November 2023 GIL TOP POLICY LESSONS ON EMPOWERING ABOUT THE AFRICA GENDER INNOVATION LAB ADOLESCENT GIRLS The Africa Gender Innovation Lab Overlapping crises such as climate change, the ongoing recovery (GIL) conducts impact evaluations of from the COVID-19 pandemic, regional conflicts and rising global development interventions in Sub-Saharan food insecurity exacerbate the inequalities faced by adolescent Africa, seeking to generate evidence on girls, making them particularly vulnerable in these critical times. how to close gender gaps in earnings, For many girls, these circumstances force them to make decisions productivity, assets, and agency. The GIL about employment and their fertility at an early age, limits team is currently working on over 80 impact evaluations in more than 30 countries in their access to formal education, and further exposes them to Africa with the aim of building an evidence restrictive social norms. Additionally, domestic responsibilities base with lessons for the region. limit adolescent girls’ time in school and educational achievement, in turn curtailing their ability to enter the labor force. 1 With 60 The impact objective of GIL is increasing percent of the total population of Africa under the age of 25, 2 take-up of effective policies by investing in empowering adolescent girls is critical to accelerate governments, development organizations, economic growth and reduce intergenerational poverty. and the private sector to address the underlying causes of gender inequality in Several impact evaluation studies conducted by the Africa Africa, particularly in terms of women’s Gender Innovation Lab (GIL) across Sub-Saharan Africa have economic and social empowerment. The demonstrated the potential of girls’ empowerment programs to Lab aims to do this by producing and positively influence the life trajectories of young women, even delivering a new body of evidence and accross a variety of contexts. developing a compelling narrative, geared towards policymakers, on what works and what does not work in promoting gender 1 Bergstrom, Katy; Ozler, Berk. 2021. Improving the Well-Being of Adolescent Girls in Developing Countries. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9827. Washington, D.C: equality. World Bank Group. 2 Charts of the Week: Africa’s changing demographics. http://www.worldbank.org/en/programs/africa-gender-innovation-lab WHAT WORKS TO EMPOWER were 48% more likely to engage in income-generating ADOLESCENT GIRLS? activities, and reported self-employment earnings three times higher, compared to the baseline average. At a cost CREATING SAFE SPACES of US$18 per eligible girl (US$85 per participating girl) per Creating safe spaces for girls to receive job or life- year, the program not only worked but also was cost- skills trainings that are tailored to an adolescent girl’s effective. Implementation of the program in other contexts environment and experience has been shown to be has shown the importance of high-quality execution for effective across a variety of contexts. these results to be achieved.3 POLICY IN ACTION: SAFE SPACES IN UGANDA POLICY IN ACTION: SAFE SPACES IN CONFLICT In Uganda, the non-governmental organization BRAC AFFECTED AREAS implemented a multifaceted program: Empowerment After the successes in Uganda, a similar program was and Livelihoods for Adolescent Girls (ELA) to create designed for Sierra Leone. However, Sierra Leone was community-based girl-only clubs, which became hubs hit with the 2014 Ebola epidemic during the program for delivery of vocational and life-skills trainings for implementation. Quarantines were imposed which limited adolescents aged 13 to 20. The program had positive travel, halted market activity, and closed schools. Health impacts on income and on girls’ decision-making power services were repurposed to fight the epidemic—and over childbearing, marriage, and sexual activity. After 4 medical services on sexual and reproductive health were years, the girls in the ELA program were 34% less likely to severely reduced. In light of these circumstances, the have a child and 62% less likely to be married. Moreover, program was redesigned to understand if and how the girls were 30% less likely to have had sex against their ELA clubs might help safeguard adolescent girls and will over the previous 12 months. Economically, they young women aged 12 to 25 in a crisis environment. 3 Bandiera, Oriana; Buehren, Niklas; Burgess, Robin; Goldstein, Markus; Gulesci, Selim; Rasul, Imran; Sulaiman, Munshi. 