Program Effectiveness
Projects funded through the PopPov Initiative have evaluated programs and policies for their effectiveness, including ability to reach poor and vulnerable populations.
25 Results
for ”
”
-
January 2018Project
PopPov Project Map
This map is is a visual representation of the countries where the PopPov network of researchers have studied social, health, and economic issues. Each red pin represents a PopPov project and is located in the country of study.
-
2015-2017Project
Do Community Health Workers Lead to Improved Health Awareness
While there has been research on the role of community health workers (CHWs) on some of these issues, there have been very few studies that use an actual experimental setting to precisely examine the role of CHWs in improving people’s health awareness, use of preventive health measures, and final health outcomes. This project will examine these relationships using a unique experiment in Uganda.
-
2015-2017Project
Intergenerational Effects of Family Planning Programs: Evidence From Madagascar
Using the Demographic Household Surveys from 1992 to 2009, this project will address whether family planning program access has reduced fertility outcomes, and thus, if it has induced an increase in women’s economic opportunities as well as an increase in their children’s human capital.
-
2013-2015Project
Can Savings Accounts Save Lives? Financial Products for Improving Sexual and Reproductive Health
The goal of this project is to see if providing women with financial independence in the form of mobile phone savings accounts can help them better manage risk in their daily lives.
-
2012-2013Project
Evaluating the Impact of a Disruption in Publicly Provided Contraceptive Supply on Fertility and Health Outcomes in the Philippines
This research explores new evidence on the role of subsidized contraceptives in influencing fertility behavior. It draws on two types of disruptions that affected the public supply of free contraceptives in the Philippines: a sharp reduction in contraceptives due to the phase out of contraceptive donations to the country coupled with a government policy that shirked public funding to fill the supply shortfall, and substantial fluctuations in the shipment of free contraceptives to the country’s provinces brought about by supply chain issues.
-
2012-2015Project
Fertility Timing and Women’s Economic Outcomes in South Africa
This study uses unique longitudinal data to analyze the impact of fertility timing on women’s long-term economic outcomes in South Africa. The research look at the impacts of teen childbearing, the timing of first birth more generally, and the number of children on a wide range of long run economic outcomes, including employment, earnings, migration, and poverty transitions.
-
2012-2014Project
Girls’ Economic Empowerment—The Best Contraceptive? A Randomized Controlled Trial in Tanzania
Teenage pregnancies are common in many low-income countries, but the reasons for why teenage girls become pregnant are not well understood. Given the health and economic downfalls that can come with early pregnancy, this project investigates whether adolescent pregnancies can be countered by empowering young women.
-
2012-2015Project
35 Years Later: Effects of the Matlab Maternal and Child Health and Family Planning Program on Women’s Economic Empowerment
Despite the global spread of reproductive health and family planning programs, little is known about long-term and multigenerational effects on women’s economic and social empowerment. This study will show the effects of participating in the Matlab Maternal and Child Health and Family Planning Program (MCH-FP) on the economic empowerment of women and their daughters over a 35-year period, which was initiated by the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) in the rural Matlab area of Bangladesh in 1977.
-
2011-2013Project
The Effects of Community-Based Interventions on Women and Children’s Health in Indonesia
Low birth weight is a global health problem, with approximately 16% of all newborns in developing countries being born with low birth weight. Motivated by these statistics, this research evaluates policies that target maternal and children’s health in low-resource settings.
-
2011-2013Project
Women, Children, and the Dynamics of Conditional Cash Transfers
Using population‐level data from the Mexican Family Life Survey (MxFLS), researchers examine the impact on child health of a large‐scale conditional cash transfer program, Oportunidades. This anti‐poverty program puts additional resources in the hands of women and their families and encourages parents to invest in human capital of their children.
-
2011-2013Project
Income Shocks and Reproductive Health: Evidence from Large-scale Randomized Cash Transfer Experiments in Zambia
This study explores the impact of Zambia’s child grant programme (CGP), a government operated large-scale unconditional CT programme, which gives monthly transfers, primarily to female adults with children under-5, on a range of maternal health outcomes focusing on quality and quantity of prenatal care and skilled attendance at birth.
