk management Disaster Response and products that promote greater agency and climate Gender-Inclusive Climate resilience along gender lines. Adaptation Finance (Saint Lucia, Organization of Eastern Caribbean States, and Small Island Developing States) Strategic UFGE Allocation: Haiti 600,000 Testing provision of skills training (including Adolescent Girls Initiative non-traditional technical ones) for improved employment and entrepreneurship outcomes for young women. 40 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA Impact of the crisis on Iraq 230,000 Research to better understand the impact of the women’s educational conflict on women’s educational and professional and professional status status in Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) and what in Kurdistan Region of kind of coping mechanisms they use to retain or Iraq (KRI) create jobs Impact Evaluation of Civil Jordan 200,000 Understanding of the impact of legal aid services in Legal Aid for Women civil matters for poor women to support evaluation of different service delivery models and provide data to promote discussions on the value of legal aid versus. Evaluation of the Morocco 181,200 Evaluating the impact of the Strengthening Micro- Strengthening Micro- Entrepreneurship for Disadvantaged Youth Project Entrepreneurship for in Morocco. Disadvantaged Youth Project Morocco Urban Transport Morocco 200,000 Household survey in three urban agglomerations Program Gender Survey to help strengthen social and economic inclusion of women by providing urban planners and policymakers with an evidence base to create smarter and more user-friendly transport systems. Study on the Impacts of the Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq 350,000 Qualitative fieldwork to assess the gender-specific Syrian Refugee Crisis risks and outcomes of the Syrian refugee crisis on host communities in Jordan, Lebanon and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI). How Does Exposure Syria 210,000 Analytical work and data collection, including to Conflict Affect the survey, experiments and interviews with Syrian Preferences and Attitudes refugees living in Turkey, to estimate the impact of of Young Syrian Refugees Syrian war on (a) social capital of women and their children (b) support for radicalization among young men and women. Lasting impact of Labour Tunisia 275,000 A randomized control trial of a public works Intensive Public Works program to test the impact of an additional small programs Through Enhanced business grant given to subsample of former Female entrepreneurship: women participants, aiming to strengthen female Evidence from the Tunisia’s leadership and to sustain livelihoods in the longer Rural Community Works and term. Local Participation Enterprise Revitalization and Yemen 150,000 To aid in the impact evaluation of an internship Employment Pilot program for youth in Yemen. Understanding how Gender Regional 400,000 Analytical work to better understand how Norms in MNA Impact displacement impacts social norms in regard to Education and Employment women's participation and preferences in labor Outcomes markets, school to work transition, and family formation. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 41 Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description SOUTH ASIA Youth, Gender, and Bangladesh, Nepal, 200,000 Piloting ICT skills for employment and ICT Program Pakistan entrepreneurship among young women, and developing apps for supporting gender-based violence victims and increasing accountability and information around public services (e.g. health). Deepening the Analytical India 150,000 The activity will use international evidence at the Foundation for Operations country level in non-traditional sectors and generate new evidence as needed for these sectors. Gender Innovation Regional 380,000 Identify interventions that address the underlying Lab South Asia causes of female and male disadvantages given a country’s context. The Lab will build the evidence base and inform Bank operations and public policy. It will perform strategic analytical work on gender and enhance the monitoring and evaluation of gender interventions by testing gender-specific interventions in World Bank programs, or as stand-alone activities in the areas of access to infrastructure services, voice and agency, and gender-based violence. Addressing Gender-Based Regional 870,000 Support development of a comprehensive gender- Violence in South Asia based violence program in the region by increasing availability of data and evidence, engaging donors, government partners, civil society and other groups to increase effectiveness of GBV programs, and learn from innovative programs. *Dropped: Piloting Women’s Participatory Rural Land Registration in China 42 TABLE 8. AFRICA AND SOUTH ASIA GENDER INNOVATION LAB SUPPORTED IMPACT EVALUATIONSa Activity Country Description AFRICA GENDER INNOVATION LAB Impact evaluation of World Bank Benin Evaluation of a youth skills development intervention with the goal of Youth Skills Training Project identifying effective policy responses. Impact evaluation of CARE Village Burundi Evaluation of a Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs) Savings and Loan Associations and program primarily targeted to women with two gender-transformative Couples Training interventions: a couples training program and a public awareness program. Great Lakes Emergency Sexual Burundi, Democratic Impact evaluation to understand how to respond most effectively to and Gender based Violence and Republic of Congo, survivors of SGBV and how to contribute to violence prevention by Women’s Health Rwanda transforming norms and behaviors regarding SGBV and gender equality. Impact evaluation of the Youth Congo, Republic of Evaluation of skills training, job insertion and entrepreneurship support for Business Training project in Republic vulnerable youth and micro-entrepreneurs. of Congo Engaging Men in Accountable Congo, Democratic The impact evaluation aims to provide evidence on sexual violence Practice (EMAP) Republic of prevention through a randomized control trial focused on engaging men through accountable practice including separate women’s discussion groups and men’s discussions groups. Impact evaluation of the Growth Congo, Democratic The impact evaluation will study the combined impact of roads Poles project Republic of rehabilitation and agricultural extension services on income and wealth, employment, agricultural outcomes such as productivity and access to markets, agency and empowerment of female farmers, women’s time use. Impact evaluation of World Bank Cote d'Ivoire Evaluation of the effects of child care provision on female formal sector Agricultural Support Project employment and income (agro-processing employment). Impact evaluation of USAID Ethiopia Evaluation of a mentorship program aiming to help address important Women's Agricultural Leaders challenges that women face in the areas of entrepreneurship and small Network business in the agri-business sector in Ethiopia. Competitiveness and Job Creation Ethiopia The impact evaluation examines the impact of access to jobs in the industrial zone on employee welfare, and will conduct ancillary research on priority issues including employee performance and retention, and impacts of wage subsidies. World Bank Randomizing access to Ghana Randomized control trial in partnership with the Ghana Commercial irrigated land and/or inputs at the Agriculture Project (GCAP) and Ariku farms to offer evidence of whether household and spousal level direct access for women alters production or consumption patterns in the household. Making Cash Grants Work for Ghana Identify innovative ways of disbursing cash grants so as to maximize their Female Entrepreneurs impact on the profits and growth of female-owned businesses. More specifically, test the relative effectiveness of providing (i) unconditional cash grants; (ii) grants conditional on first reaching a pre-defined savings goal; and (iii) grants conditional on both the beneficiary and her partner attending a training on allocation of resources within the household. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 43 Activity Country Description AFRICA GENDER INNOVATION LAB (CONT.) Gender, Insurance and Agricultural Ghana Assess the effects of regular extension services on output of women Productivity farmers as part of a larger effort in providing community based extension services, integrating a gender dimension into a project that was previously focused only on men, and testing the effects of counterpart funding of drought index insurance support to women and its’ influence on household allocation of resources including land. Impact evaluation of the Household Kenya This impact evaluation project will collaborate with a for-profit financial Joint Accounts and Survivor institution to encourage male individual account holders to take up a new Ownership Rights project form of joint account, wherein the co-owner has limited rights until the death of the primary owner, but has immediate unrestricted access to the account in the event of the primary owner’s passing. The Impacts of Microfranchising on Kenya A first ever impact evaluation of a randomized microfranchising Young Women in Nairobi intervention expected to make a valuable contribution to the literature on the overall impacts of expanding credit access and providing capital to entrepreneurs in low-income countries. Impact evaluation of the Liberia Evaluation of whether being part of a mentorship program during early International Rescue Committee adolescence (ages 12-15) improves outcomes for girls in Liberia’s capital (IRC) Sisters of Success project city, Monrovia. Impact evaluation of USAID Growing Nigeria This project targets vulnerable households in northern Nigeria, particularly Income and Rural Markets for female members, by providing financial products and in-kind asset Agriculture project transfers to assist them in moving away from subsistence agriculture and into the market. Impact evaluation of the BRAC Sierra Leone This initiative seeks adolescent girls’ social and economic empowerment Empowerment and Livelihoods for by providing adolescent development centers (ELA clubs), life skills Adolescent Girls project training, livelihood training, and credit support to start income-generating activities. Youth Job Assistance South Africa Assess the effectiveness of an innovative intervention aimed to address gender disparities in the labor market outcomes of young new entrants. The intervention is expected to have important impacts for young new work-seekers, who lack job experience and references from prior employment. Skill Certification & Counseling South Africa Evaluation of the effectiveness of a skill certification and job-search counseling program addressing gender disparities in the labor market outcomes of unemployed young adults. Work-seekers will be offered a certificate of aptitude, a letter of recommendation template, and advice on how to prepare and submit job applications. The certification and counseling interventions are potentially more valuable for women, as they have more limited job networks, and thus find more challenging to directly signal their skills to prospective employers in a credible and relevant manner. Evaluation of USAID Feed the Future Tanzania The NAFAKA Staples Value Chain Activity is a $30 million project funded by USAID under the Tanzania Feed the Future (FTF) Initiative. NAFAKA’s goal is to sustainably reduce poverty and food insecurity by increasing agricultural production and incomes for smallholder farmers. GIL is primarily focusing on the agricultural extension and private-sector-led out- grower components of NAFAKA. 