The Africa Gender Innovation Lab: A GUIDE FOR WORLD BANK TTLS The World Bank’s Africa Region Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) conducts impact evaluations of development interventions and policy research to generate evidence on how to close gender gaps in earnings, productivity, assets, and agency. With these findings, GIL enables project teams and policymakers to design innovative and scalable interventions that address gender inequality. The GIL portfolio includes over GIL has Advised Over 100 Projects 70 impact evaluations across Africa in 5 thematic areas: in More Than 35 Countries We are a team of staff economists and research analysts equipped with deep knowledge of econometrics, impact evaluations, and sectoral Agriculture experience in our 5 thematic areas. The Type of Services we Provide: Private Sector Development/ � Evidence Briefs: Briefing note and/or PPT Entrepreneurship summarizing the relevant literature and recommendations on a particular intervention � Design Support (light): Meeting with GIL to Property Rights discuss project design and provision of inputs to the PCN/ PAD � Design Support (extensive): Cross-support during project preparation to help design intervention Social Norms and Dynamics � Implementation and Impact Evaluation Partnership: A GIL team member joins core team during preparation and implementation, and leads Youth Employment/ an impact evaluation Social Safety Nets � Country Level Support: support in drafting strategic country diagnostics and advice on country program planning In Focus A FEW EXAMPLES OF GIL’S WORK WITH PARTNERS Entrepreneurship Chad and informed the discussions on women’s access to assets and women’s productivity during GIL partnered with the World Bank Togo Private the Mali SCD workshop. GIL is now working with Sector Development Support Project (P122326) agriculture project teams across sub-Saharan on a business training program, and put forward Africa to inform project designs and test innovative a new, psychology-based training aimed at interventions to support women farmers. developing the growth mindsets of entrepreneurs. The GIL impact evaluation of the project showed that this “personal initiative” training resulted in a Property Rights 40% increase in profits for female entrepreneurs In Rwanda, GIL provided advice for the design in Togo, compared to no significant growth in of a pilot that became one of the first initiatives profits for those who followed the traditional in Africa to address tenure security on a national business training. GIL has subsequently helped level. One of the factors contributing to women’s teams introduce this training in their projects in lower productivity as farmers is their weaker over 10 countries on two continents, including access to and ownership of land, which reduces variations for women farmers. their incentives to make productive investments. Responding to this constraint, GIL partnered with the Government of Rwanda to evaluate the pilot Youth Employment of Rwanda’s Land Tenure Regularization program. The GIL team worked with the Sahel Women GIL evidence uncovered a 19-percentage point Empowerment and Demographic Dividend increase in the likelihood of women making soil Regional Project -SWEDD- (P150080) and the conservation investments – twice the increase seen India Tejaswini Socioeconomic Empowerment for men. With this evidence in hand, the pilot was of Adolescent Girls & Young Women project scaled up nationally. (P150576) to include ‘safe space’ clubs for adolescent girls. This was based on previous GIL Social Norms and Dynamics findings from Uganda which showed that the clubs raised the likelihood of girls engaging in income In Western DRC, GIL evidence uncovered that generating activities by 72% and decreased teen female plot managers spend 1 hour and 52 minutes pregnancy by 26%, at a cost of under $100 US per more on domestic work per day than male plot girl per year. managers, and that more than 60 percent of individuals reported being likely to leave their children in childcare if it was available. As a result, Agriculture GIL is designing, implementing, and evaluating The policy conclusions from GIL’s Leveling the a system of community-based childcare center field report were integrated into the Decision Draft in partnership with a local NGO, the Ministry of of the Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD) of Education, and an international NGO. GET IN TOUCH This work has been funded in part by the Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality (UFGE), which is a multi-donor trust fund administered by the World Bank to Visit our website: advance gender equality and women’s empowerment through experimentation and www.worldbank.org/africa/gil knowledge creation to help governments and the private sector focus policy and programs on scalable solutions with sustainable outcomes. The UFGE is supported Email us: with generous contributions from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Iceland, afrgenderlab@worldbank.org Latvia, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.