The objective of the Women's Economic Empowerment Project for Afghanistan is to increase and enhance the participation of women, who are organized in community-based savings groups, in business support services and income-generating activities in pilot areas of Afghanistan.
... See More + The changes in this restructuring are: (i) to simplify the seed grant requirements; (ii) extend closing date by 12 months, and (iii) revise the results framework to incorporate the new closing date.
See Less -
The creation of national middle classes and the changes in consumption patterns in many Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries suggest reconsidering the way welfare and consequently inequality is typically measured.
... See More + Using only consumption to measure welfare can lead to an important loss of information regarding the real welfare of the top 10-20 percent of the welfare distribution that is generally referred as 'middle class' in these countries. This paper proposes a method capable of correcting the middle-class part of the consumption distribution using information coming fromthe income distribution of the same surveys. Results from 6 SSA countries indicate an increase of about 20 percent in the Gini index.
See Less -
In Sierra Leone, the empowerment and livelihoods for adolescents (ELA) initiative sought to enhance adolescent girls’ social and economic empowerment by providing life skills training, livelihood training, and credit support to start income-generating activities.
... See More + The Ebola crisis occurred during the project, resulting in curbed implementation. In contrast, younger girls (12 to 17 years old) who resided in communities that benefitted from the program in high Ebola disruption areas were more likely to be in school and saw their numeracy and literacy levels improve. However, as younger women spend less time with men in the presence of ELA, men likely shift their attention to older girls: the evaluation finds an increase in unwanted and transactional sex by older girls in areas highly exposed to the Ebola crisis. As the program was implemented, the Ebola epidemic hit Sierra Leone. First, in an effort to stem the spread of the disease, the government-imposed quarantines, limited travel, and closed public spaces such as markets in certain areas, which significantly impacted the economic activities of men and women. Second, schools were closed for an entire academic year. Finally, Sierra Leone’s limited health resources were diverted into caring for patients and preventing the spread of the epidemic, limiting their ability to attend to other issues such as sexual and reproductive health. These results show how safe spaces interventions can be effective even in the face of large-scale shocks such as Ebola crises as seen in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Uganda, as well as other shocks constraining economic and social life, by buffering girls from the adverse effects of crises.
See Less -
In the last several decades, Bangladesh witnessed a steady decline in forest cover. Largely driven by unsustainable logging, conversion of forest areas into settlements, pastures, croplands, wastelands, or land used for recreational or industrial purposes.
... See More + The forest cover has been declining by 2.1 percent annually in the last three decades alone. At present, only 13.20 percent of land in Bangladesh has tree cover with density of thirty percent and above. Further, the sudden influx of over 725,000 Rohingya to Cox’s Bazar caused the loss of nearly thirteen thousand hectares of forest. The Bangladesh Forest Department (BFD) faces challenge to effectively manage the remaining natural forests and prevent degradation due to high population density and incidences of encroachment. BFD also faces institutional constraints of budget and short staff.
See Less -
Ratings for the Northern Uganda Business Support Program Project for Uganda were as follows: outcome and Bank performance was satisfactory and monitoring and evaluation (M and E) quality was substantial.
... See More + Some lessons learned included: access to credit through village revolving fund (VRF) and regular follow up support is more effective and game-changing than just grant plus training. Targeting existing groups of poor with at least 50 percent females was more effective than forming new groups of poor. Building strong institutions of the poor is critical for ownership and sustainability of project investments. Disbursing funds to only those groups that abided by the five-core principles for at least 3 to 6 months was essential for weeding out non-serious groups initially. Adherence to five core principles helped to build a culture of systematic savings, not for consumption but for investment. Move from grant to credit and VRF requires unlearning dependency behavior and promoting business mindset development. Process of convincing, testing, and trying out credit and unlearning different behavior was critical for the success of the program.
See Less -
Implementation Completion and Results Report ICR00004892 JUN 28, 2019