44 Activity Country Description AFRICA GENDER INNOVATION LAB (CONT.) Impact evaluation of the Land Uganda A randomized control trial of the program will experiment with different Registration and Matching Grants nudges to incentivize households to adopt the joint spousal registration of project land. The study will examine the impact of including a woman’s name on a land title on agricultural and household outcomes, over and above the impact of owning a land title itself. Impact evaluation of the BRAC Uganda This project takes an integrated approach to improving nutrition and food Orange Sweet Potato project security for children, adolescent girls and women of childbearing age by increasing smallholders’ adoption, production and consumption of a nutrient-rich staple crop. IFPRI Fair Pay Project Uganda This project measures the impact of contracting with women on labor inputs and productivity, household welfare, women’s empowerment and marital harmony and contract success and corporate welfare. The impact evaluation intervention will cross-randomize i) encouraging households to transfer one of multiple sugar contracts into wife’s name ii) providing sensitization workshop to increase gender equity and cooperation in households. Girls’ Education and Women’s Zambia The impact evaluation will focus on one arm of the project entitled Empowerment and Livelihoods Support Women’s Livelihoods which will provide i) short training, ii) cash grants (US$225), iii) savings support to 20 women identified as “extremely poor per community. SOUTH ASIA GENDER INNOVATION LAB Northern Areas Reduction of Poverty Bangladesh Evaluates the impact of training programs on women's labor market and Initiative other outcomes. Second Rural Transport Improvement Bangladesh Evaluates the gender disaggregated impacts of improved rural accessibility Project and strengthened capacity for rural road maintenance. PMGSY Rural Roads Program India Evaluates the impact of introducing a national network of rural roads on women's empowerment. Telangana Rural Inclusive Growth India Evaluates the impact of water supply and nutrition interventions on Project children, and pregnant and lactating mothers. Karnataka Urban Water supply India Evaluates the impact of 24x7 water supply on urban households, Modernization Project especially women. Punjab Rural Water and Sanitation India Evaluates the gender related effects of community driven water schemes. Program Rural Water Supply and Sanitation India Evaluates the gender related impact of rural water supply and sanitation in Project for Low Income States three low income states. Impact of Change Management India Evaluates the impact of the effect of this program on service delivery, with Program in Tamil Nadu a focus on women. Bridges improvement and Nepal Evaluates the gender disaggregated impacts of improved bridge maintenance program infrastructure on empowerment and economic opportunities PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 45 TABLE 9. PRIVATE SECTOR ENGAGEMENT WINDOW (IFC) Activity Country Funding Granted (US$) Description Women Mobile Financial Bangladesh 350,000 The project will seek to facilitate the financial Services inclusion of women in Bangladesh into the formal financial system through mobile financial services. Financial Inclusion of Women Bangladesh 250,000 Financial inclusion of women garment workers Ready-Made Garments through the adoption of mobile financial services in Workers through Mobile Bangladesh. Financial Services Enabling Women India 250,000 Develop data driven insights on how to enhance Entrepreneurship women entrepreneurship and access to finance through ecommerce through ecommerce and develop a pilot program to narrow the gender finance and skills gap. Gender Housing Finance India, Panama, Egypt 250,000 Creation of a research and action framework Initiative -Facilitate women’s for gender based housing finance products, access to Title, Finance and implementation of pilot projects, and organization Housing of knowledge exchange events. Enhancing women’s market Mozambique 250,000 Develop private sector focused value chain training access in agribusiness modules that address business challenges of women farmers in Mozambique. Gender Responsive Extractive Global 300,000 Develop a diagnostic tool for Investment Officers Industries to better understand the dynamics of gender in extractive industries and a toolkit for extractives companies to integrate gender into their operations. Southeast Asia #Get2Equal Regional 3,400,000 Increase quality employment and business leadership opportunities for women and expand opportunities for women entrepreneurs by targeted studies to understand binding constraints and possible solutions, and engagement with companies to share solutions and encourage change. Developing Gender Data Regional 350,000 Develop and test a gender data analytics tools for Analytics in LAC financial institutions. The project will also leverage IFC’s existing data analytics work being currently done in Africa, mostly for mobile financial services. Tackling Gender in Multi-Region 200,000 Partner with four different agribusiness private Agribusiness: Improving sector companies in three regions (Africa, Eastern Business Europe, and Latin America) to test the business case for applying existing gender analytical tools across a broad spectrum of agribusiness operations and subsectors. Innovation in Banking Multi-Region 120,000 Enable financial institutions in developing countries Women through a to provide innovative financial and non-financial Partnership with Global services to women-owned SMEs and thereby Banking Alliance for closing gender financing gaps. Women (GBA) 46 Photo: Barbara Coello / World Bank WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES (WLSME) The Women’s Leadership in Small and Medium Enterprises (WLSME) initiative is a partnership with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) that aims to increase the entry and growth of women-owned and managed small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in developing countries. The initiative fosters learning through practical research and collaboration at the World Bank Group, as well as with USAID and NGOs. The WLSME trust fund supports rigorous evaluations of innovative interventions to help answer the question “what works” in promoting women-led SMEs. Understanding why women do not participate more actively in SME entrepreneurship and creating opportunities for their higher engagement through effective interventions can yield dividends in terms of productivity and broad-based economic growth. The WLSME trust fund is active in 12 countries across Africa, Central Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, the Middle East and North Africa, and South Asia (see Table 10). Interventions are addressing the following constraints: Human and other capital gaps, by providing education and training and/or more capital to better equip women • entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses; Poor roads that limit male and female entrepreneurs’ access to markets and gender gaps in access to technology and • information; and High tax compliance burdens and opaque regulatory environments for SMEs. •  15 For more information on the Women’s Leadership in Small and Medium Enterprises Initiative see http://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/womens-leadership-in-small-and-medium-enterprises-trust-fund. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 47 TABLE 10. WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES: INTERVENTIONS AND EVALUATION BY COUNTRY Intervention Tested Country Evaluation Status Of Analysis Providing education, training and/or more capital to better equip female entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses Business and technical training Ethiopia Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey and baseline and access to micro-finance to evaluate impact of credit report were completed in on business growth and FY16; the midline survey was the differential impact of completed in FY16, the report is various approaches to forthcoming. Endline survey will entrepreneurship training. start in October 2017. Sample size: 2,400 Financial literacy and business Haiti Non-experimental evaluation Baseline survey was completed training for (propensity score matching) in FY16. Midline surveys will food services to assess social and economic start in October 2016 for the outcomes of female first cohort of beneficiaries beneficiaries such as income, and the midline report will be profits, women’s agency and completed food security. in FY16. Sample size: 1,400 Mixed managerial training and Mexico Evaluation to assess the Baseline survey was completed personal initiative training added value of a “soft skills” in FY14; midline survey was component to traditional completed in FY15. The results business training packages for of the midline survey data female small entrepreneurs in analysis will be reported by the Mexico. end of 2016. Sample size: 3,000 Business training, start-up grants Nigeria Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey and report and mentoring for winners of a to examine outcomes such as were completed in FY12. business plan competition business start-up and expansion