How countries nurture EVIDENCE Human Capital Policies and programs that use and expand the evidence base N OVERN GO ME MEN RNM T NT CO TIO NT NA IN DI UI OR TY CO Interventions designed using existing empirical evidence or new analyses can help deliver higher returns to investments in human capital. ABOUT THIS SERIES This four-part series explores the strategies Pakistan: implementing lessons governments have deployed to overcome the myriad barriers to effectively invest learned from years of research in human capital. It focuses on a whole The design of Pakistan’s nationwide unconditional of government approach that (i) sustains cash transfer program, the Benazir Income Support efforts across political cycles; (ii) coordinates Program (BISP), launched in June 2008, benefited across government; and (iii) designs policies from years of prior research on cash transfer and programs that use and expand the programs in Latin America and other regions. By evidence base. directly transferring the benefits to the female heads of the households, BISP aimed not only to reduce While adopting any one of these strategies poverty but also to empower women. To date, more can help build human capital, countries than US$3 billion has been disbursed to 5.4 million that have implemented all three in tandem beneficiary households.1 Quantitative and qualitative are often among those that have made analyses suggest that women gain more bargaining major strides in improving human capital power by receiving BISP benefits, with a significant outcomes. In this series, we examine the share (64 percent) of female beneficiaries reporting various dimensions of this approach using control over the funds, and women beneficiaries country examples and conclude with reporting feeling less dependent on their husbands. a look at how success across all three Gains in promoting female mobility and changing strategies has led to meaningful gains and community perceptions towards the mobility of women have also been reported. In turn, this has lasting benefits. contributed to women’s ability to invest in children’s education, improve food intake for the household, and gain better mobility in urban areas and resources for fuel in rural areas. BISP has also been found to significantly reduce children’s malnutrition and has had a positive impact on adult monthly food consumption. worldbank.org/humancapital These and other lessons from the implementation component—participating schools had to ensure and evaluation of BISP have fed back into the that a minimum percentage of their students design of human capital-focused operations in passed a biannual standardized academic test. the country through BISP itself and through other Schools that failed to reach the minimum pass provincial initiatives. For instance, a review of rate two times in a row were dropped from the adequacy of benefit amounts under BISP is the program. being conducted to strengthen its poverty impact. World Bank lending operations currently under Recent research has shown that this development are also trying to utilize the targeting accountability mechanism has worked. Schools method established and utilized by BISP. Ongoing threatened with losing access to subsidies almost evaluation will further improve the BISP program. always managed to raise student scores to meet the minimum pass rate needed to keep the funds. In addition to the stimulation of the demand- As a result, student learning in these schools was side of education via BISP, the government of higher and teachers performed better.2 Pakistan also sought to address supply-side challenges. Between 2005 and 2012, Pakistan Chile: programmatic developed a public-private partnership program in which for-profit private schools waived tuition improvements and expansion costs for poorer students in exchange for a per- based on evidence student subsidy from the government. By 2012, the program covered one million students. One Evidence-based improvements over time have program began in 2005 in Punjab province helped drive the success, sustainability, and included a built-in accountability and evaluation expansion of Chile Crece Contigo (ChCC), Chile’s multisectoral early childhood education and development program that supports children and their families. ChCC has shown positive effects on child development, with significant impact on the health and welfare of low-income Chileans. The Chilean government collects statistics on ChCC outcomes to inform future decision-making. As a result, the program continues to be adjusted and improved in response to new evidence and data. After operating successfully since its countrywide implementation in 2008, ChCC has recently expanded to provide coverage to children up to 9 years old. It has also served as a basis for the design of similar initiatives in several other Latin American countries such as Colombia, Peru, and Uruguay. Poland: reforms based on international testing Between 2000 and 2012, there was an impressive transformation in test score performance among Poland’s youth. The proportion of students at the top performance level increased, and the share of poor performers declined. Students from poor and well-off socioeconomic backgrounds alike saw performance improvements. Poland’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) scores Among other benefits, Pakistan’s Benazir Income Support Program has contributed to women’s ability to invest in their children’s education. Photo: Curt Carnemark/World Bank are now above the OECD average and at the same levels as countries such as Finland and Existing evidence and new Germany. All this has been achieved with stable analyses can help identify levels of education spending, at about 5 percent of GDP, which is below the OECD average. As successful interventions and a result, PISA scores in mathematics, reading, and science jumped 30 points—equivalent to an also aid in their design. additional year of schooling.3 The reason for this success lies in a series PAKISTAN: of comprehensive education reforms put into motion in the early 1990s. Successive nationwide unconditional cash administrations introduced standardized transfer program benefited from examinations at the end of primary, lower and years of research from other regions upper-secondary education; transferred significant responsibilities from the central to the local governments; reformed the curriculum; and over US$3 billion disbursed to invested in teachers’ professional development 5.2 million households since 2008 and expanded their freedom to choose textbooks. Perhaps most fundamental, was the introduction analyses show gains in education, of the comprehensive lower secondary gimnazjum nutrition, consumption and in 1999, which delayed selection between general women’s economic empowerment and vocational tracks and effectively added one year of exposure to the general curriculum for those students who, prior to the reform, would lessons learned helped design other have been in vocational school. Taking effect human capital-focused operations after the first PISA test in 2000, in which Poland performed poorly relative to EU and OECD averages, this change has been rigorously evaluated and shown to have had a significant positive effect on student performance. 