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Field
Trial Status
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Before
in_development
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After
on_going
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Abstract
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Before
Low-income households in the Philippines lack sufficient access to affordable and resilient housing to protect them from the physical and economic damages brought by increasingly frequent extreme weather events, such as typhoons and floods. We partner with a large microfinance NGO and an NGO focused on housing for low-income households, to evaluate a new housing microfinance product. We will run a 2x2 randomized evaluation that cross-randomizes the education component (versus no education) and the new housing loan terms (versus being offered the old housing loan terms), against a control group. The main outcomes are short-term impacts on perceptions of climate risk and resilience, knowledge and plans for house construction, and other measures of resilience. The study will create new knowledge about how to support low-income households in obtaining housing that is resilient to extreme weather events, which is relevant across a number of developing countries that are vulnerable to climate change.
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After
Low-income households in the Philippines lack sufficient access to affordable and resilient housing to protect them from the physical and economic damages brought by increasingly frequent extreme weather events, such as typhoons and floods. We partner with a large microfinance NGO and an NGO focused on housing for low-income households, to evaluate a new housing microfinance product. We will run a 2x2 randomized evaluation that cross-randomizes a high-touch education component (versus no education) and the new housing loan terms (versus being offered the old housing loan terms), against a control group. The main outcomes are short-term impacts on perceptions of climate risk and resilience, knowledge and plans for house construction, and other measures of resilience. The study will create new knowledge about how to support low-income households in obtaining housing that is resilient to extreme weather events, which is relevant across a number of developing countries that are vulnerable to climate change.
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Trial Start Date
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Before
May 16, 2022
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After
June 20, 2022
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Field
Last Published
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Before
June 19, 2022 10:08 PM
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After
June 21, 2022 01:48 AM
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Field
Intervention Start Date
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Before
May 16, 2022
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After
June 20, 2022
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Field
Primary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
There are four areas of primary outcomes: (1) loan usage, (2) climate resilience of dwelling, (3) climate resilience of households, and (4) economic outcomes such income, expenditure and savings.
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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Field
Primary Outcomes (Explanation)
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Before
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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Randomization Method
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Before
Randomization will be done by computer using Stata.
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After
Randomization done by computer using Stata.
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Field
Randomization Unit
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Before
Randomization will be at the microfinance client-group level (720), stratified by loan officer (70).
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After
Randomization is at the microfinance client-group level (954), stratified by branch (12), by loan officer (70).
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Field
Planned Number of Clusters
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Before
720 microfinance client groups, across 12 MFI branches and 70 loan officers.
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After
954 microfinance client groups, stratified across 12 MFI branches and 70 loan officers.
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Field
Planned Number of Observations
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Before
On average each client group has about 25 clients, so the eligible population has about (720 client groups) x (25 clients) = 18,000 clients. We will obtain administrative data on all of these clients, and mini-survey data on all who agree to respond.
We plan to survey 2000 of these ASA clients, through a phone survey:
-1000 loan takers across treatment arms, where loan takers are successively surveyed as they take up the loans, at least 3 months after they first take up the loan. Once any treatment arm reaches 250 surveyed, we will stop surveying loan takers from that arm.
-500 randomly-selected non-loan takers across treatment groups, evenly selected at 125 per group. These will be surveyed so the survey timing balances with the loan taker group. Since a non-loan taker could later become a loan taker, we will randomly replace any respondents who later attrit from this group by taking up a loan.
-500 randomly selected clients in the pure control group. These will be surveyed so the survey timing balances with the loan taker group.
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After
There are 22,244 clients divided across 954 microfinance client groups, stratified across 12 MFI branches and 70 loan officers. We will attempt to collect the mini-survey and administrative data from as many clients as will consent. For more details on this, and the endline survey sampling, please see the attached analysis plan.
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Field
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
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Before
Each treatment arm, and the control, have 144 clients groups.
This leads to the following number of observations per treatment arm:
Administrative data and mini-survey: up to (144 client groups) x (about 25 per group) = 3,600 per arm.
Phone survey:
-Treatment arms: up to 250 loan takers + up to 125 non-loan takers = up to 375
-Control arm: 500
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After
Each treatment arm, and the control, have about 190 clients groups. For more details on this, and the allocation of endline surveys to treatment arms, please see the attached analysis plan.
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Field
Power calculation: Minimum Detectable Effect Size for Main Outcomes
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Before
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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Intervention (Hidden)
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Before
The interventions to be evaluated are:
1. (i) ASA Philippines’ existing housing loan product, (ii) ASA Philippines’ new housing microfinance product designed to increase climate resilience of borrowers’ households. The product features an increased loan amount and loan term relative to the standard ASA housing loan. The modified loan terms intend to allow families more flexibility to borrow for home improvements based on their needs.
(i) The existing housing loan product has a fixed 12 month loan term, offers up to 50,000 Philipino pesos (PHP) loan size (just under 1000 USD), requires clients to already have an ASA productive microfinance loan.
(ii) The new housing loan product can have a 12 to 48 month loan term (decided jointly by the client, their loan officer, and ASA), offers up to 300,000 PHP loan size (just under 6000 USD), and does not require clients to already have an ASA productive microfinance loan.
2. high-touch consumer education on building resilient houses, designed by ASA in partnership with Habitat for Humanity. The education component trains beneficiaries on materials selection, effective budgeting, and construction basic dos and don’ts. It will be delivered by the loan officer, to the client, and any other close family members involved in the construction project. The focus of the education is on high-touch support once the client decides to take up a loan, rather than generalized training for all clients pre-loan. So it will be timely, adaptive, and customized to the client's own situation.
3. Socialization of the loan products and/or the education component. Each of the 4 treatment arms will receive socialization about the interventions they are receiving (new/old loan products, education). This includes the (old loan, no education) group, which will still receive socialization of the old loan product, which is what distinguishes it from the pure control group, which still has access to the old loan product, but does not receive any new socialization or prompting.
These interventions will be offered to existing ASA clients, all of whom are female micro-entrepreneurs already receiving productive loans from ASA, depending on which treatment arm they are in.
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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Secondary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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Secondary Outcomes (Explanation)
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Before
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After
Please see the attached analysis plan.
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