Mobilizing for the Public Good: A Field Experiment on Community-Driven Development and Waste Management in El Salvador

Last registered on March 08, 2023

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Mobilizing for the Public Good: A Field Experiment on Community-Driven Development and Waste Management in El Salvador
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0010913
Initial registration date
February 23, 2023

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
March 08, 2023, 11:22 AM EST

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Primary Investigator

Affiliation

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Affiliation

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2022-08-25
End date
2023-08-31
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Inadequately disposed waste is ubiquitous in low- and middle income countries, and causes serious environmental and health-related problems. In El Salvador, where streets and public spaces are typically highly contaminated by waste, littering poses a serious public goods problem at the community level. While the standard solution for public goods problems calls for an intervention by an external actor such as the state, a recent strand of literature has studied community driven development (CDD) as a potential alternative. Several studies have experimentally evaluated CDD initiatives, but their effectiveness has never been compared with that of the traditional non-participatory approach.
We will conduct a randomized controlled trial with 120 communities in El Salvador to address that question in the context of the littering problem. Communities will be assigned to either a control group or to one out of two treatments: (1) a top-down intervention where the streets will be cleaned by an external actor, or (2) a bottom-up intervention were a community facilitator is hired to raise awareness and to mobilize for collective clean-ups and a change in social norms regarding littering.
In all communities, we will conduct two types of measurements: (1) photos along the streets that will be evaluated using deep learning, (2) a short survey with a sample of 20 community members We will estimate both the immediate impact and the sustainability of the two interventions.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Coccia, Carla and Martina Jakob. 2023. "Mobilizing for the Public Good: A Field Experiment on Community-Driven Development and Waste Management in El Salvador." AEA RCT Registry. March 08. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.10913-1.0
Sponsors & Partners

Sponsors

Partner

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Traditional intervention (top-down approach): A team of cleaners with a garbage truck visits each community once a month to collect garbage and clean all public spaces. Community members can also use the truck to dispose of their household waste.
Community-driven intervention (community-driven development approach): In each community, a facilitator is hired to organize workshops and activities to raise awareness about the problem and solve it through collective action. The facilitator also coordinates the implementation of clean-up campaigns by community members.

Both interventions have a duration of four months and roughly the same cost.
Intervention (Hidden)
Intervention Start Date
2022-12-01
Intervention End Date
2023-03-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
(1) Waste contamination
(2) Self-reported attitudes, behaviors and perceptions of social norms regarding solid waste contamination
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
Our first primary outcome is waste contamination in all public places within communities, measured through two different approaches:
(a) Image classification: Enumerators take geo-tagged photos every five steps along all streets in all communities. We will then use deep learning to classify the images and construct contamination maps for all communities. For the construction of the maps, the photo assessments will be pooled into approximately 100 cells per community.
(b) Enumerator assessment: Additionally, enumerators make a cleanliness assessment of the environment every 25 steps in all communities, allowing for the construction of a second set of contamination maps based on these assessments.The assessment is done in four categories: completely clean, a bit dirty, rather dirty and very dirty. Example photos are provided for each category.

Our second set of primary outcomes stems from a survey with about 20 villagers per community and captures people's self-reported attitudes, behaviors and perceptions of social norms regarding solid waste contamination in their communities. Outcome variables constructed based on this survey data are: (i) perceived cleanliness of the community, (ii) perceived importance of cleanliness, (iii) descriptive littering norms (share of people reporting to litter and beliefs about share of others who litter), (iv) injunctive littering norms (share of people disapproving of littering and beliefs about share of others who disapprove), (v) littering punishment (share of people reporting to punish littering and beliefs about share of others who punish), (vi) waste disposal practice within households, and (vii) reported willingness to pay for garbage removal.

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
(1) Social capital
(2) Trust in institutions
(3) Living conditions
(4) Safety
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
Our survey also covered items to construct the following secondary outcomes:
(1) Social capital: A set of questions on social capital in the community covering social ties, trust in other community members, solidarity, altruism, membership in organizations, voluntary engagement, and willingness to contribute to community projects
(2) Trust in institutions: Reported trust in community leaders, municipality officials, and central government officials
(3) Living conditions: Perceptions of living conditions in the community
(4) Safety: Perceptions of safety of the community

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
For this study, we selected 120 communities throughout Morazán based on (i) community size, (ii) safety, (iii) the presence of solid waste management problems, (iv) accessibility, and (v) geographical distance between communities to avoid spillover effects. Communities were then randomly assigned to our three experimental groups: (1) a traditional intervention, (2) a community-driven intervention, or (3) a control group.

In all communities, we conduct a baseline assessment prior to the interventions (wave 1), an endline assessment immediately after the interventions (wave 2), and a follow-up assessment four months later (wave 3). The assessments include (1) a contamination assessment and (2) a survey.

(1) Contamination assessment: Based on a detailed manual, enumerators take geo-tagged photos along the streets in all 120 communities. This procedure yields an average of about 540 photos per community for each of the three waves. Within a set distance along the streets, enumerators further make assessments of the overall cleanliness of the environment.

(2) Survey: In each community, a convenience sample of 20 villagers is selected to take part in all three waves of data collection. The survey has a duration of 10--15 minutes and covers questions about (i) attitudes, behaviors and perceptions of social norms regarding solid waste contamination, (ii) social capital within the community (e.g. social networks, trust, solidarity and organizations) as well as perceptions of living conditions and safety, and (iii) socio-demographic background (only baseline). The endline and follow-up assessments will further include questions about involvement in/observation of activities regarding solid waste management. Baseline surveys are conducted face-to-face in people's homes. For the endline and the follow-up survey, we conduct both phone or face-to-face interviews (depending on how each person can best be reached).
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization is conducted by the research team using the software R. Randomization is stratified by contamination level measured during the baseline assessment (terciles) and geographical zone (North, South, Center West, Center East).
Randomization Unit
Communities
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
120 communities
Sample size: planned number of observations
Contamination maps: - 65,000 photo locations, aggregated into approximately 100 raster cells per community (12,000) - 13,000 assessment locations Surveys: - 2400 community members (20 per community)
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Treatment 1, Traditional intervention: 40 communities
Treatment 2, community-driven intervention: 39 communities
Control: 41 communities
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Photo assessment: MDE = 0.13--0.33 standard deviations. Calculations based on the following parameter values: power = 80%; alpha (level of significance) = 0.05; rho (intra-cluster correlation) = 0.1--0.4; R2b (share of between-variance absorbed by baseline scores) = 0.3--0.6; R2w (share of within-variance absorbed by baseline scores = 0.1--0.4; J (number of clusters) = 80, P (share of control clusters) = 0.5; n (observations per cluster) = 100 Survey outcomes: MDE = 0.16--0.35 standard deviations. Calculations based on the following parameter values power = 80%; alpha (level of significance) = 0.05; rho (intra-cluster correlation) = 0.1--0.4; R2b (share of between-variance absorbed by baseline scores) = 0.3--0.6; R2w (share of within-variance absorbed by baseline scores = 0.1--0.4; J (number of clusters) = 80, P (share of control clusters) = 0.5; n (observations per cluster) = 20 Calculations based on formula by Bloom (2007)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Ethics committe of the Faculty for Social Sciences of The University of Bern
IRB Approval Date
2022-08-11
IRB Approval Number
N/A

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials