Impact Evaluation of a Large Scale Female Entrepreneurship Program in Mexico

Last registered on July 18, 2017

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Impact Evaluation of a Large Scale Female Entrepreneurship Program in Mexico
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0001989
Initial registration date
May 21, 2017

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
May 22, 2017, 12:33 PM EDT

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

Last updated
July 18, 2017, 8:19 PM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Primary Investigator

Affiliation
World Bank

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2014-08-01
End date
2018-03-31
Secondary IDs
Abstract
: The purpose of this project is to evaluate an innovative pilot program to improve the performance of female micro entrepreneurs in Mexico. This program is funded by the National Institute of the Entrepreneur (INADEM). The intervention is Mujeres Moviendo México, a program explicitly conceived as a large-scale pilot in five states, as the step before turning it into a national program, and it is implemented by Crea Comunidades de Emprendedores Sociales A.C. (CREA), a Mexican non-for-profit organization focused on providing business training and specialized services to female entrepreneurs in marginalized communities.

Programs targeting micro businesses have become increasingly common in developing countries, particularly because micro enterprises employ a substantial fraction of individuals in these economies (about 47 percent in Mexico) and because the majority of these micro enterprises tend to stay small and have low productivity Many programs aimed at fostering the growth of micro and small businesses have focused on providing credits or offering business and financial training, since access to credit and lack of managerial skills are believed to limit the success of this type of businesses (Bruhn et al. 2011).
The evaluation of this pilot, would provide evidence on an innovative approach to business-trainings, which is a combination of training on “hard skills” (traditional managerial skills) and “soft skills”(personal initiative training, aiming at promoting self-starting behavior, future orientation, and persistence against obstacles, helping entrepreneurs to preserve and gain competitive advantage in order to be one step ahead of competitors). This project will allow to estimate the added value of the “soft skills” approach to traditional business training packages for female micro entrepreneurs.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Iacovone, Leonardo. 2017. "Impact Evaluation of a Large Scale Female Entrepreneurship Program in Mexico." AEA RCT Registry. July 18. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.1989-2.0
Former Citation
Iacovone, Leonardo. 2017. "Impact Evaluation of a Large Scale Female Entrepreneurship Program in Mexico." AEA RCT Registry. July 18. https://www.socialscienceregistry.org/trials/1989/history/19618
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2014-09-01
Intervention End Date
2015-03-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
A short term follow up survey will be applied for between six and nine months after the treatment is completed. The long-term follow-up will be applied to between 18-21 months after the treatment. In the long term follow up as outcome variable of interest for the impact evaluation we will analyze performance measures such as weekly profits, sales, number of clients, number of products, investments, etc. Further, in the short-term follow up we will also analyze impact on management behavior, changes in strategic behavior for setting up prices, using accounting methods, and financial planning.

Finally, as we stratified our sample on the basis of the level of cognitive skills relying on an index which includes education, Raven test and digit span recall test, we will also be able to address the question if the program has higher impact on entrepreneurs with higher potential (i.e. higher skills).
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
This experiment is focused on women who became interested in taking the business literacy training after Mujeres Moviendo México started implementing their trainings. This selected sample is composed by approximately 4000 women from five different states - Ciudad de México, Estado de México, Aguascalientes, Querétaro and Guanajuato -and are representative of the type of women who would benefit from the program if it was expanded at the national level.

All women who approached a center of Mujeres Moviendo Mexico had to complete a survey. After having gathered a group of approximately 50 women, a treatment and a control group were randomly selected balanced between high and low cognitive potential entrepreneurs. In order to classify a women as a high or low potential entrepreneur we created an index using principal components of level of education, a score from a Raven test and a score from a digit span test. Women assigned to the treatment from each stratum are organized so that they take the training simultaneously, which consists of a business literacy (hard skills) and personal initiative (soft skills) program, which lasts 9 to 10 weeks.

In order to measure mid-term effects, we have applied a first follow-up survey for the intention-to-treat and the control group six months after the treatment group of each stratus has completed or should have completed the course. The long-term follow-up which will allow us to measure long-term effects will be applied to each stratum 18 months after the treatment group of that stratum has completed the training program.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
In office by computer using STATA.
Randomization Unit
Firm
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
No clusters.
Sample size: planned number of observations
Between 3000 and 3995.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
1997 control observations and 1995 treatment observations.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
IRB Approval Date
IRB Approval Number

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

There is information in this trial unavailable to the public. Use the button below to request access.

Request Information

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