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Good practice Imported

IDEA Project: Randomised Evaluation of Women's Empowerment in Aquaculture, Northwest Bangladesh

Bangladesh · Rajshahi · See the Bangladesh profile

Evidence: Randomised controlled trial Top 75% 41/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

A 3ie randomised evaluation of WorldFish's IDEA aquaculture project across 551 villages in Rajshahi and Rangpur found income gains came mainly from market forces, nutrition stayed flat, and gender-attitude shifts were mixed.

74 %
Women with independent income-generating activity
9 %
Women with adequate control over productive capital
22 %
Respondents holding equitable gender attitudes
IDEA Project: Randomised Evaluation of Women's Empowerment in Aquaculture, Northwest Bangladesh

Details

Maturity
Pilot
Promoter
WorldFish (CGIAR) / 3ie, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Period
2018-2022
Keywords
fisheries, aquaculture, nutrition, economic empowerment

Context

WorldFish (CGIAR), funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, ran the IDEA project ('Increasing Income, Diversifying Diets, and Empowering Women in Aquaculture') targeting smallholder fish-farming households in northwest Bangladesh from around 2018 to 2022.

Results

A baseline study of 1,653 households found 74% of women engaged in independent income-generating activity and 88% took part in income decisions, yet only 9% had adequate control over productive capital and 4% adequate access to financial services; only 22% of respondents held equitable gender attitudes.

Conclusions

The final 3ie evaluation reported honestly that productivity/income gains were 'driven by broader market forces rather than the project itself', nutrition outcomes 'remained largely unchanged', and shifts in gender attitudes were 'neither linear nor uniformly progressive'.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Medium (€50k–€500k)
Time to results
Medium (1–3 years)
Staffing & skills
WorldFish extension/training staff, independent evaluators (3ie, University of Greenwich, Potsdam Institute)

Conditions for success

  • combined livelihoods and empowerment-index measurement (pro-WEFI) to track intrinsic, instrumental and collective agency

Common failure modes

  • productivity gains attributable more to broader market forces than the project
  • nutrition outcomes largely unchanged
  • gender-attitude shifts were uneven, including backlash

Commonly funded by

Philanthropic / foundation funding

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

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