Portfolio
Our Projects
Inspiration for Your Next Project
From June 12 to July 14, 2022, 7,240 respondents participated from 20 communities across Montserrado County in the Baseline Study for improving access to finance and digital skills for SMEs in Liberia.
Concerns or questions were focused on online visibility and the impact on firms that are not receiving training, but are closely competing with SBS beneficiaries from the baseline study conducted by the Research and Innovations Hub, partnered with the World Bank Team and the Ministry of Youth and Sports Project Team.
Randomization methodology was used to determine eligible markets; the small number of communities reached by SBS to increase its statistical power, the aim to define a market as a sector-community combination, with the distinction between soap sellers in the community compared to motor vehicle drivers from the community.
From June 12 to July 14, 2022, 7,240 respondents participated from 20 communities across Montserrado County in the Baseline Study for improving access to finance and digital skills for SMEs in Liberia.
Concerns or questions were focused on online visibility and the impact on firms that are not receiving training, but are closely competing with SBS beneficiaries from the baseline study conducted by the Research and Innovations Hub, partnered with the World Bank Team and the Ministry of Youth and Sports Project Team.
Randomization methodology was used to determine eligible markets; the small number of communities reached by SBS to increase its statistical power, the aim to define a market as a sector-community combination, with the distinction between soap sellers in the community compared to motor vehicle drivers from the community.
The Research and Innovations Hub is collaborating with Researchers from the World Bank and Science Po University in Paris, France to evaluate the effectiveness of a cash grant, business training, and business-connectivity intervention on small businesses in Monrovia, implemented by the government of Liberia through the Ministry of Youth and Sports REALISE Project Management Team (PMT). To achieve the above, the Impact Evaluation (IE) will answer two key questions:
- Does an intervention financially supporting small firms help some firms at the expense of other firms?
- Do small firms face information frictions and how does online connectivity help firms overcome them?
To answer these questions, the IE will rely on the randomization of eligible markets, first, after which beneficiaries from eligible markets will be randomly selected. This will allow measuring of spillovers by comparing profits and revenues of non-selected firms in eligible markets (which are potentially affected by spillovers from Small Business Support (SBS)-benefiting competitors) to those from ineligible markets (which are instead not affected by spillovers since they do not compete with Small Business Support (SBS)-beneficiaries). Given the small number of communities reached by SBS, to increase its statistical power, the IE will define a market as a sector-community combination: soap-sellers in community 1, for example, will be a market distinct from motor- taxi drivers from community 1 or, say, soap-sellers from community 2.
The Research Innovations Hub in partnership with the World Bank Group and Vantage Group successfully completed a Business Connectivity Study pilot. The pilot study brings together micro-entrepreneurs to discuss various business topics to share experiences and exchange knowledge. The idea is to see if entrepreneurs can learn from their peers to improve their business operations which will, in turn, lead to more sustainable businesses.