-
2008-2012Project
Information, Sexual Behavior, and Health Among Teenagers in Cameroon
HIV has tremendous economic consequences, and can be a crucial factor in whether people are pushed into poverty. In sub-Saharan Africa, most new infections are among young people, and women are disproportionately affected. The goal of this study was to better understand what kind of information young women in Cameroon need in order to prevent HIV infection, and how the information can be best delivered. Researchers ran a randomized controlled trial that evaluated the impact of school-based HIV education programs to prevent risky sexual behavior in young women.
-
2010-2012Project
Child Development Program, Child Health, Women’s Labor Supply, and Education of Older Female Children in India
India is home to the largest malnourished child population in the world with around 80 million children. India’s flagship program and the only national program for combating child malnutrition is the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). This research takes advantage of data from the 2005-2006 National Family Health Survey on ICDS to look at the impact of its Supplementary Nutrition Program on children’s growth.
-
2010-2011Project
Conditional Cash Transfers and HIV Prevention
The objective of cash transfer interventions is to reduce structural barriers to education and to increase school attendance of young women, thereby decreasing their risk for HIV. Mobilization activities aim to reeducate young men about gender norms, intimate partner violence, and HIV risk; and to encourage them about protecting young women and reducing HIV risk in their communities.
-
2010-2011Project
The Effects of Cash Transfer Programs
Health and education are big concerns for youth transitioning into adulthood. Furthermore, they are even more critical for young women in sub-Saharan Africa. While there is a large literature on the relationship between women’s poverty and HIV/AIDS risk, little is known regarding the marginal impact of income for young women on their sexual behavior and partner selection.
-
2006-2011Project
Family size and investments in early childhood development in Ecuador
This research extends a longitudinal study in Ecuador that evaluated the impact of intervention programs which improve circumstances surrounding birth, maternal and child health, and parenting “quality” on child cognitive and physiological development. This project focuses on how family size interacts with the use of early childhood development (ECD) interventions and how it mediates the impact of those interventions on child cognitive outcomes.
-
2007-2011Project
Demographic Change and Women’s Work and Earnings in Bangladesh
This study examines the impact of fertility changes and childbearing practices on women’s labor force participation in Bangladesh. The study separately identifies the impact of changes in fertility on changes in work by taking advantage of a family planning program selectively introduced in the subdistrict of Matlab, Bangladesh.
-
2008-2011Project
Poverty, Gender Inequities, and Sexual/Reproductive Health: An Impact Evaluation of a Combined Economic and Psycho-social Intervention in Southern Tanzania
This project designed, implemented, and evaluated a combined economic and psycho-social intervention on individual/household economic outcomes and sexual/reproductive health outcomes among young people aged 18-30 in a rural area of southern Tanzania. The one-year intervention to reduce risky sexual behaviors was implemented as an individual-level randomized trial. The intervention offered the treatment group a cash reward (similar to conditional cash transfer programs elsewhere) at 4, 8, and 12 months if the individual tested STI negative at that contact.
-
2010-2011Project
Impact of Scholarships on Schooling in Cambodia
This study builds on a long-run follow up study of Cambodian children–male and female–who applied for a secondary school scholarship program in 2005. This study evaluates the impact of the program and the resulting increase in school attainment, on a variety of outcomes among adolescents such as learning outcomes, life-skills, knowledge about healthy behaviors and risk taking.
-
2008-2010Project
Measuring Returns to Reproductive Health Services: The Impact of the Global Gag Rule
The aim of this study is to measure the impact of reproductive health services (RHS) on indicators of health and well-being. The research examined the impact of decreased availability of RHS as a result of the U.S. policy known as the global gag rule.
-
2008-2010Project
Experimental Approaches to Assessing the Economic Determinants and Consequences of Contraceptive Adoption in Zambia
This study explores how the husband’s presence in the fertility clinic affected uptake of contraception among women through a field experiment in Zambia, a country that experiences high excess fertility, despite availability of contraceptives through both public and private providers.
