Evaluating the Impact of Development Projects on Poverty: A Handbook for Practitioners (Directions in Development)

240 pages. Despite the billions of dollars spent on development assistance each year, th ere is still very little known about the actual impact of projects on the poor. There is broad evidence on the benefits of economic growth, investments in human capital, and the provision of safety nets for the poor. But for a specific prog ram or project in a given country, is the intervention producing the intended be nefits and what was the overall impact on the population? Could the program or p roject be better designed to achieve the intended outcomes? Are resources being spent efficiently? These are the types of questions that can only be answered th rough an impact evaluation, an approach which measures the outcomes of a program intervention in isolation of other possible factors. This handbook seeks to pr ovide project managers and policy analysts with the tools needed for evaluating project impact. It is aimed at readers with a general knowledge of statistics. F or some of the more in-depth statistical methods discussed, the reader is referr ed to the technical literature on the topic. Chapter 1 presents an overview of c oncepts and methods. Chapter 2 discusses key steps and related issues to conside r in implementation. Chapter 3 illustrates various analytical techniques through a case study. Chapter 4 includes a discussion of lessons learned from a rich se t of 'good practice' evaluations of poverty projects which have been reviewed fo r this handbook.…