Three follow-up surveys were rates, profits, completed in FY13, FY14 and and job creation. FY15. Findings are published in the World Bank Policy Research Sample size: 1,841 Working Paper (WPS7391) in August 2015. Comprehensive support of Pakistan Quasi-experimental (non- Baseline survey completed in business education, mentoring, random) approach to test FY16. Baseline report will be networking, and access to program outcomes such as completed early FY17. finance facilitation profits, sales and access to finance Baseline Sample: 637; Beneficiaries: 400 Financial literacy and technical Sierra Leone Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey and baseline training through classroom to examine gender-specific report were completed in teaching and apprenticeships, constraints, basic firm metrics FY14; the endline survey was and microfinance facilitation (profits and outputs) and completed in FY16. The final outcomes related to female report on findings will be agency. completed in early FY17. Sample size: 3,344 48 Intervention Tested Country Evaluation Status Of Analysis Financial literacy and technical Sierra Leone Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey and baseline training through classroom to examine gender-specific report were completed in teaching and apprenticeships, constraints, basic firm metrics FY14; the endline survey was and microfinance facilitation (profits and outputs) and completed in FY16. The final outcomes related to female report on findings will be agency. completed in early FY17. Sample size: 3,344 Managerial training or personal Togo Randomized controlled trial to Baseline survey was completed initiative training (attitudes and compare relative effectiveness of in January 2014; follow up behavior) the two types of training. surveys were conducted in September 2014, January 2015 Sample size: 1,500 and September 2015. An endline will be completed in October 2016 and analysis in early 2017. Business training and Tunisia Pre- and post-test evaluation Baseline survey and baseline personalized coaching for to measure impact on report were completed in graduate students, with seed self-employment rate and FY10; follow up surveys were grants for winners of perceptions of obstacles faced completed in FY11 and FY14; an a business plan competition at by women, harassment, etc. endline survey was completed graduation in FY15. The final report was Sample size: 1,700 completed in FY16. Improving access to infrastructure and reducing gender gaps in access to information and technology Road rehabilitation, agricultural Democratic Republic of Congo Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey was completed extension services and childcare to examine the impact of a in FY16. The baseline report will provision farmer’s field school on the be completed by end 2016. adoption of technology by The midline survey will be male and female farmers and fielded in FY17. the impact of child care service provision on women’s time use. Sample size: 3,000 households Road rehabilitation, and cash Mozambique Randomized control trial of the Baseline survey was completed and non-cognitive skills to impact of interventions taking in FY16, baseline report and improve market access place under the auspices of a midline survey will be completed Growth in FY17. Poles Project including non-cognitive skills development and cash grants for market access. Sample size: 3,000 households An online marketplace to link South Africa Randomized controlled trial Baseline survey and baseline female and male suppliers to to examine how information report were completed in FY13. potential buyers shapes networking capital for Interventions ongoing in FY17 female suppliers and how this and follow-up survey expected affects firm performance. for FY18. Sample size: 2,444 firms PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 49 Intervention Tested Country Evaluation Status Of Analysis Reducing the tax compliance burden and improving the regulatory environment Interventions to reduce tax Kyrgyz Republic Randomized controlled trial to Baseline survey was completed compliance burden, promote design, implement, and evaluate in FY16. A midline survey will regulatory transparency in tax incentive-based institutional be completed in early FY17 and inspections of male and female- mechanisms that can reduce the a report on early results will be owned SMEs, and improve tax compliance burden of male finalized in FY17. transparency and accountability and female owned MSMEs. of the tax administration Sample size: 2,500 businesses PROGRESS AND EARLY FINDINGS WLSME activities have considerably advanced over the last year: in FY16, five remaining baseline surveys were completed, and follow-up surveys took place in six countries. A new project in Mexico was also added to the portfolio. Building on findings of (1) the relevance of soft skills training and (2) their greater impact on growth orientated entrepreneurs, this project examines the impact of alternative types of training on female micro entrepreneurs. Past evaluations of traditional business training programs for female entrepreneurs have shown that they are ineffective in increasing the firm’s size or probability of survival. The Mexico intervention not only looks at the impact of a traditional managerial training versus soft skills (personal initiative) training but also takes into account how these different types of training work for entrepreneurs with different skills and abilities. To date the WLSME has attracted interest from other bilateral donors and its value is being increasingly recognized within the WBG. All five of the projects that are at baseline stage plus the Pakistan project where implementation is under way, have attracted funds from other sources at the WBG and from other donors (DFID, IZA and the Department of Foreign Affairs of Canada). The total $1.4 million that WLSME provided for these baselines has leveraged a total of $4.91 million. Results to-date shed light on the first of the three WSLME areas of constraints: human and other capital gaps. Final reports and papers from the Nigeria and Tunisia evaluations are available and have been disseminated in workshops with government counterparts and World Bank Group technical teams; in meetings and other dissemination events with stakeholders in country, including policy makers and staff from academic institutions; in discussions with bi-lateral donors and UN agencies; and on social media. These findings were reported on in FY16. Preliminary results from follow-up surveys have been produced for Togo and Sierra Leone (see Box 6, below) and a summary of these is given below. CLOSING HUMAN AND OTHER CAPITAL GAPS: ACCESS TO TRAINING, ACCESS TO FINANCE, OR BOTH? While there is an established link between both managerial and entrepreneurial skills and productivity,16 there is little rigorous evidence that either access to finance alone, particularly in small amounts, or business training alone leads to sustained business growth among women’s enterprises. Some evaluations of the impact of increased access to finance for female micro entrepreneurs have revealed that finance frequently gets diverted from their enterprises into consumption expenditures. This leads to the conclusion that increasing access to assets or capital in kind works better for female micro entrepreneurs than increasing their access to loans or cash grants.17 More knowledge about whether alternatives to business training, or whether combining improved access to finance with training, can effectively support male and female entrepreneurs will help policymakers design more effective interventions. WLSME supported evaluations of Togo, Nigeria and Sierra Leone provide insights about these questions.  16 De Mel et al., 2008; Bloom and Van Reenen, 2010  17 See for example, Suresh de Mel, David McKenzie and Christopher Woodruff Returns to Capital in Microenterprises: Evidence from a Field Experiment, 2008 The Quarterly Journal of Economics (2008) 123 (4): 1329-1372. doi: 10.1162/qjec.2008.123.4.1329 50 The Togo intervention trained 1,000 male and female owners of informal micro-enterprises with growth potential in the capital city of Lomé. Five hundred entrepreneurs received Business Edge training, an internationally accredited business managerial training program, and an additional 500 entrepreneurs received personal initiative training which focused on developing skills like setting goals and working toward them, being proactive, using innovation to improve business performance, learning how to overcome obstacles, and accessing unconventional financing opportunities. Results from Togo show that both training programs had positive impacts on businesses run by male and female entrepreneurs. After the training programs both male and female entrepreneurs invested more in their businesses, buying more assets like machinery and equipment, and their business practices—marketing and customer services, record-keeping, and human resource management—improved, as well as their information-seeking practices. However, the impact of the two training programs on male and female entrepreneurs differed. While the business training had more or less equivalent impacts for men and women, the personal initiative trainings’ impact was greater for women than for men. Personal initiative training had more impact on the amount of money female entrepreneurs were able to borrow, their adoption of new processes, and the survival of their enterprises. After attending the personal initiative training, women were able to obtain business loans that were substantially larger than those of the control group. On the other hand, the managerial training had no impact on male and female entrepreneurs’ access to business loans while men (but not women) attending this training gained greater access to other financial services such as emergency financing and business bank accounts. One of the key components of personal initiative training is about how to start or grow a business with limited financial resources. In this component women learn to go beyond obstacles and become much more proactive which could explain why they were able to access larger loans than the control group. The Togo evaluation also compares whether male and female entrepreneurs were more likely to expand their businesses as a result of the training, looking at whether they invested in assets like machinery, equipment, tools, land, and vehicles (capital inputs) or whether they worked longer hours