Impact Evaluation of the SJY Program: a Government-led Scale up of the Graduation Approach

Last registered on July 21, 2022
View Trial History

Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Impact Evaluation of the SJY Program: a Government-led Scale up of the Graduation Approach
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0009729
Initial registration date
July 18, 2022

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
July 21, 2022, 11:46 AM EDT

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

Locations

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

Request Information

Primary Investigator

Name
Esther Duflo
Affiliation
MIT
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Shagun Sabarwal
PI Affiliation
Contact Investigator
PI Name
JyotiPrasad Mukhopadhyay
PI Affiliation
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Sharan M.R.
PI Affiliation
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Abhijit Banerjee
PI Affiliation
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2019-11-20
End date
2025-09-30
Keywords
Other, Welfare
Additional Keywords
Livelihood
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
The SJY scheme is the first large-scale government implementation of a multi-layered livelihoods program (the “Graduation Approach”) with the objective to scale up the program to 1 Lakh ultra-poor households across Bihar. J-PAL SA supports JEEViKA, the Bihar state’s Rural Livelihoods Mission, in their implementation of the Satat Jeevikoparjan Yojana (SJY) program. In addition to evaluating the SJY program, J-PAL SA supports JEEViKA in the scale up of the program through process evaluation research and by strengthening JEEViKA’s data management and use.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Banerjee, Abhijit et al. 2022. "Impact Evaluation of the SJY Program: a Government-led Scale up of the Graduation Approach." AEA RCT Registry. July 21. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.9729-1.0
Sponsors & Partners

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

Request Information
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Under SJY, the local village-based community organization named “Village Organization (VO)”, being promoted by Jeevika, is conducting a community-based participatory targeting process to identify and endorse ultra-poor households. In the next stage, participants of the SJY program will receive consumption stipends and asset transfers through their respective Village Organization, which, together with continuous handholding support of SJY Master Resource Person (MRP) and Jeevika’s ongoing interventions, will constitute a comprehensive graduation package. These steps are conducted over a period of 24 months for a particular beneficiary. Jeevika is already in the process of identifying the ultra-poor households and distributing assets to identified beneficiaries.
Intervention Start Date
2020-12-04
Intervention End Date
2022-07-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Impact of a government-implemented program in the state of Bihar among the ultra-poor beneficiaries on a range of outcomes including: total per capita consumption, food security, asset value, financial inclusion, incomes and revenues
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Physical health, political involvement, and women’s empowerment
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
This is the first time that the graduation approach is being directly implemented by a government body. Implementation of the graduation approach in previous studies was led by local NGOs at a much smaller scale. Whenever a smaller-scale NGO-implemented program is transformed into a government-implemented large-scale program, it is expected that there will be deviations from the original model. However, it is essential to measure and understand how much the scale-up version is deviating from the core processes of the graduation approach. One of the critical challenges faced by Jeevika is to ensure that the implementation of the SJY does not deviate substantially from the underlying principles of the graduation approach. This is why the impact evaluation will be supplemented with a small-scale process monitoring of a subsample of the impact evaluation sample.
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
The randomized evaluation study will randomly allocate panchayats to either the treatment and control group in our study districts/blocks. The randomization will be stratified using secondary data. After randomization, the SJY program will only be implemented by Jeevika in the treatment group.
Randomization Unit
Village level (Gram Panchayat)
Was the treatment clustered?
Yes

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
Clustered at the village level with a total of 131 gram panchayats.
Sample size: planned number of observations
Our planned number of observations is 2743 households with approximately 5600 adults.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
1429 households across 65 gram panchayats
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Institute for Financial Management and Research
IRB Approval Date
2019-12-02
IRB Approval Number
IRB00007107; FWA00014616; IORG0005894
IRB Name
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
IRB Approval Date
2020-09-10
IRB Approval Number
2008000216
Analysis Plan