The Yemen Social Fund for Development: An Effective Community-Based Approach amid Political Instability

Abstract

The Yemen Social Fund for Development (SFD) was established in 1997 to combat national poverty and reinforce the limited existing social safety net. Since its inception, SFD has been widely viewed as effective in implementing programmes throughout the country and has steadily expanded its activities, despite Yemen's weak state and political unrest. In designing a novel approach to implementing its programmes, SFD provides a model of how to use the Social Fund approach to deliver good aid in hard places. Drawing on first hand experience with SFD and on a review of results from impact evaluations, this article argues that SFD's achievements have been primarily due to four factors: (1) stakeholder ownership over projects due to its close work relationship with local communities following a demand-driven approach; (2) trust based on its perceived political neutrality in allocating resources; (3) flexibility due to its mode of project funding and operations in a rapidly changing context; and (4) relevance of its interventions for beneficiaries who in reciprocity provide strong support and effective protection to its programmes. The article discusses how these factors may be transposed to other hard places using the social fund approach to deliver good aid under difficult conditions.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Lamis Al-Iryani is head of the monitoring and evaluation unit of the Social Fund for Development (SFD) in Yemen. She led all major internal evaluations of the SFD since 2003 and has been providing strategic, policy and operational advice to the Fund’s management.

Alain de Janvry is professor of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley where he teaches development economics. His research addresses issues of social assistance programmes, land reform, rural development and technological change in agriculture.

Elisabeth Sadoulet is professor of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of California at Berkeley. She teaches econometrics and development economics. Her research focuses on the impact evaluation of development programmes and on issues of technology adoption, risk and insurance, and microfinance.

Notes

1. See www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-14704951.

2. Abdulmajeed Al-Batuly, Mohamed Al-Hawri, Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation of Yemen, Martin Cicowiez, CEDLAS-UNLP, La Plata, Argentina Hans Lofgren, World Bank, Washington, DC, Mohammad Pournik, UNDP, Regional Bureau for Arab States, Cairo, ‘Assessing Development Strategies to Achieve the MDGs in the Republic of Yemen', Country Case Study, New York: United Nations Department for Economic and Social Affairs, Jul. 2011.

3. Government of Yemen, Social Fund for Development Establishment Law number 10, 1997.

4. ESA Consultores Internacional, ‘Yemen Social Fund for Development 2003: Impact Evaluation Study', Final Client Report, World Bank, 2003.

5. ESA Consultores Internacional/Environmental Resources Management, ‘Yemen Social Fund for Development 2006 Impact Evaluation Study. Final Report', Client Report, DFID, 2007.

6. DFID Yemen Social Fund for Development – Impact Evaluation Final Report Nov. 2010. The Recovery and Development Consortium: Maxwell Stamp PLC, the Post-Conflict Reconstruction Unit, the University of York and COWI.

7. World Bank, United Nations, the European Union and the Islamic Development Bank, Joint Social and Economic Assessment for the Republic of Yemen, Sana'a: World Bank, 2012.

8. Yemen Central Statistics Organization, The Yearly Statistics Book, Sana'a: Central Statistics Organization, 2011.

9. Marta Colburn, ‘Yemeni Non Governmental NGO Assessment', Report to SFD, Jun. 2009.

10. Daniel Egel, ‘Tribal Diversity, Political Patronage and the Yemeni Decentralization Experiment', PhD thesis, University of California at Berkeley, 2010 (at: www.cgdev.org/doc/events/Post-Doc%20Seminars/Daniel_Egel.pdfwww.cgdev.org/doc/events/Post-Doc%20Seminars/Daniel_Egel.pdf).

11. World Bank, ‘Republic of Yemen Poverty Update', Volume 1: The Main Report, Report No. 24422, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2002, p.55.

12. DFID, Aide Memoire on SFD-DFID Discussions, London: DFID, 2011, para. 3.

13. April Alley, ‘The Rules of the Game: Unpacking Patronage Politics in Yemen', Middle East Journal, Vol.64, No.3, 2010, pp.385–409.