themselves, employed more people, or employed those already working for more hours (labor inputs). It found that both male and female entrepreneurs attending the managerial training invested in more capital inputs, but they did not hire more people. No statistically significant gender differences were detected at this stage. For those attending the personal initiative training, both male and female entrepreneurs increased their use of both labor and capital inputs. However, whereas male entrepreneurs increased the number of hours they and their employees worked, female entrepreneurs hired more people. The employment impacts of the personal initiative training on female-owned businesses are impressive: compared to the control group consisting of both male and female entrepreneurs (same as treatment group), women increased the total number of both own account and paid workers. In summary, the Togo evaluation found that the personal initiative training works better for female entrepreneurs than managerial training, as it is linked to greater investments in their businesses and increased use of labor inputs, better business survival and process innovation. In contrast, there is no significant difference between the impacts of the two types of training for male entrepreneurs. These results support similar findings in Sierra Leone that show young women who attended on the job and skills training derived higher, more stable incomes with the results being less marked for young men (Box 6). The next steps for the Togo evaluation are to investigate how the intermediate outcomes in terms of increased investment and improved business practices affect business performance and survival. In addition, the team plans to shed more light on why the personal initiative training has a greater positive impact on women entrepreneurs. To do this the researchers will be looking at the impact of the trainings on women’s empowerment and their ability to overcome obstacles. A two-year follow-up survey scheduled in September 2016 will answer these questions. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 51 Photo: Stephan Gladieu / World Bank BOX 7. EARLY FINDINGS: SIERRA LEONE YOUTH EMPLOYMENT SUPPORT PROJECT Sierra Leone’s Youth Employment Support Project included a series of interventions aimed at improving the skills of youth (ages 15 to 35) to make them more employable and to promote the creation and expansion of youth owned small and medium enterprises. One of these interventions provided training and access to finance for urban youth who had some secondary education. This intervention had a quota of 50 percent participation for women allowing enough statistical power to draw conclusions by gender, a fairly unusual characteristic among impact evaluations of other skills development projects. The 2,400 program beneficiaries, half of whom were women, received a stipend that represented about 45 percent of average earnings at baseline, a non-trivial cash transfer. The intervention took place in five urban areas of Sierra Leone, which were badly hit by Ebola crisis in 2014-2015. An impact evaluation was designed to assess the relative effectiveness of different interventions: (A) technical skills and on-the-job training; (B) business skills training and microfinance facilitation, and (C) a package combining (A) and (B). The Ebola outbreak prevented the delivery of the microfinance component. The evaluation successfully tracked 3,344 youth (800 in A, 800 in B, 800 in C, and 1,200 in the control group). The evaluation results show that overall levels of employment, both wage and self-employment, increased in all treatment groups, but these results were entirely driven by men. Labor earnings, on the other hand, increased for women but not for men. Earnings increased by 67.9 percent for women who attended the technical skills and on the jobs training (treatment group A). The young women in treatment groups B and C were more likely to find wage work than the control group. The program was also successful in promoting entrepreneurship for both young men and young women. Participation in the program increased the likelihood of starting a business (own or family) by 11.4 percentage points. These and other overall findings are consistent with prior evidence that the combination of capital (in this case the cash stipends) and skills is effective in promoting micro and small enterprises. The program also proved to have a protective effect during the Ebola outbreak. Participants’ household consumption per capita grew by 52.5 percent compared with the control group. Households with a female program participant saw large increases in overall per capita consumption – in the range of 60 to 70 percent - while households with a male program participant also registered positive, albeit lower increases of between 20 and 40 percent. While the stipend contributed to households’ increased per capita consumption, increased profits, borrowing and, for women earnings, also played a role. This suggests that skills and training interventions can help build households’ resilience against shocks. 52 The Youth Enterprise with Innovation in Nigeria (YouWIN!) project18 combined business training with follow-up technical assistance and business grants. The entrepreneurs who received this support were selected through a business plan competition, which attracted nearly 24,000 individuals, of which 3,614 (15 percent) were from entrepreneurs seeking to expand their business and 20,230 were for new entrepreneurs. A minority of applicants were female: 18.5 percent of new business applicants, and 14.9 percent of existing business applicants. The second YouWin! competition round (YouWIN! Women) was open only to women entrepreneurs age 45 years or less and subsequent rounds have had higher proportions of female applicants. The awards were paid in four tranches with the final two tranches made conditional on employment and sales turnover. These triggers for tranches were set individually for each firm and sought to ensure the business was set up and producing. The impact evaluation of the first round of YouWin! showed that winning the business plan competition had a positive impact on business creation and increased the survival rates of existing firms. Both male and female-owned enterprises had higher profits and sales, and generated higher employment. Receiving a YouWIN! grant and training was especially beneficial to female entrepreneurs when it came to starting up and operating their businesses, helping to close the performance gap between them and their male counterparts. In the control group, 42 percent of women and 56 percent of men operated a business three years after applying for the competition. The intervention increased this by 35 percentage points for men, and by 47 percentage points for women, almost completely closing the 14 point gap between men and women in the control group. However, the grants had no impact on closing the gap between male and female-owned new startups with regard to profits, sales, and the firm’s ability to expand beyond 10 workers, where male owned enterprises continued to perform better. The evaluation of the Togo intervention shows that when female entrepreneurs are trained, they will, like their male counterparts, improve their business practices and invest in and grow their businesses. It also shows that personal initiative training is particularly effective for female entrepreneurs when it comes to achieving these results. The Nigeria impact evaluation shows that tailored support (combining training and access to grant finance) works equally well for female and male entrepreneurs wanting to grow their businesses. It also shows that existing male and female owned businesses performed equally well in terms of increased profits and sales for entrepreneurs with an average of four years’ experience. Table 11 gives some more examples how the WLSME program is building the knowledge base about female entrepreneurship and the research questions that will inform future project design. Photo: Stephan Gladieu / World Bank David MacKenzie (2015). “Identifying and Spurring High-Growth Entrepreneurship: Experimental Evidence from a Business Plan Competition.”  18 The World Bank Policy Research Working Paper no. 7391. The World Bank: Washington DC, [http://imagebank.worldbank.org/servlet/ WDSContentServer/IW3P/IB/2015/08/12/090224b08306bb9a/1_0/Rendered/PDF/Identifying0an0ess0plan0competition.pdf]. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 53 TABLE 11. EXAMPLES OF PRELIMINARY FINDINGS AND TYPES OF QUESTIONS TO BE ANSWERED BY WLSME EVALUATIONS Issue Preliminary findings and questions addressed Growth entrepreneurs Pakistan, Togo and Mexico evaluations are exploring the question of what constitutes a growth orientated entrepreneur, proposing definitions and producing more information about their profiles and the characteristics of their enterprises. They are also producing evidence about which training interventions work best to support them. The Tunisia evaluation examined whether training can assist university graduates to become entrepreneurs. Female and male entrepreneurship in fragile situations Several WLSME interventions are taking place in fragile situations, where data and evidence are often scant. The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Haiti, Sierra Leone and Togo evaluations have produced information about female and male entrepreneurs’ profiles and the characteristics of their enterprises. They will produce evidence on which training interventions, in some cases in combination with capital or access to finance, work best. Access to finance Mozambique, Nigeria, and Ethiopia are producing evidence about whether releasing financial constraints can improve the performance of female entrepreneurs. Access to markets The Mozambique and DRC evaluations will produce results that show whether improved access to markets from better roads, combined training, and/or access to finance improves the profitability of male and female entrepreneurs. Information about markets The South Africa evaluation will show whether better market information provided by the private sector improves the performance of male and female entrepreneurs. Child care DRC results will show whether child care is a constraint to female entrepreneurs. Training, networking and mentoring. Mexico, Mozambique, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Togo, Tunisia all add to the evidence base about the impact of different types of training on female and male entrepreneurs. Findings will include evidence about the relative effectiveness of non-cognitive skills development compared with traditional business and managerial training, and the impact of networks and mentoring. Improving the productivity of female and male farmers. The Mozambique evaluation will examine the impact of using agricultural extension services to deliver skills and non-cognitive skills training on its own and combined with grants. The Haiti evaluation will look at the impact of grants combined with training on rural women’s agricultural enterprises and the nutrition of their families to members of women’s agricultural co-operatives. 