EPAG Study Team (World Bank / MoGD / Subah-Belleh Associates) Making Cents / Youth Economic Opportunities Conference

1. EPAG Impact Evaluation:Preliminary Midline Results EPAG Study Team (World Bank / MoGD/ Subah-Belleh Associates) Making Cents / Youth Economic Opportunities Conference 12 September 2012

2. The Adolescent Girls Initiative • Countries:Liberia, Nepal, South Sudan, Afghanistan, Rwanda, Jordan, Laos, Haiti Afghanistan Jordan Nepal Haiti South Sudan Laos Liberia Rwanda

3. The Adolescent Girls Initiative • Objective: Vocational and entrepreneurship training for young women • Design Features: • Private sector/NGO training providers competitively selected to provide market-relevant skills • Vocational Skills for wage or self employment • Life skills training to address girls’ vulnerabilities • Financial literacy and business development • Stipend (Liberia, Rwanda, Afghanistan) • Job placement through performance-based contracts

4. Global Perspective of the AGI • Cross-country learning • Core evaluation team works across countries • Reports shared across countries • International workshops at different stages of project to share lessons learned • Expansion: Potential to influence AGI programs in new countries • Sustainability: By comparing outcomes, we can learn what methods work best. • These lessons can inform design of future programs and the scale-up of these pilot projects

5. AGI in Liberia (EPAG) • Implemented by Ministry of Gender and Development • Design Features: • 4 service providers competitively selected (plus 4 more sub-contracted) • Training delivered in 2 rounds in 9 communities • In Round 1: Job Skills (35%) and Business Development Services (65%) • Wide variety of job skills areas: painting, hotel/ restaurant work, driving, etc. • Coverage: 2500 girls in Greater Monrovia and Kakata (1191 in Round 1; 1300 in Round 2) • Six month follow-up period for job placement

6. Impact Evaluation • Like other evaluations, IE focuses on outcomes • What is the effect of a specific program on specific outcomes? • But unlike other evaluations: • IE starts before the project begins • IE compares the beneficiary group with a similargroup of individuals who do NOT receive the project • This method allows us to attribute causality: • How much better off are beneficiaries because of the program? • How can we know that the outcomes we see are due to the program, rather than other factors?

7. Research Design • Objective:To measure the impact of the program on the well-being of participants and their families • Methodology: Randomized selection to treatment and comparison groups • Data collection using a series of household and individual surveys: • Baseline: 2010 • Midline: 2011 • Endline: 2012 (in the field now)

8. Research Questions What we will learn: • Does the program improve the economic well-being of young women who participate? What is the impact on employment, earnings, investment, savings, borrowing, and lending? • What is the impact of the program on a wide range of socioeconomic behaviors and outcomes, such as reproductive health, time management, experience of gender-based and other violence, and attitudes toward risk? • Does the program promote the empowerment of participants, as measured by proxies such as decision-making, aspirations for the future, and control over household resources? • How do the program impacts vary according to the demographic and personal characteristics of the participants?

9. Research Design

10. Sample size 2106 Originally recruited 25 Very pregnant (assigned to round 2) 808 Assigned to round 2 1273 Assigned to round 1 39 Re-assigned to round 1 769 Control group 116 Never started training 1157 Started training 34 Started training 1191 Entered round 1 1131 Completed round 1

11. Response Rates

12. Baseline Survey • Benchmark the socioeconomic status and demographic characteristics of the young women who would be participating in the EPAG program to provide a basis for comparison in the future • Validate whether the treatment and control groups are statistically viable comparison groups for the impact evaluation • Should not be used to make generalizations about adolescent girls and young women in Liberia overall • EPAG girls are more educated than the “average” girl • EPAG girls live in more urban areas than the “average” girl

13. Results: Employment • Notes: • The treatment group in the graph includes only those who actually started the training. • The overall midline employment rate for the treatment group is 67%. This includes the Job Skills (52%) and BDS (76%) tracks.

14. Results: Earnings Note: An increase of 1,109 LD per week is roughly equal to 58 USD per month. The average earnings at baseline was 43 USD per month.

15. Results: Savings Note: EPAG participants were given small stipends and a $25 bonus for completing the course.

16. Results: Self-Confidence

17. Summary What have we learned? • Large increases in employment (55% increase) and earnings (115% increase) • Positive impacts on savings and self-confidence • Stronger effects for Business Skills trainees than for Job Skills trainees • But the business skills income is total enterprise revenue, not earnings or profits.

18. Summary Next Steps: • Examine impact on households • Investigate heterogeneous impacts: by community, type of training, age, etc. • (After completion of endline survey) Look at longer-term outcomes: do these positive effects persist, grow, or weaken over time? • Understand profits and incomes of businesses.

19. Thank you