-
2007-2010Project
Enhancing the Economic Health and Social Capabilities of Highly Vulnerable Youth
Young people in South Africa face a high risk of HIV, teenage pregnancy, school dropout, and unemployment, and are further disadvantaged by the actual or potential loss of one or both parents to HIV and conditions of poverty, inequality, and food in security. These circumstances make the transition from childhood to adulthood especially difficult, and many of the most disadvantaged are in danger of falling even farther behind socially and economically due to illness, stigma, and the loss of key supportive adults such as parents and teachers. This research presents baseline findings from an intervention randomized at the classroom level in peri- urban secondary schools within the Durban metro area of KwaZulu-Natal, Province, South Africa – the “Siyakha Nentsha” program.
-
2008-2010Project
Economic Impact of Unsafe Induced Abortion in Uganda
The research quantifies the opportunity cost of unsafe abortion in terms of individual health and costs as well as health care and societal costs. Preventing unsafe abortions would reduce morbidity and mortality among Ugandan mothers and benefit society through increased productivity because young mothers are at the core of agricultural production and child care in Uganda.
-
2007-2009Project
Long-Term Financial Incentives and Investment in Daughters: Evidence From Conditional Cash Transfers in North India
Since the early 1990s, several states in India have introduced financial incentive programs to discourage son preference among parents and to encourage investment in daughters’ education and health. This study evaluates one such program in the state of Haryana, Apni Beti Apna Dhan (Our Daughter, Our Wealth).
-
2007-2009Project
Experimental Approaches to Assessing the Economic Determinants and Consequences of Contraceptive Adoption in Zambia
There is not enough rigorous empirical evidence to support claims that access to reproductive health services and technologies impact the economic lives of women and children, or that decisions about contraceptive use and fertility respond to improvements in economic opportunities. This study focuses on the effects of contraceptive availability on economic outcomes, male involvement and bargaining effects, and peer effects on adoption, with the goal to impact policy by providing evidence on whether and how to promote access to and use of modern contraceptives, especially in Africa where male involvement in family planning is actively debated.
Program Effectiveness
Projects funded through the PopPov Initiative have evaluated programs and policies for their effectiveness, including ability to reach poor and vulnerable populations.
25 Results
for ”
”
-
January 2018Project
PopPov Project Map
This map is is a visual representation of the countries where the PopPov network of researchers have studied social, health, and economic issues. Each red pin represents a PopPov project and is located in the country of study.
-
2015-2017Project
Do Community Health Workers Lead to Improved Health Awareness
While there has been research on the role of community health workers (CHWs) on some of these issues, there have been very few studies that use an actual experimental setting to precisely examine the role of CHWs in improving people’s health awareness, use of preventive health measures, and final health outcomes. This project will examine these relationships using a unique experiment in Uganda.
-
2015-2017Project
Intergenerational Effects of Family Planning Programs: Evidence From Madagascar
Using the Demographic Household Surveys from 1992 to 2009, this project will address whether family planning program access has reduced fertility outcomes, and thus, if it has induced an increase in women’s economic opportunities as well as an increase in their children’s human capital.
-
2013-2015Project
Can Savings Accounts Save Lives? Financial Products for Improving Sexual and Reproductive Health
The goal of this project is to see if providing women with financial independence in the form of mobile phone savings accounts can help them better manage risk in their daily lives.
-
2012-2013Project
Evaluating the Impact of a Disruption in Publicly Provided Contraceptive Supply on Fertility and Health Outcomes in the Philippines
This research explores new evidence on the role of subsidized contraceptives in influencing fertility behavior. It draws on two types of disruptions that affected the public supply of free contraceptives in the Philippines: a sharp reduction in contraceptives due to the phase out of contraceptive donations to the country coupled with a government policy that shirked public funding to fill the supply shortfall, and substantial fluctuations in the shipment of free contraceptives to the country’s provinces brought about by supply chain issues.
-
2012-2015Project
Fertility Timing and Women’s Economic Outcomes in South Africa
This study uses unique longitudinal data to analyze the impact of fertility timing on women’s long-term economic outcomes in South Africa. The research look at the impacts of teen childbearing, the timing of first birth more generally, and the number of children on a wide range of long run economic outcomes, including employment, earnings, migration, and poverty transitions.