54 KNOWLEDGE AND LEARNING LEARNING UPTAKE In order to build knowledge on what works in promoting woman-led SMEs, raise awareness about the WLSME program and enrich dialogue with client country governments, several learning activities took place in FY16, at the World Bank Group headquarters and elsewhere. WLSME findings are enriching policy dialog and helping to inform the design of World Bank projects in Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, Tunisia and Pakistan. In Tunisia, for example, the WLSME team engaged Government departments and other national agencies in a discussion around why the entrepreneurial track may not have not succeeded in helping male and female graduate students become entrepreneurs. Recommendations were also made for strengthening the entrepreneurial track and addressing specific barriers faced by women entrepreneurs. Insights from this workshop are being reflected in a World Bank project implemented by the Ministry of Employment and national employment agency; “Productive Inclusion Opportunities for Young Women and Men.” In Pakistan, experience from the WomenX program was structured to integrate participant feedback into program design on an ongoing basis. Changes made to the program include: incorporating more applied knowledge by adding case studies and guest speakers to the course content; including more practical, hands-on financial skills training and less theory; and adding consulting services to help design solutions to specific issues faced by participants. Feedback from the WomenX program has also been helpful in providing inputs and resources for other entrepreneurship programs, such as Plan 9 (an incubator run by the Punjab State Government focused on IT start-ups) and SMEDA (the SME Development Agency) on technology skills training for women entrepreneurs. As a result of feedback from WomenX participants training on using social media for business and marketing is now included in SMEDA programs. A number of workshops and meetings with stakeholders and government counterparts over the course of the year provided valuable opportunities to discuss the specific barriers faced by female entrepreneurs (see Table 14 in Annex 2 for details). The WLSME project has generated a large amount of knowledge and learning about evaluations and design of training interventions. Two guidance notes will curate this knowledge to help World Bank Group staff and other development professionals tackle barriers to female entrepreneurship. The first will cover instruments, methods, and design for impact evaluations. It will collate and review the different survey instruments used by the project teams, categorize the questions used to uncover different dimensions of gender specific constraints (e.g. access to finance, access to information and network, mobility, self-efficacy), and document some of the lessons learned. The second product will provide an overview of the different approaches taken to deliver entrepreneurial training for women. Photo: Barbara Coello / World Bank PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 55 BOX 8: WLSME PUBLICATIONS Bossuroy, T., Campos, F., Coville, A., Goldstein, M., Roberts, G., & Sequeira, S. “Shape Up and Ship Out? Gender “ Constraints to Growth and Exporting in South Africa” in Women and Trade in Africa: Realizing the Potential (2013) Paul Brenton, Eliza Gamberoni and Catherine Sear (eds). World Bank. Washington. http://documents. worldbank.org/curated/en/115591468211805723/pdf/825200WP0Women00Box379865B00PUBLIC0.pdf. David MacKenzie (2015). “Identifying and Spurring High-Growth Entrepreneurship: Experimental Evidence from a Business Plan Competition.” The World Bank Policy Research Working Paper no. 7391. The World Bank: Washington DC, [http://imagebank.worldbank.org/servlet/WDSContentServer/IW3P/IB/2015/08/12/090224b08306bb9a/1_0/ Rendered/PDF/Identifying0an0ess0plan0competition.pdf]. The World Bank (2015). “Finance and PSD Impact: Lessons from DECFP Impact Evaluations.” The World Bank Finance and Private Sector Development Impact Notes. The World Bank: Washington DC. [http://siteresources. worldbank.org/INTFR/Resources/IN33.pdf]. Premand, Patrick; Koettl - Brodmann, Stefanie; Almeida, Rita; Kullberg; Grun, Rebekka E.; Barouni, Mahdi (2013). “From Evidence to Policy: Can entrepreneurship education improve work opportunities for college graduates,” [http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/486151468121137863/Can-entrepreneurship-training-improve- work-opportunities-for-college-graduates]. World Bank and ONEQ “Republic of Tunisia: Entrepreneurship Education for University Students in Tunisia.” Long-term impact evaluation results (April 2016) Report No: ACS18057, Middle East and North Africa, World Bank, Washington. Patrick Premand; Stefanie Brodmann; Rita Almeida, Rebekka Grun; Mahdi Barouni. (2016). “Entrepreneurship Education and Entry into Self-Employment Among University Graduates.” World Development Publication; Volume 77. Pages 311-327.[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X15002090]. Salman Alibhai, Niklas Buehren and Sreelakshmi Papineni (2015). “Female Entrepreneurs Who Succeed in Male-dominated Sectors in Ethiopia.” Policy Brief Issue 12. The World Bank: Washington DC. [http://documents. worldbank.org/curated/en/956031468185386493/Female-entrepreneurs-who-succeed-in-male-dominated- sectors-in-Ethiopia]. Xavier Cirera and Qursum Qasim (2014). “Supporting Growth-Oriented Women Entrepreneurs: A Review of the Evidence and Key Challenges,” The World Bank Innovation, Technology & Entrepreneurship Policy Note no. 92210. [http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/301891468327585460/pdf/92210-REPLACEMENT- Supporting-Growth-Oriented-Women-Entrepreneurs-A-Review-of-the-Evidence-and-Key-Challenge.pdf]. 56 ADMINISTRATION AND FINANCE Budget savings have been realized over the course of the WLSME MDTF implementation; some activities were curtailed due to changes in intervention design and reflows from activities that closed early were realized. These savings allowed for $175,000 to be allocated to an impact evaluation in Mexico exploring the impacts of traditional managerial training versus soft skills (personal initiative) training. Based on the revised budget needs of the overall MDTF program, it was agreed with the donor that the Bank would only call for $3,294,450 of the $3.5 million originally pledged. The WLSME will close in December 2016 and it is expected that three of the 12 impact evaluations will be complete prior to closure. The remaining WLSME supported projects have secured financial support to complete the impact evaluations and are expected later in FY17/FY18. One of the lessons learned from the administration of the trust fund is that generating results from impact evaluations of interventions implemented as part of wider government programs takes time. Up to five years should be planned to design, implement, and evaluate an intervention, especially in low income, and post conflict and fragile situations. Additional time is also needed to evaluate whether positive impacts are sustained beyond the project. TABLE 12. WLSME CONTRIBUTIONS (IN US$) Donors Pledges Receipts Balance* USAID 3,500,000 3,294,450 205,550 *Due to implementation adjustments in some countries, the remaining balance will not be called for. The main funds close December 31, 2016. Photo: Stephan Gladieu / World Bank PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 57 TABLE 13. WLSME ALLOCATIONS (IN US$) Pilots Allocations Disbursed and Committed Balance Measuring and Reducing 600,000 543,404 56,596 Regulatory Uncertainty and Discretion for Female Entrepreneurs in Central Asia Haiti—Fostering Woman’s 350,000 329,637 20,363 Involvement in Agro-Enterprise for Improved Food Quality and Household Food Security Testing Relative Impacts of 300,000 300,000 - Training, Access to Finance, and Social Networks for Fostering Entrepreneurial Success in Sierra Leone Improving Market Access of 350,000 346,156 3,844 WLSMEs in Africa through Innovative Programs Providing Integrated Support 350,000 236,550 - and Incubation Services for Graduates of the University Entrepreneurship Track in Tunisia Pakistan Women Entrepreneurs 400,000 400,000 - Innovative Approaches to 350,000 275,634 74,366 Develop Entrepreneurial Capacities of Female-Led Business Egyptian Women Leadership in 300,000 134,053 - Micro and Small Enterprises Mexico Female Entrepreneurship 175,000 175,000 - Subtotal Pilots 3,175,000 2,740,435 155,169 Communication and 104,000 43,037 60,963 dissemination Technical support, supervision, 221,000 159,196 61,804 and implementation activities Program management and 105,000 104,254 746 administration Grand total 3,605,000* 3,046,921 278,682 Early closure or curtailment of some grants resulted in unused balances that could be reallocated to other initiatives. For this reason, total allocations * exceed the pledged amount of $3,500,000. 