Ideas to Action

Yagazie Emezi/Getty Images/Images of Empowerment

Yagazie Emezi/Getty Images/Images of Empowerment

To illustrate the application of this agenda to specific development funders, the working group developed detailed recommendations for three key audiences with strong existing foundations for evaluation and evidence use: philanthropies, USAID, and the World Bank.

Ideas draw from working group discussions, additional consultations with experts from these institutions, and background research. Detailed recommendations for each audience can be found in complementary briefs.

Beyond these three specific audiences, development funders should form an alliance or coalition of development institutions committed to evidence generation and use where it is most in need and demand. Collaboration and collective action across organizations and funders will have a more transformative effect than any single organization can offer.

Table 2. Recommendations for a selection of development funders

PHILANTHROPIES USAID WORLD BANK
Key Recommendations for Philanthropies to Invest in a New Era of Evidence-Informed Decision Making to Improve and Save Lives

Key Recommendations for USAID to Mainstream Evidence Use through Locally Led Development

Key Recommendations for the World Bank to Leverage Knowledge Production for Policy Impact

  • Adjust current grantmaking to better meet high-value decision-making needs of lower- income country governments

  • Identify opportunities for shared learning and aligned funding

  • Develop new funding consortia for policy-responsive evaluation
  • Partner with philanthropies on a localization and evidence initiative to systematically support policy-proximate researchers, research organizations, and evidence collaboratives in a set of lower-income countries

  • Structure the new behavioral science and experimental economics unit for maximum impact, including high-value decision-oriented evaluation.

  • Bolster agency capacity through new specialized evidence roles

  • Champion cost effectiveness analysis and cash benchmarking

  • Develop accountability policies and performance metrics to incentivize sustained change

  • Build evidence, evaluation, and cost-effectiveness into the agency’s routine operational policies and guidance
  • Embed impact evaluation and related evidence resources across the Bank’s operational structure and develop sectoral, regional, and country learning agendas

  • Allocate dedicated resources to routinely finance rigorous evaluation

  • Strengthen and centralize tracking and publication systems for data and evidence

  • Develop formal mechanisms to promote evidence-to-policy partnerships, capacity strengthening, and demand generation

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