Spanish-World Bank Trust Fund for Impact Evaluation (SIEF)

As Spain scales up its own development assistance, improving aid effectiveness and promoting results-based management in its own agencies and in partner developing countries is increasingly important. The SIEF advances global knowledge on "what works" to promote MDGs and other key HD goals. It also builds the capacity of developing countries, World Bank staff, Spanish and other development partner agency staff to carry out rigorous impact evaluations and effectively utilize the results.

Click here for information on SIEF’s governance structure.

– The bulk of SIEF resources are funding impact evaluations of programs designed to improve human development outcomes. Funding for evaluations is available through three separate funding windows described below.

How to access: See description of Quick Wins Fund, Cluster Fund, and Innovation Fund

2. Regional Workshops on Impact Evaluation

– The SIEF supports up to 5 field-based Impact Evaluation workshops per year to build staff, client and donor capacity for measuring results, evaluating impact and using evaluation evidence for policy.

2008 SIEF Workshops

– January 13-17 – MENA Region (Cairo, Egypt)
– March 3-7 – LAC Region (Managua, Nicaragua)
– June 23-27 – Madrid, Spain
– December 1-5 – EAP Region (Manila, Philippines)

2009 SIEF Workshops

– January 26-30 – LAC Region (Lima, Peru)
– March (TBC) – ECA Region (Istanbul, Turkey)
– May (TBC) – SA Region (Delhi, India)

How to access: Regional HD Sector Directors may request support for IE workshops with a memo to the HD Chief Economist.

3. Results Dissemination

– High quality global policy studies, designed to synthesize the evidence generated from this program and others on “what works” to promote HD outcomes; global and regional conferences to disseminate major results; public access databases and Spanish translation of research results.

How to access: Please send requests to SIEF Program Manager, Barbara Bruns (bbruns@worldbank.org).

All evaluations must impact HD outcomes as well as fulfill the following criteria:

1. Prospective and rigorous, preferably randomized, identification strategies (to ensure that program impact is measured vis-à-vis a valid control group).

2. Programs either currently or prospectively supported by World Bank lending (a World Bank staff member must manage the work).

3. Programs in one of 72 eligible developing countries Spain has prioritized (see list below).

4. Programs that fall under one of the 11 priority areas identified by Spain (see list below).

Eligible Sectors
1. Poverty and Hunger
2. Education
3. Social Protection & Labor
4. Health
5. HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Other Diseases
6. Gender
7. Fertility and Reproductive Health
8. Children and Youth
9. Disability
10. Water and Sanitation
11. Housing

1. Quick Wins Fund

The goal of the Quick Wins Fund is to provide limited funding to a small number of ongoing high quality impact evaluations within existing clusters that demonstrated immediate funding needs.

– Click here to see list of Quick Wins programs approved by the Steering Committee

– New methods of service delivery which have not been implemented or rigorously evaluated before in developing countries.

As one of the core objectives of the SIEF is to understand the scope for non-HD interventions and programs to improve HD outcomes, the Innovation Fund will make awards through two separate windows:

– HD Window ($1 million) – for the following SIEF-eligible sectors/themes: poverty and hunger; education; social protection & labor; health; HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; gender; fertility and reproductive health; children and youth; disability
– SD Window ($1 million) – for the following SIEF-eligible sectors: water and sanitation; housing

The final $600,000 available will be allocated to the highest ranked proposals across the two windows. No proposal will be funded through either window, however, unless it meets a threshold standard of technical rigor and team quality. If insufficient applications meet the quality threshold, funds will be reserved for a future call for proposals.

Innovation Fund:
1. Deadline for proposals: June 11, 2008
2. Technical Committee Review Meeting: July 9, 2008 (TBC)
3. Steering Committee approves Innovation Fund program: July 23, 2008 (TBC)
4. Innovation Fund awards communicated to evaluations TTLs: August 1, 2008 (TBC)

Call for Proposals: Innovation Fund

– Detailed Call for Proposals

– Template for Submissions

– Budget Template

The mission of the Office of the Chief Economist (CE) for the Human Development Network is to improve the analytical and operational quality of the World Bank’s efforts to promote sustainable and inclusive “investment in people”.

The CE unit is responsible for advising on the quality of analytical work conducted by staff of the HD Network, with primary focus on the areas of education, health, HIV/AIDS, social protection, children and youth and disability. The goal is to develop evidence based policy advice for local governments, as well as international agencies and donors.

The CE unit is actively involved in research to strengthen the knowledge base for HD policy by promoting systematic impact evaluations in Bank-supported HD projects, and in training Bank staff and government officials on the value of evidence from rigorous impact evaluations and the for policy and program design.