58 Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images ANNEX 1: IMPLEMENTATION UPDATES DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO - IMPROVING MARKET ACCESS FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS IN AFRICA Intervention: The $110 million World Bank Western Growth Poles project supports the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) to develop and strengthen agricultural value chains in the Bas-Congo province by rehabilitating roads and providing agricultural productivity, processing, and marketing services to farmers in the area. The project targets female beneficiaries, as women’s land ownership rights are legally restricted in the DRC, making them less likely to invest in agricultural technology and to use extension services. This study evaluates the gender-differentiated impact of the overall package of activities provided by the Western Growth Poles project on productivity and access to markets. In addition, the study will use a Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) to evaluate the impact of Farmer Field Schools and childcare services on agricultural outcomes, women’s time use, and well-being. Implementation Update: Despite initial delays in World Bank project implementation, commitment to conduct the evaluation has been strong. In FY16, substantial progress was made. The baseline survey was completed with a sample of 3,000 households. The research team is analyzing the data and a baseline report will be completed and the midline survey will begin in FY17. Early findings suggest the importance of time use and land characteristics as factors in explaining gender gaps in productivity. The project has received additional trust fund support for the impact evaluation and the child care intervention from DFID and the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs. This funding is comprised of $250,000 to support the interventions and $500,000 to finalize the impact evaluation. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 59 ETHIOPIA - TAILORING FINANCIAL PRODUCTS TO ADDRESS WOMEN’S CONSTRAINTS TO FINANCE Intervention: The WLSME has been piloting and testing several innovative products and services for women entrepreneurs under the Women Entrepreneurship Development Project (WEDP). The baseline showed that 79 percent of WEDP clients had never taken a loan before, as most Ethiopian women-owned enterprises were stuck in a “missing middle” trap where loans offered by microfinance institutions were too small to meet their needs. Therefore, one of WEDP’s objectives is to increase loan sizes. The project has partnered with Ethiopia’s largest micro-finance institution (MFI) to pilot a psychometric loan-screening tool. Borrowers who do not possess adequate collateral take a psychometric test on a tablet computer, which predicts their likelihood of repaying a loan. They can then receive access to a loan based on their test score. An impact evaluation is measuring the effect of loans on the business growth of borrowers who would otherwise have been credit-constrained and examining the feasibility and profitability of psychometric testing as a screening tool for the MFI. The average WEDP loan has led to an increase of 24 percent in annual profits and 17 percent in net employment for Ethiopian women entrepreneurs. The average loan size that women entrepreneurs who registered for the WEDP program had taken before WEDP was 27,000 Birr (~$1,350). The average WEDP loan size is 240,000 Birr (~$12,000), a meaningful increase which can be used to develop and expand businesses. The reason for the large change is that most women were previously confined to group lending schemes, which capped out at around 30,000 ETB ($1500). WEDP introduced individual lending for women entrepreneurs, and equipped MFIs with the ability to appraise and lend on an individual basis. Most of the WEDP borrowers (about 67 percent) have never taken a loan before. Repayment of loans stood at 99 percent. Microfinance institutions were able to reduce collateral requirements from an average of 200 percent of the loan to 125 percent. Through WEDP’s technical assistance, microfinance institutions improved their ability to appraise and were able to collateral requirements from an average of 200 percent of the loan to 125 percent. The team raised additional funding from Canada and DFID (over $1 million) for the evaluation. Implementation Update: The baseline survey, a project-wide baseline study of 2,400 respondents was completed in FY15 and the baseline report was completed in FY16. The midline survey is currently underway, the survey firm began activities in October 2016. The midline report is expected to be completed by March 2017. The endline survey will start in October 2017. Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images 60 HAITI - PROVIDING SUPPLEMENTAL TRAINING FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS TO BRIDGE PRODUCTIVITY GAPS Intervention: As part of a $40 million IDA project—Strengthening Agricultural Services II (RESEPAG II)—a grant scheme supports Haitian agricultural producer organizations to adopt new technology, improve inputs, make post-harvest investments, improve the nutritional content of their products, and commercialize. Supplemental training is being provided and includes cognitive skills, such as business administration and financial literacy, with instruction on food preparation practices. A randomized trial of 1,200 individuals is being used to measure the overall impact of the matching grant treatment. Within this framework the WLSME designed a gender-focused IE methodology for 600 women beneficiaries who are receiving the financial trainings and the food preparation training. This randomized control trial approach measures the supplementary impact of providing training to women beneficiaries on social and economic outcomes such as; earned income and profits, women’s agency, and food security. Implementation Update: The Government of Haiti launched the matching grant scheme in June 2014, inviting proposals from producer organizations and selected the beneficiaries in December 2014. The IDA Project itself suffered considerable delays leading to a Level 1 Restructuring which was approved by the WBG Board in July 2015. The new project design, together with the reinforcement of the implementation team in the Ministry of Agriculture, helped accelerate implementation. In the baseline survey was completed and the disbursements of matching grants started. Midline surveys will start in October 2016 for the first cohort of beneficiaries. The firm that will adapt and deliver the trainings is testing the content and length of the different training modules. A pilot impact evaluation was tested on the ground and as a result the impact evaluation has been redesigned. KYRGYZ REPUBLIC - IMPROVING BUSINESS OUTCOMES THROUGH BETTER TAX PRACTICES Intervention: The intervention aims to improve the regulatory transparency of tax collection in the Kyrgyz Republic. Surveys of micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSME) undertaken for this project will assess: (a) whether women have less access to information and knowledge about tax inspections; (b) whether this lack of access to information and knowledge affects female entrepreneurs more adversely than male entrepreneurs; (c) whether entrepreneurs’ lack of access to information and knowledge leads to higher rates of demands for bribes, harassment or discretionary behavior by tax inspectors; (d) whether governance-related issues and harassment affect the business decisions of women more strongly than those of men; and (e) whether a feedback-loop driven incentive mechanism piloted by the project will help reduce the tax compliance burden and improve the quality and transparency in tax inspection, and if such improvements in tax inspection have different impacts on the business outcomes of male entrepreneurs compared to female entrepreneurs. There are two types of tax inspections in Kyrgyzstan: the visiting inspection and the raid inspection. The visiting inspection is carried out by a team of officers and can last several days, during which the team goes through accounting books of the company. The raid inspections are typically performed by a single officer who has the discretionary power to select which businesses are inspected and at what time the inspection will take place. According to the state tax authority data, raid inspections disproportionally target individual entrepreneurs as opposed to larger businesses. Implementation Update: A sample frame of approximately 10,000 MSMEs was developed in consultation with State Tax Services of Kyrgyz Republic using their business tax payers’ database. A sample of 2,500 businesses, 50 percent female owned MSMEs was drawn from the database. The baseline survey instrument was field-tested and the baseline survey was completed in March 2016. The performance of tax raid inspectors of these local tax offices during May and July 2016 were assessed by the World Bank through a survey of businesses during August 2016. On the basis of the information obtained from the baseline survey, the WBG team designed four different incentive schemes. Each of the 50 regional tax offices were randomly PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 61 assigned to one of the four incentive schemes or to the control group. In all schemes, local tax inspector are awarded a monetary bonus on the basis of their behavior with MSMEs during the inspection, as inferred from interviews with inspected business. The amount and nature of the monetary bonus vary across schemes. By May 2016, all raid officials from concerned local tax offices were informed about the incentive scheme for their tax offices. A midline survey is planned to be completed early FY17 and a report on early results will be produced in FY17. MEXICO - MUJERES MOVIENDO MÉXICO: AN INNOVATIVE PILOT TRAINING PROGRAM TO IMPROVE THE PERFORMANCE OF FEMALE MICRO ENTREPRENEURS IN MEXICO Intervention: The purpose of this project is to: (1) evaluate the impact of an intervention which mixes “hard skills” (managerial skills) with “soft skills” (non-cognitive skills); (2) evaluate the impact on two different populations - one composed of “average” type of entrepreneurs (based on a census bloc enumeration) and the other composed of “self- selected” entrepreneurs who heard about the program and approached the entrepreneurship center; (3) evaluate impact across females with different skills, where skills are defined as an index composed of education level, education of parents and the results of tests designed to measure skills—Digispan recall test and Raven test. The target population is female entrepreneurs in urban and semi-rural areas with small businesses of less than five employees and under four million Mexican pesos income. The program is being piloted in five states (Distrito Federal, Aguascalientes, Guanajuato, Querétaro and Estado de México) prior to being rolled out nationwide. The program is funded by the Mexican National Institute of the Entrepreneur INADEM (Instituto Mexicano del Emprendedor) and the evaluation will inform the scaling up from the original five states to the entire country. The program is implemented by Crea Comunidades de Emprendedores Sociales A.C. (CREA), a Mexican not-for-profit organization focused on providing business training and specialized services to female entrepreneurs in