-
2012-2014Project
Girls’ Economic Empowerment—The Best Contraceptive? A Randomized Controlled Trial in Tanzania
Teenage pregnancies are common in many low-income countries, but the reasons for why teenage girls become pregnant are not well understood. Given the health and economic downfalls that can come with early pregnancy, this project investigates whether adolescent pregnancies can be countered by empowering young women.
-
2012-2015Project
35 Years Later: Effects of the Matlab Maternal and Child Health and Family Planning Program on Women’s Economic Empowerment
Despite the global spread of reproductive health and family planning programs, little is known about long-term and multigenerational effects on women’s economic and social empowerment. This study will show the effects of participating in the Matlab Maternal and Child Health and Family Planning Program (MCH-FP) on the economic empowerment of women and their daughters over a 35-year period, which was initiated by the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) in the rural Matlab area of Bangladesh in 1977.
-
2011-2013Project
The Effects of Community-Based Interventions on Women and Children’s Health in Indonesia
Low birth weight is a global health problem, with approximately 16% of all newborns in developing countries being born with low birth weight. Motivated by these statistics, this research evaluates policies that target maternal and children’s health in low-resource settings.
-
2011-2013Project
Women, Children, and the Dynamics of Conditional Cash Transfers
Using population‐level data from the Mexican Family Life Survey (MxFLS), researchers examine the impact on child health of a large‐scale conditional cash transfer program, Oportunidades. This anti‐poverty program puts additional resources in the hands of women and their families and encourages parents to invest in human capital of their children.
-
2011-2013Project
Income Shocks and Reproductive Health: Evidence from Large-scale Randomized Cash Transfer Experiments in Zambia
This study explores the impact of Zambia’s child grant programme (CGP), a government operated large-scale unconditional CT programme, which gives monthly transfers, primarily to female adults with children under-5, on a range of maternal health outcomes focusing on quality and quantity of prenatal care and skilled attendance at birth.
-
2008-2012Project
Information, Sexual Behavior, and Health Among Teenagers in Cameroon
HIV has tremendous economic consequences, and can be a crucial factor in whether people are pushed into poverty. In sub-Saharan Africa, most new infections are among young people, and women are disproportionately affected. The goal of this study was to better understand what kind of information young women in Cameroon need in order to prevent HIV infection, and how the information can be best delivered. Researchers ran a randomized controlled trial that evaluated the impact of school-based HIV education programs to prevent risky sexual behavior in young women.
-
2010-2012Project
Child Development Program, Child Health, Women’s Labor Supply, and Education of Older Female Children in India
India is home to the largest malnourished child population in the world with around 80 million children. India’s flagship program and the only national program for combating child malnutrition is the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). This research takes advantage of data from the 2005-2006 National Family Health Survey on ICDS to look at the impact of its Supplementary Nutrition Program on children’s growth.
-
2010-2011Project
Conditional Cash Transfers and HIV Prevention
The objective of cash transfer interventions is to reduce structural barriers to education and to increase school attendance of young women, thereby decreasing their risk for HIV. Mobilization activities aim to reeducate young men about gender norms, intimate partner violence, and HIV risk; and to encourage them about protecting young women and reducing HIV risk in their communities.
-
2010-2011Project
The Effects of Cash Transfer Programs
Health and education are big concerns for youth transitioning into adulthood. Furthermore, they are even more critical for young women in sub-Saharan Africa. While there is a large literature on the relationship between women’s poverty and HIV/AIDS risk, little is known regarding the marginal impact of income for young women on their sexual behavior and partner selection.
-
2006-2011Project
Family size and investments in early childhood development in Ecuador
This research extends a longitudinal study in Ecuador that evaluated the impact of intervention programs which improve circumstances surrounding birth, maternal and child health, and parenting “quality” on child cognitive and physiological development. This project focuses on how family size interacts with the use of early childhood development (ECD) interventions and how it mediates the impact of those interventions on child cognitive outcomes.