2020. “Women’s Empowerment in Action: Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Africa”. Washington, D.C: World Bank Group. Working with village leaders, a World Bank team Ebola crisis, older girls reported increases in unwanted categorized communities into high- and low-disruption and transactional sex. The authors hypothesize that as areas to determine how the crisis and the program might younger girls enrolled in the ELA program and spent less have impacted the resilience of girls in both types of time with men, older girls were more likely to be targeted communities. Though the measures taken were critical by men. Nevertheless, the ELA program increased the to contain Ebola, they did have strong, negative effects ability of older girls to mitigate some of the risks associated on adolescent girls. In high-disruption communities with with transactional sex, as they were more likely to use no ELA programming, younger girls were 17 percentage contraceptives and pregnancy rates did not increase.4 points (pp) (32% of the baseline mean) less likely to return to schools after they were reopened and spent an An evaluation of a program very similar to the ELA average of 1.3 additional weekly hours with men. Girls in program, and implemented by the same organization, in the high-disruption communities were also more likely to South Sudan also suggests that the girls affected by the become pregnant. crisis in fact improved schooling outcomes. Similarly, the results suggest a positive impact of the program on girls’ In contrast, the girls in the ELA program experienced probability of engagement in income-generating activities different outcomes. The school enrollment decline in high disruption communities was reduced by half and the probability of saving as well as other measures when the girls were exposed to the clubs. In all types of socio-emotional wellbeing in areas not affected by of communities, both younger (12 to 17) and older girls conflict. However, treated girls in areas not affected by (18 to 25) who participated in the clubs spent less time conflict were also less likely to have been engaged in with men. In high-disruption communities, pregnancies transactional sex or experience sex against their will but outside of wedlock also decreased by 7.5 pp (82% of the are more likely to have married as a teen about a year and baseline mean). However, in areas highly disrupted by the a half after the end of the program.5 4 Bandiera, Oriana; Buehren, Niklas; Goldstein, Markus; Rasul, Imran; Smurra, Andrea. 2019. The Economic Lives of Young Women in the Time of Ebola: Lessons from an Empowerment Program. Washington, D.C: World Bank Group. 5 Niklas Buehren, Shubha Chakravarty, Markus Goldstein, Vanya Slavchevska, Munshi Sulaiman. 2017. Adolescent Girls’ Empowerment in Conflict-Affected Settings: Experimental Evidence from South Sudan. Washington, D.C: World Bank Group. POLICY IN ACTION: ENSURING THE QUALITY OF young women that take the constraints that may restrict IMPLEMENTATION IN TANZANIA girls from attending the sessions into account have While the ELA program was found to be effective in been demonstrated to be effective. For example, these Uganda, South Sudan, and Sierra Leone, the same might include free childcare or transportation that allow positive effects were not replicated in Tanzania: the young women with children, or limited means, to attend. standard community-based girls’ clubs had no impact on POLICY IN ACTION: REMOVING CONSTRAINTS TO employment nor income. Qualitative research suggests SKILLS TRAINING IN LIBERIA that resource constraints negatively affected the quality of implementation in this context: club meetings and In Liberia, the Economic Empowerment of Adolescent trainings were held in lower-quality public spaces, with Girls and Young Women (EPAG) project offered a year-long lower-quality materials that likely reduced club members’ employment program, including six months of trainings— interest in regular participation. Inadequate provision for which included socio-emotional skills, as well as either the training of new mentors and less frequent supervision vocational or business skills training—and six months of also contributed to the lower implementation quality. The follow-up support. Free childcare was provided during contrasting results suggest that, despite the strength of the classroom trainings—as well as savings accounts, a the core model, adapting and scaling the intervention stipend for transportation, and a completion bonus. The across different contexts requires continuous learning, program was geared toward young women, between the adequate training of mentors and close, regular ages of 16 to 27, who had been out of school for at least a supervision. 6 year. Compared to non-participants, young women in the program had strongly positive employment and earnings TAKING BARRIERS TO PARTICIPATION outcomes: employment increased by 47%, and earnings INTO ACCOUNT increased by 80%. Along with the economic outcomes, Careful program design that is tailored to the specific participants gained other elements of empowerment: needs of adolescent girls is critical to consider for access to money, self-confidence, and anxiety about programs targeting young women. Indeed, trainings for circumstances and the future were positively impacted.7 6 Buehren, Niklas; Goldstein, Markus; Gulesci, Selim; Sulaiman, Munshi; Yam, Venus. 2017. Evaluation of an Adolescent Development Program for Girls in Tanzania. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 7961. Washington, D.C: World Bank Group. 