marginalized communities. Implementation Update: This project was added to the WLSME portfolio in 2016 as results from the intervention complemented and added depth to the WLSME Program. The baseline survey was completed in FY14 in eight urban areas which have a relatively high concentration of commercial activity. A midline survey was completed in FY15. A short-term impact evaluation based on the follow-up surveys was also completed. This evaluation mainly focuses on “management performance outcomes” that are likely to be affected six to nine months following the intervention, and will also include other outcomes (such as profits, sales, employees, etc.) The midline survey data will be fully analyzed and results will be reported by the end of 2016. MOZAMBIQUE - IMPROVING MARKET ACCESS FOR WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS IN AFRICA Intervention: The Integrated Regional Growth Poles (IGPP) project in Mozambique is a $100 million project supporting targeted investments in public goods and services in zones with high growth potential. This impact evaluation focuses on the impacts of a roads rehabilitation project on women farmers in the Zambezi Valley, as well as the complementary and individual effects of skills delivery and cash grants. The skills intervention aims to foster non-cognitive entrepreneurial abilities (such as perseverance, optimism, long-term orientation, and aspirations) through extension services aimed at expanding marketing practices to productively manage agribusiness. The cash grants provided for investments in cash crop production and/or in the transportation of produce to agricultural markets. The evaluation focuses on female smallholder farmers’ use of inputs, as well as their productivity, output, and profits. Implementation Update: The baseline survey was completed in April 2016, and the report will be completed in FY17. The sample comprised 3,000 households in 150 communities who live along four feeder roads in Tete Province, two of which will be rehabilitated under the WB project. The road works are expected to start in the second half of 2016. The design of the curriculum and mode of delivery of this intervention will be finalized by December 2016 and rolled out in 2017. The research team has raised additional funds from donors and WBG funds to implement the delivery of non- 62 Photo: Jonathan Torgovnik / Getty Images cognitive skills for women farmers ($400,000) and complete the impact evaluation after the grant is closed ($500,000). This additional funding was leveraged by the WLSME grant and will be used to meet project objectives and finalize the impact evaluation after the grant closes. NIGERIA - SELECTING AND SUPPORTING HIGH GROWTH POTENTIAL ENTREPRENEURS Intervention: The nationwide YouWiN! (Youth Enterprise with Innovation in Nigeria), a collaboration between the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry for Information and Communication Technology (ICT), and the Ministry of Youth Development, helps young men and women develop and execute their business ideas and overcome common challenges such as access to finance and skills to run a successful business. Program participants receive a start-up grant linked to business and performance milestones. They are required to register their business and open a bank account. Each entrepreneur also benefits from continuous hands-on mentoring to enhance their chances of succeeding and two rounds of intensive business boot camp on topics such as management, marketing, finance and accounting, and public speaking. Implementation Update: The baseline survey and baseline report were completed in FY12. Follow-up surveys were conducted at six months (FY13), one year (FY14) and three years (FY15) after treatment to measure outcomes such as business start-up and expansion rates, profits, and job creation. The impact evaluation is now complete and its results are presented in a World Bank Policy Research Working Paper. Results show that winning a business plan competition leads to greater firm entry, higher survival of existing businesses, higher profits and sales, and higher employment, as well as an increased likelihood of a firm having 10 or more workers. These results hold equally for both male and female-owned businesses with an average of four years of business experience. For those planning to start a new business, receiving a YouWIN! grant was especially beneficial to female entrepreneurs. It helped reduce gender gaps in the amount of time it took to start a firm and get it running. However, it had no impact on the gaps with regard to profits, sales, and the ability to expand the business’ workforce to more than 10 workers. Male-owned enterprises continued to perform better by all these metrics. Further policy work is therefore needed to learn how to better identify which female-owned firms are most likely to benefit from financial assistance – while other policy interventions may be needed to overcome constraints that prevent other female-owned firms from growing even with financial assistance. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 63 Photo: Visual News Associates / Getty Images PAKISTAN - PROVIDING FEMALE ENTREPRENEURS WITH HIGH GROWTH POTENTIAL OFFERING A COMPREHENSIVE PACKAGE OF SERVICES Intervention: The WLSME supported pilot offers a supportive ecosystem for female entrepreneurs. Four hundred female entrepreneurs in Karachi and Peshawar with existing micro and small firms and potential for growth are given a holistic package of services. The package includes: 1) Networking and access to markets designed to capitalize on partnerships in local business associations, chambers of commerce, and business networks; 2) Business education provided by a local business school; and 3) Mentoring given in group settings as well as one-on-one. The aim of the pilot is to help these women grow their firms while measuring the impact of the various services to suggest ways to replicate and scale the approach. Special attention is paid to the quality of business education through customization, delivery, and relevance of the curriculum. Implementation Update: The delivery of business education and soft skills has been ongoing in Karachi since September 2014. The fourth and final batch of WomenX participants began the four-month training in January 2016 and will program will end after the participants have completed phase two in December 2016. The Institute of Business Administration (IBA), a local business school, is delivering the business education component in Karachi and has integrated program content and resources for women entrepreneurs into their regular program offerings, which is a significant achievement of the program. The Peshawar program was initiated in March 2016. In Peshawar, a similar partnership with the Institute of Management Sciences (IM Sciences) has been developed and IBA has supported training of trainers to ensure that program standards are uniform across the two cities. An impact evaluation has been designed to robustly measure progress on business management practices and firm performance. The baseline survey showed that women surveyed tend to be relatively 64 confident but lacked autonomy. The analysis suggests that entrepreneurship support programs need to focus on managerial skills for these women and to support strategies to enhance their autonomy. The program leveraged additional funds to expand to other cities: DFID Pakistan provided $1.1 million through an IFC-led Trust Fund to extend the program to Lahore and its neighboring districts in FY16-18. SIERRA LEONE - TRAINING AND FACILITATION OF ACCESS TO FINANCE IN THE CREATION AND EXPANSION OF YOUTH-OWNED ENTERPRISES Intervention: The project investigates several hypotheses regarding constraints to youth-owned micro- and small enterprise (MSE) creation and expansion by providing one of the following types of support, or a combination of both: 1) technical training, in a specific trade (e.g. welding or catering) through classroom teaching and apprenticeships, as well as basic financial literacy; 2) microfinance facilitation, such as support for developing a business plan, setting up business clubs, accessing microfinance, and follow-up support to set up and maintain a business once a loan has been obtained. 2,314 young men and women (15-35 years old) across five major urban centers—Freetown, Bo, Kenema, Kono, and Makeni—who have a business or are interested in starting one are participating in the program. Implementation Update: The Ebola crisis disrupted the program. While the technical training was complete, the on the job training and business plan elements of the training suffered delays and some reductions in duration. The microfinance component of the program was not delivered. The baseline survey and report were completed in FY15. The follow- up survey and the field report were completed in June 2015. Results of the follow up survey were presented to the Government and other stakeholders in March 2016. The final report will be complete in early FY17. The evaluation results show that overall levels of employment increased in all treatment groups, with results being mainly driven by men, and more young men and women became first time entrepreneurs. Young women derived higher, more stable incomes, especially those who attended the technical skills and on the jobs training. The young women who attended the non-cognitive skills training or a combination of both trainings were more likely to find wage work. The program also proved to have a protective effect during the Ebola crisis compared with others not in the program. Those participating in the intervention increased their consumption of goods and services and invested in more household assets, suggesting that skills training interventions can help build household resilience against shocks. These findings also suggest that interventions that include non-cognitive skills training have the potential to create jobs for youth in fragile states and increase participant’s employment prospects, particularly for women who are disadvantaged in the labor market. SOUTH AFRICA - INCREASING FIRM PRODUCTIVITY THOUGH BETTER ACCESS TO INFORMATION Intervention: Supply Chain Network (SCNet)—a new online marketplace—was launched to facilitate business connections between medium to large companies and potential suppliers in a quick and easy way. It is intended to overcome barriers to entry where lack of credible information on quality is otherwise lacking. It also reduces the