-
2007-2011Project
Demographic Change and Women’s Work and Earnings in Bangladesh
This study examines the impact of fertility changes and childbearing practices on women’s labor force participation in Bangladesh. The study separately identifies the impact of changes in fertility on changes in work by taking advantage of a family planning program selectively introduced in the subdistrict of Matlab, Bangladesh.
-
2008-2011Project
Poverty, Gender Inequities, and Sexual/Reproductive Health: An Impact Evaluation of a Combined Economic and Psycho-social Intervention in Southern Tanzania
This project designed, implemented, and evaluated a combined economic and psycho-social intervention on individual/household economic outcomes and sexual/reproductive health outcomes among young people aged 18-30 in a rural area of southern Tanzania. The one-year intervention to reduce risky sexual behaviors was implemented as an individual-level randomized trial. The intervention offered the treatment group a cash reward (similar to conditional cash transfer programs elsewhere) at 4, 8, and 12 months if the individual tested STI negative at that contact.
-
2010-2011Project
Impact of Scholarships on Schooling in Cambodia
This study builds on a long-run follow up study of Cambodian children–male and female–who applied for a secondary school scholarship program in 2005. This study evaluates the impact of the program and the resulting increase in school attainment, on a variety of outcomes among adolescents such as learning outcomes, life-skills, knowledge about healthy behaviors and risk taking.
-
2008-2010Project
Measuring Returns to Reproductive Health Services: The Impact of the Global Gag Rule
The aim of this study is to measure the impact of reproductive health services (RHS) on indicators of health and well-being. The research examined the impact of decreased availability of RHS as a result of the U.S. policy known as the global gag rule.
-
2008-2010Project
Experimental Approaches to Assessing the Economic Determinants and Consequences of Contraceptive Adoption in Zambia
This study explores how the husband’s presence in the fertility clinic affected uptake of contraception among women through a field experiment in Zambia, a country that experiences high excess fertility, despite availability of contraceptives through both public and private providers.
-
2007-2010Project
Enhancing the Economic Health and Social Capabilities of Highly Vulnerable Youth
Young people in South Africa face a high risk of HIV, teenage pregnancy, school dropout, and unemployment, and are further disadvantaged by the actual or potential loss of one or both parents to HIV and conditions of poverty, inequality, and food in security. These circumstances make the transition from childhood to adulthood especially difficult, and many of the most disadvantaged are in danger of falling even farther behind socially and economically due to illness, stigma, and the loss of key supportive adults such as parents and teachers. This research presents baseline findings from an intervention randomized at the classroom level in peri- urban secondary schools within the Durban metro area of KwaZulu-Natal, Province, South Africa – the “Siyakha Nentsha” program.
-
2008-2010Project
Economic Impact of Unsafe Induced Abortion in Uganda
The research quantifies the opportunity cost of unsafe abortion in terms of individual health and costs as well as health care and societal costs. Preventing unsafe abortions would reduce morbidity and mortality among Ugandan mothers and benefit society through increased productivity because young mothers are at the core of agricultural production and child care in Uganda.
-
2007-2009Project
Long-Term Financial Incentives and Investment in Daughters: Evidence From Conditional Cash Transfers in North India
Since the early 1990s, several states in India have introduced financial incentive programs to discourage son preference among parents and to encourage investment in daughters’ education and health. This study evaluates one such program in the state of Haryana, Apni Beti Apna Dhan (Our Daughter, Our Wealth).
-
2007-2009Project
Experimental Approaches to Assessing the Economic Determinants and Consequences of Contraceptive Adoption in Zambia
There is not enough rigorous empirical evidence to support claims that access to reproductive health services and technologies impact the economic lives of women and children, or that decisions about contraceptive use and fertility respond to improvements in economic opportunities. This study focuses on the effects of contraceptive availability on economic outcomes, male involvement and bargaining effects, and peer effects on adoption, with the goal to impact policy by providing evidence on whether and how to promote access to and use of modern contraceptives, especially in Africa where male involvement in family planning is actively debated.