2015 PISA, Vietnam’s average score was 32 Vietnam: utilizing points higher than the OECD average—equivalent international benchmarks to about one year of schooling.4 Similarly, by effectively benchmarking its student The Strategic Impact Evaluation assessment system against international Fund: measuring impact to good practices, Vietnam was able to assess the effectiveness of its education system. inform improvements Participating for the first time in the 2012 PISA, the country’s 15-year olds ranked 17th The World Bank’s Strategic Impact Evaluation in mathematics, 8th in science, and 19th in Fund (SIEF) supports scientifically rigorous reading among 65 participating nations, placing research that measures the impact of programs Vietnam above the OECD average. Following and policies to improve education, health, PISA 2012, Vietnam changed the legal framework access to quality water and sanitation, and early for its large-scale exams to diversify testing childhood development in low- and middle- methods, improve item quality, and pave the way income countries. A selection of SIEF evaluations for competency-based assessment—reiterating is included on the following page. its commitment to evidence-based policy design. Among the top 10 worldwide in science in the SIEF EVALUATIONS* APRIL 2019 no. 3 of 4 Evaluation Informed program, related focus program, or measurement Bangladesh (Early childhood) Evaluated low-cost integrated interventions that Save the Children (implementer) discussing targeted pregnant women and parents with use of results with Ministry of Health children under age three to improve nutrition and child stimulation. Bulgaria (Early childhood) Measured the effectiveness of offering free The Ministry of Education and Science and preschool for selected beneficiaries, and the implementing NGO decided to support providing a conditional financial grant for further longitudinal analysis and cognitive some selected communities (both jointly and measurement of the experimental sample as independently) to understand how policymak- they leave kindergarten. ers can increase the number of Roma children attending preschool and improve children’s cognitive and socio-emotional development Djibouti (Workfare and Nutrition) Examined the effectiveness of linking child Results helped build policymaker support for nutrition and workfare as a means of reducing continuing workfare program in the national malnutrition in young children. roll-out Kenya (Clinic inspections) Evaluated whether increased monitoring and Based on the instruments used during the providing information to patients about the clin- baseline survey, the government collabo- ics that serve them can strengthen the quality rated with the evaluation team on a new of care in private and public facilities. regulatory framework for monitoring private and public health facilities to promote patient safety standards. Malawi (Training volunteer teachers) Studied the effects of teacher incentives and The Ministry of Gender has adopted curric- training, parental education, and learning ma- ulum developed for the teacher and parent terials for children on their physical, emotional, training. and cognitive development and their readiness for primary school. Mexico (Mobile teachers) Evaluated the effects of mobile pedagogical Government has decided to expand program assistants sent to underperforming remote pri- based on results of the evaluation. Had the mary schools to give parents information about results not been positive, the program would the schools and provide classroom support to have been shut down. teachers on student learning. Nepal (Information on nutrition) Evaluated the effectiveness of providing The government adopted the training model information alone, or information and cash, on and materials to ensure that easy-to-un- improved nutrition for pregnant women and derstand and better-informed nutritional young children. information is reaching the country’s poorest and most remote communities.  Niger (Early childhood) Evaluated the effectiveness of the cash Training and mentoring of the staff deliver- The Human Capital Project is a global transfers and the value-added of the parenting ing the stimulation program in the national training on nutrition, health and cognitive devel- roll-out. Government decision to design effort to accelerate more and better opment of children under the age of five. complementary pilot approaches for water and sanitation and health investments in people for greater Pakistan (School grants) equity and economic growth. The Determined whether making loans available to Tameer microfinance bank in Pakistan is test- Project is helping create the political private schools that serve low-income students ing a new loan product for private schools would lead schools to make investments that that serve poor students. space for national leaders to prioritize improve student learning. transformational investments in health, *not all evaluations are shown. education, and social protection. The Source: Adapted from the World Bank Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund objective is rapid progress toward a ENDNOTES world in which all children are well- 1 World Bank. 2016. Reaching the Poorest through Strengthening the Social Safety Net System nourished and ready to learn, can attain in Pakistan. http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/pakistan/brief/reaching-the-poorest- real learning in the classroom, and can through-strengthening-the-social-safety-net-system-in-pakistan 2 Barrera-Osorio, Felipe, Raju, Dhushyanth, Marcus, Aliza [eds.]. 2012. Pakistan: Can low-cost enter the job market as healthy, skilled, private schools improve learning? (English). From evidence to policy. World Bank Group. and productive adults. 3 Wes, Marina, and Bodewig, Christian. 2016. Poland’s Education System: Leading in Europe. http://www.worldbank.org/en/news/opinion/2016/01/22/polands-education-system-lead- ing-in-europe 4 Kataoka, Sachiko. 2019. Vietnam’s Human Capital: Remarkable Education Success and Future FOR MORE INFORMATION VISIT: Challenges. World Bank. worldbank.org/humancapital