search cost by helping buyers identify potential suppliers and providing ratings of suppliers. The WLSME is supporting an evaluation designed to understand whether this helps women overcome gender biases among buyers and expand their network. By rolling out the information about suppliers in different phases over time the evaluation can help understand how information shapes networking capital for female small suppliers and how this impacts performance of their firms. For instance, does the SCNet change who female entrepreneurs do business with and how much business they do? Does it change the nature and content of the contracts they enter into, and how do these contracts impact risk and business performance? The lessons from the pilot suggested the scale-up of the experiment should include a comparison between entrepreneurs using a basic search engine of suppliers and entrepreneurs using the premium version where participating firms have access to additional features including requests for quotes and feedback systems. PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 65 Implementation Update: A baseline survey and report were completed in FY13. The findings from the analysis of the baseline data identified the following potential barriers to women entrepreneurs’ growth and access to foreign markets: limited internal and external partnership opportunities, lack of basic skills, and risk aversion. To implement the intervention linking SMEs with larger firms, the team has partnered with SCNet and a major national bank. In FY16 the team conducted a pilot for randomizing access to the SCNet marketplace by female and male-owners of SMEs who are customers of the bank. The lessons from that pilot are now being used for establishing an agreement with the networking marketplace service provider for implementing a larger scale experiment. The intervention will be implemented in 2017. The project has leveraged other internal WBG funds and received additional donor support from trust funds to cover future costs in the amount of $250,000. TOGO - HARD VERSUS SOFT SKILLS: WHICH IS MORE EFFECTIVE FOR MEN AND FOR WOMEN? Intervention: The $13 million Private Sector Development Support Project includes training of 1,000 micro and small scale informal entrepreneurs in the capital Lomé, half of which are women-owned. Selected firms are in non-agricultural sectors and have less than 50 employees. Entrepreneurs received either managerial or personal initiative training to improve their business’ success. The managerial Business Edge training, developed by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), taught entrepreneurs how to improve their marketing, customer service, financial management, accounting, negotiation skills, and human resource management. The personal initiative training taught entrepreneurs how to set goals and make plans to work towards them, become proactive and future-oriented, and overcome obstacles. Participants in both training programs benefitted from individual monthly three-hour mentoring sessions at their place of work delivered by the trainers. The evaluation aims to determine the impact of both trainings on business outcomes and identify which of the two approaches is more effective and if effects differ between men and women entrepreneurs. Implementation Update: The baseline survey was completed in January 2014. The first follow-up survey was conducted in September 2014 and the second follow-up survey was conducted in January 2015, one and five months after the end of the mentoring sessions. An additional follow-up survey was conducted in September 2015 and a fourth will be complete in October 2016. Early results show that both training programs had positive impacts on businesses run by male and female entrepreneurs. After the training programs both male and female entrepreneurs invested more in their businesses, buying more assets like machinery and equipment, and their business practices, marketing and customer services, record-keeping, and human resource management information seeking practices improved. The team has raised additional funding (about $850,000), to complete the endline survey and analysis. TUNISIA - SUPPORTING YOUNG MEN AND WOMEN IN BUSINESS PLAN DEVELOPMENT Intervention: A new entrepreneurship track in Tunisian universities is giving students the opportunity to graduate with a business plan rather than a traditional thesis. Students following the entrepreneurship track receive business development training, personalized coaching, and graduate with a business plan. Following graduation, students are invited to submit their business plans to a competition in which the winners receive seed start-up capital. The WLSME is supporting a follow-up survey covering 1,700 students. The survey was expanded to include questions on topics specifically relevant to women. Implementation Update: The baseline survey and report were completed in FY10. A follow up survey was completed in FY11 to assess short-term impacts. A qualitative study was completed in FY14. The endline survey was completed in FY15 to assess longer term impacts and the final report was completed in early 2016. A policy note for policy makers and a Working Paper were also completed. Results were shared at a seminar organized by the WLSME and other events. 66 A dissemination workshop with Tunisian counterparts took place in August 2016. The evaluation results show that the entrepreneurship track’s main objective at inception—to stimulate graduates’ entrepreneurial spirit and skills to ease labor market entry—was partly achieved in the short term. A year after graduation students in the treatment group had high aspirations for the future, were motivated, and set out to create their own businesses compared to those in the control group. These effects, with the exception of increase in business skills, disappeared in the long-term. Entrepreneurship training had no impact on a range of outcomes (self-employment, wage employment, personality, entrepreneurship traits, networks, credit, and aspirations) in the long term. There were no significant differences in outcomes between men and women. Post-project surveys found no lasting impacts on an entrepreneurship culture nearly four years after graduation for either men nor women. Most students who had business ideas had abandoned them, and participants in the entrepreneurship training did not have more new business ideas than the control group. Overall, the impacts of the entrepreneurship track were limited to short-term impacts of small magnitude, mostly for male graduates in the year after graduation. The evaluation shows that skills are not main binding constraint for business setup; the main reasons for failure are: (i) lack of funds/access to credit, and (ii) burdensome bureaucratic procedures. Additional constraints for women are: (i) social norms (e.g., restrictions on travel for business trips), (ii) balancing family commitments, and (iii) harassment. As the results highlight, limited access to capital remains a key challenge for many aspiring entrepreneurs. Policy makers can address this challenge directly by streamlining the bank loan process, providing cash grants to young graduates or seeking new approaches that remove barriers young people face in obtaining credit. Additional follow-up support after graduation, such as coaching and access to business development services to ensure that short-term gains are sustained in the long term, may also be critical to ensuring success. Photo: Arne Hoel / Getty Images PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 67 Photo: Paula Bronstein / Getty Images ANNEX 2: DISSEMINATION ACTIVITIES At the World Bank Group, in Washington, DC a learning event brought together the results from Tunisia and Nigeria and early findings from Togo to identify common themes and overarching conclusions. Topics that were discussed at the workshop included: Identifying and spurring high-growth entrepreneurship; entrepreneurship education for university students and its long-term impact; and effects of entrepreneurship training programs on women-owned enterprises. There was also an exchange of ideas on how to work with governments to promote public policies that support women’s entrepreneurship, the reasons why there are so few female led start-ups, and how to address the obstacles that female entrepreneurs need to overcome. Over 100 people attended, including World Bank Group staff and representatives of external partners. The event generated a high level of interest and its presentations and a recording are available on the World Bank Group website (see http://www.worldbank.org/en/events/2016/04/05/what-works-in-promoting- women-led-smes). Follow up learning events for six other WLSME funded projects are scheduled for early FY1719. These will include presentations of the findings of WLSME projects in fragile and conflict-affected states such as Haiti, Sierra Leone, and Democratic Republic of Congo, as well as results from projects in Mexico, Pakistan and Mozambique. In addition, a number of workshops were held in-country stakeholders to discuss emerging lessons and research findings (see Table 14). For WSLME Report 2015 please see: http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/465841467999715075/pdf/101061-AR-P133146-PUBLIC-  19 Box393257B-WBG-GenderTrustFunds-Report-2015.pdf. 68 TABLE 14. CONSULTATIVE WORKSHOPS Country Number of workshops Stakeholders Topic Democratic Republic 2 Government, women’s Consultations of plans for and of Congo associations, NGOs, private design of the impact evaluation. sector, development partners. Mozambique 2 Government, women’s Consultations on plans for associations, NGOs, private and design of the impact sector, development partners. evaluations. Pakistan 3 Institute of Business Sessions on women’s Administration (academic entrepreneurship at the National partner); World Bank staff, Symposium on Entrepreneurship external partners, NGOs. Education; Baseline survey of women entrepreneurs in Karachi. Sierra Leone 1 Government: Ministry of Youth Preliminary results. Affairs, and the National Youth Commission. South Africa 1 USAID Business-to-business online marketplaces: Their potential for increasing access to markets for women-owned emerging firms in Africa. Photo: Scott Wallace / World Bank PARTNERING FOR GENDER EQUALITY • WORLD BANK GROUP ANNUAL GENDER TRUST FUNDS PROGRAM REPORT • 2016 69 Photo: Paula Bronstein / Getty Images 1818 H Street, NW • Washington, DC 20443 worldbank.org/gender