7 Adoho, Franck; Chakravarty, Shubha; Korkoyah, Jr, Dala T.; Lundberg, Mattias; Tasneem, Afia. 2014. “The impact of an adolescent girl’s employment program: the EPAG project in Liberia”. Washington, D.C: World Bank Group. POLICY IN ACTION: CHALLENGING RESTRICTIVE of gender egalitarian ideals. The program also led to GENDER NORMS IN SOMALIA improvements in adolescent mental health and increased A gender norms training program called CHOICES, the likelihood of boys’ involvement in domestic chores. implemented by the NGO Save the Children, targeted Program impacts occurred in a relatively short timeframe young adolescent girls and boys (aged 10-14 years) in and were maintained two years post-intervention. A Somalia. CHOICES is a component of the Challenging complementary gender norms intervention to parents Harmful Attitudes and Norms for Gender Equality and also led to an increase in both mothers’ and fathers’ Empowerment in Somalia (CHANGES) project. The gender egalitarian attitudes, especially with respect to a CHOICES training curriculum was designed to raise girl’s right to education but had limited additional impact awareness of societal expectations that enable gender on the attitudes and behaviors of adolescents.8 inequality through mixed-gender activities such as PROVIDING SCHOLARSHIPS TO KEEP drama, poetry, and debate competitions. The program GIRLS IN SCHOOL consists of ten 2-hour sessions delivered by two trainers (male + female) over the course of three months in an Across much of Sub-Saharan Africa, adolescent girls are after-school program. less likely than boys to be enrolled in secondary school, and they face a higher risk of dropout. Reducing the cost of A recent impact evaluation of the CHOICES program schooling through cash transfers and in-kind transfers has in Somalia showed that the CHOICES gender norms been found to be effective at increasing girls’ enrollment program led to a shift towards more gender egalitarian and attendance in different contexts and could potentially attitudes among both adolescent girls and boys in- and be effective at delaying marriage and/or pregnancies. out-of-school. Trained adolescents were less likely to POLICY IN ACTION: SCHOLARSHIPS IN NIGER succumb to peer pressure to conform when stating their attitudes in public, leading to a greater public expression In Niger, a component of the Sahel Women Empowerment 8 Munshi, Sulaiman; Niklas, Buehren; RajdeV, Brar; Sreelakshmi, Papineni. Rebel with a Cause: Effects of a Gender Norms. 2023. Washington D.C: World Bank Group. and Demographic Dividend (SWEDD) project offered Results from the program’s impact evaluation showed scholarships and some tutoring to adolescent girls that the girls offered the mentorship program were (aged 13 on average) from vulnerable rural households 4% more likely to have completed primary school and upon admission to middle school. Compared to non- 3% more likely to have enrolled in secondary school participants, girls who received the scholarship and compared to girls who did not receive the program tutoring program were 50% less likely to be married in (Koroknay-Palicz and IRC, 2016). In addition to the the summer following their third year of middle school. boost in school enrollment, girls in the clubs improved The program also improved educational outcomes and the quality of their relationships with both their peers and wellbeing: girls who received the program were 53% their parents. These impacts were already observed the more likely to remain enrolled in school and reported first year after the program and persisted more than a higher degree of life satisfaction. The intervention four years after the end of the program. Moreover, the raised girls’ educational and professional aspirations younger girls, between ages 12 and 13, experienced for themselves as well as their parents’ aspirations larger impacts— suggesting that supporting girls for their daughter, suggesting that the intervention’s as they are transitioning into adolescence may yield greater impacts. The program resulted in no effects on effects are likely to last beyond the mere duration of the sexual activity nor pregnancy.9 scholarship. ENGAGING BOYS TO PROMOTE HARNESSING THE POWER OF IMPROVED SEXUAL AND MENTORSHIP REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH OUTCOMES Mentors can play a positive role in girls’ lives, helping As the peers of millions of girls and important them transition into adolescence and adulthood, adopt advocates in their communities, boys play a critical healthy behaviors, build confidence and self-esteem, role in adolescent girls’ development. The joint and navigate decisions about schooling, employment, education and dissemination of safe sexual and and fertility. At critical junctures in girls’ development, reproductive health practices to both girls and boys mentors can help to nudge them in positive directions. can help promote informed sexual decisions. POLICY IN ACTION: MENTORING PROGRAMS POLICY IN ACTION: USING SPORTS PEDAGOGY TO IN LIBERIA ENGAGE BOYS IN TANZANIA Implemented by the International Rescue Committee In Tanzania, an intervention targeting both males and (IRC), the Sisters of Success (SOS) program in Liberia females sought to reduce intimate partner violence (IPV) was designed to harness the power of mentorship by by focusing on females in adolescent