Looks at the necessary conditions in the optimization of donor operations for debt relief, notably additional resource generation and desirability of earmarking. Presents a tentative overview of the role of microfinance in the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSPR) policies of 29 countries in...

Systematic reviews and meta-analysis have risen in popularity in international development to provide evidence on 'what works'. This paper reports the findings of a meta-analysis to assess the impact of microcredit on women's control over household spending to illustrate the challenges of...

In this paper, we explore some of the methodological challenges that evaluators face in assessing the impacts of complex intervention strategies. We illustrate these challenges, using the specific example of an impact evaluation of one of the six focal areas of the Global Environment Facility;...

Access and outreach are two sides of the same coin that currently receive much attention in the literature. This paper explores the accessibility of rural credit for the case of a rural bank in Northern Nicaragua. Both the point of view of the potential client and the bank are addressed. It is...

Impact studies at the level of the beneficiary are not very common in the case of small-scale development projects. In this paper we will present the case of an evaluation study on a training project in Low External Input Agriculture in Guatemala. The evaluation design is based on a simple...

At a time when technological innovations are making our world increasingly smaller and our production systems are becoming increasingly more efficient, the benefits of economic growth and development as a whole have not been able to reach all of society. Indeed, many poor countries,...

In mid term program evaluations evaluators are often confronted with the double task of retrospectively judging the program's merit and worth while at the same time advising decision makers concerning future adjustments in courses of action. In such cases, it can be argued that it is...

In this paper, we explore some of the methodological challenges that evaluators face in assessing the impacts of complex intervention strategies. We illustrate these challenges, using the specific example of an impact evaluation of one of the six focal areas of the Global Environment Facility;...