Scaling poverty solutions with Innovations for Poverty Action

Enormous sums have been spent on poverty reduction over the past fifty years, and for a surprising share of it nobody can say whether it worked. Where good evidence does exist, it frequently fails to reach the officials writing the budget. This program attacks both halves of that problem.

The core method is the randomized controlled trial, which isolates a program's effect from everything else changing in people's lives. Researchers and decision-makers design an intervention together, test it in the field, and then refine it. Promising results are replicated in new contexts, because a program that works in one district may not survive a different set of institutions.

The second half is the one most research organizations skip. Evidence only changes anything if it reaches the people setting policy, in a form they can act on and at the moment a decision is being made. That means sustained engagement with governments and implementers rather than publishing a paper and moving on, and it is where a good deal of the funding goes.

When it works, the leverage is large: a modest research budget can redirect much bigger public programs toward approaches that actually help. The organization doing this is Innovations for Poverty Action.

Canadians giving through Rethink Charity receive an official Canadian donation receipt. If you would prefer your gift to fund direct delivery instead of research, the full list of programs on this platform includes several options.