14. Nadwa Al-Dawsari, ‘Tribal Governance and Stability in Yemen', Carnegie Foundation, 2012 (at: http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/04/24/tribal-governance-and-stability-in-yemen).

15. Al-Batuly et al. (see n.2 above).

16. World Bank, ‘Project Appraisal Document on a Proposed Grant to the Republic of Yemen for a Social Fund for Development Phase IV Project’, Report No. 52365 YE, 2010.

17. SFD Management Information System.

18. Data collection, analysis and report finalization were completed in 2010. However, the evaluation title is the S2009 Impact Evaluation as the process started in 2009.

19. Statistical technique to calculate the average change over time in the outcome variable for the treatment group to the average change over time for the control group.

20. Communities are randomly allocated to the different treatments of the study. In this case, the communities' pairs are randomly allocated for the interventions in 2010 and those of the interventions in 2013.

21. S. Christian, A. de Janvry, D. Egel and E. Sadoulet, Quantitative Evaluation of the Social Fund for Development Labor Intensive Works Program (LIWP), Berkeley, CA: University of California, 2013.

22. SFD Management Information System, Jul. 2013.

23. Based on the 2004 Yemen Population Census, 73 per cent of Yemen's 19.3 million population live in rural areas.

24. M. Jennings, ‘DFID Yemen Social Fund for Development – Institutional Evaluation SFD Evaluation 2009', Final Institutional Evaluation Report, Contract No. CNTR 200808562, The Recovery and Development Consortium: Maxwell Stamp PLC, the Post-Conflict Reconstruction Unit, The University of York and COWI, 2009.

25. Ibid.

26. SFD Management Information System.

27. M. Jennings, Institutional Analysis of Social Fund for Development, Republic of Yemen, London: DFID, 2006.

28. Ibid.

29. Ministry of Education, Republic of Yemen and KfW Entwicklungsbank, ‘School Construction Costs in Yemen Cross-Sector and Multi-Institutional Assessment Study', Draft Report on Findings SEF No. 1992 70 182, Prepared by GET German Education and Training GmbH, 2008.

30. Jennings (see n.24 above).

31. Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation, ‘Developing Yemen's Aid Policy', Working Paper No. 6, Sana'a: Aid Harmonization Unit, Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation, 2006.

32. S. Baas and A.O. Ali, Community-Based Organizations in Yemen: Good Practices and Lessons Learned, Rome: FAO Rural Institutions and Participation Service, 2004, p.2 (at: www.fao.org/docrep/008/y7218t/y7218t07.htm).

33. Jennings (see n.24 above).

34. Oxfam, ‘Yemen: Fragile Lives in Hungry Times', Oxfam Briefing Paper No. 152, 2011, p.4.

35. Laura Rawlings, Lynne Sherburne-Benz and Julie Van Domelen, Evaluating Social Funds: A Cross-Country Analysis of Community Investments, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2003.

36. The 2009 evaluation reported an increase in enrolment rates between 2006 and 2010 of 14 per cent (6 per cent for boys and 27 per cent for girls).

37. Local authorities consist of elected local councils and line ministries offices at the district level.

38. Soniya Carvalho and Howard White, ‘Theory-Based Evaluation: The Case of Social Funds', American Journal of Evaluation 2004 (at: http://lnweb90.worldbank.org/oed/oeddoclib.nsf/DocUNIDViewForJavaSearch/A0E7163ED9E3E43985256BA600563482/$file/Social_Funds.pdf).

39. Egel (see n.10 above).

40. Yemen Social Fund for Development, A Vision for the 5th Cycle, Sana'a: SFD, 2014.

41. Please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yemeni_Civil_War_%282015%29.

42. World Bank Operation Evaluation Department, Social Funds: Assessing Effectiveness, Washington, DC: World Bank, 2002.