empowerment linking mentors with girls’ groups to deliver life skills clubs run by BRAC. The program offered females a trainings—including socio-emotional skills—to young goal setting activity designed to improve their sexual adolescent girls between the ages of 12-15. The program and reproductive health outcomes and simultaneously aimed to support girls’ transition into adolescence by provided their male partners a soccer intervention, promoting healthy behaviors, fostering confidence and which educated and inspired young men to make self-esteem, increasing girls’ knowledge and practice better sexual and reproductive health choices. of their rights, developing savings and financial literacy habits, increasing girls’ community participation and Both interventions effectively reduced female reports involvement, and working towards their own personal of IPV, with larger impacts observed among females development goals. who were already sexually active at baseline. In terms 9 Sisters of success: measuring the impact of mentoring and girls’ groups in supporting girls’ transition into adolescence and adulthood, in Liberia: full length baseline report (English). Washington, D.C.: World Bank Group. of mechanism, the soccer intervention improved male attitudes around violence and risky sexual behaviors, while females in the goal setting arm took more control of their sexual and reproductive health by exiting violent relationships. Both of these mechanisms generated IPV reductions and were found to be cost-efficient, with costs of around $41 per female for the boys’ intervention and $38 for the goal-setting intervention. The findings suggest the need for continued research pertaining to SRH as adolescents transition into adulthood.10 SCALING UP PROGRAMS THAT WORK GIL’s evidence has played a crucial role in shaping and expanding various programs in Africa, including two World Bank regional initiatives: the Sahel Women Empowerment and Demographic Dividend Regional project (SWEDD) and the East Africa Girl’s Empowerment and Resilience (EAGER) Program. Since the early design stage of the SWEDD project, GIL collaborated with the project team, offering technical assistance based on GIL’s own rigorous global evidence related to adolescent girls’ projects. Notably, GIL’s input significantly influenced the design of several innovations incorporated into the SWEDD project, which spans nine countries with plans for expansion into three additional West African countries. These innovations include the development of safe spaces FOR MORE INFORMATION, curricula following international best practices and the introduction of boys’ clubs PLEASE CONTACT alongside girls’ clubs, among other innovations. As of June 2023, the SWEDD Estelle Koussoube project had positively impacted nearly 1 million girls through interventions aimed mkoussoube@worldbank.org at keeping them in school, enhancing their life skills and knowledge of sexual and reproductive health, and expanding their economic prospects. Nelsy Affoum naffoum@worldbank.org Regarding the EAGER program, currently in the design phase, GIL’s evidence is 1818 H St NW playing a pivotal role in refining the program’s knowledge base and operational Washington, DC 20433 USA objectives. The EAGER program aims to advance human capital development www.worldbank.org/africa/gil by keeping girls in school, promoting a smooth transition from school to work, facilitating the economic inclusion of young women in the workforce, and strengthening institutional capacity through the establishment of policies, services, and a knowledge hub promoting gender equality. The program aims to reach 2 million girls by increasing their access and retention in schools, support 170,000 young women’s productivity in the labor market, and shift gender norms of nearly ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 7 million change agents (such as traditional leaders, parents, and boys) by 2029. This work has been funded in part by the Similarly, GIL evidence has influenced the World Bank Tejaswini project in India, Umbrella Facility for Gender Equality (UFGE), which is a multi-donor trust fund administered by which uses safe spaces as a platform to offer a package of activities for girls the World Bank to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment through experimentation aged 14 to 24, including community-based social support, life skills (including and knowledge creation to help governments and the private sector focus policy and reproductive health), business skills and vocational training. The project has programs on scalable solutions with sustainable outcomes. The UFGE is supported with generous successfully expanded the social, educational, and economic opportunities of over contributions from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Latvia, 1.1 million adolescent girls and young women over its 7 years of implementation. the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Wellspring Philanthropic Fund. 10 Manisha, Shah; Jennifer, Seager; Joao, Montalvao; Markus, Goldstein. Two Sides of Gender: Sex, Power, and Adolescence. 2022. Washington D.C: World Bank Group.