Yemen-social Fund Presentation

Scaling up Poverty Reduction Global Learning Process and Shanghai Conference The Yemen Social Fund for Development

Yemen Context •Population of 18 millions scattered over 100,000 settlements, 73% rural. •42 percent of the population living in poverty •illiteracy (47%), basic education enrollment rate (64%) •infant mortality(75 per 1000), high MMR (351 per 100000) •access to health services(49%), access to drinking water 36%, and sanitation 35% •Poverty risk factors: (i) lack of education, (b) large household size and (iii) geographical location

Yemen Context •Macroeconomic crisis in the early 1990s. •Government embarked an economic reform program. •Establishment of Social Safety Net with SFD as main component. •The SFD has broad objectives to support long-term development opportunities for the poor, and establish new innovative and participative approaches in delivering social services

ain Programs Community development : participatory small-scale laborintensive works (basic services). Small and Micro-enterprise development: access to credit, saving and technical assistance. Capacity building: assist stakeholders to take share in the local development.

Scaling up

•Poverty Targeting: improving the methodology over time and diversifying approaches to reach the poor. •Community Participation: evolved from project-focused to supporting social capital •Capacity building: evolved from a mean to ensure sub projects sustainability into comprehensive programs. •Partnership: SFD widened partnership with development stakeholders. •Demonstration Effect: • SFD performance and unit cost used as bench mark. •SFD proven systems and modality are offered to other institutions.

Scaling up Capacity evolution Outputs per Phase

Phase I (19972000)

Phase II (20012003)

Phase III (20042008)

US$80

US$175

US$400

Number of donors

6

8

12

Number of projects

1086

2350

4000

Funding

Number of staff Number branch

99 5

128 7

170 9

Contributing Factors to Scaling Up •Leadership and Political Commitment granted SFD’s autonomy •Continuous development: innovating and learning from tradition and international “best practices” •Flexibility: adjust organization setup and operational policies and practices in line with lesson learned from the field •Donors support, both funding and technical assistance

Impact Evaluation 

enrollment rate for girls where SFD investments were made, increased from 42% in 1999 to 58% in 2003. The overall rate increased from 59% to 70%.

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sick individuals who receive health care rose from 55% to 68% in SFD intervention areas.

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SFD interventions increased access to household taps by 35% and reduced the average distance by 19% and time needed to fetch water by 14%

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Rural roads interventions reduced the journey cost and time by 40% , daily trips increased by 180%, journeys to markets increased 10 times

Impact Evaluation Findings of SFD 2003 Impact Evaluation Study: 

SFD favors the poor over the less poor with 40% of the resources went to the poorest three deciles and only 4% went to the top docile group

High correspondence of project choice with community priorities Subprojects’ quality perceived as excellent by around 50% of household respondents and 70% of key informants 

“The SFD was the only authority that was honest with us and did something for us” (Al Zahra School project, Saadah)

Lessons Learned Some lessons learned for scaling up: •Autonomy: allowed to establish credibility, assured management flexibility and supported innovation. •Targeting: diversifying targeting approaches improve reaching the poor. •Policy Support: Supporting sectoral policy development in order to improve the impact of projects. •Credit Operations: need for enabling environment, vocational training and non-financial services •Capacity building: capacity of intermediary structures is limited requiring medium to longer term commitments •Support of Government Agencies: success depends primarily on their responsiveness