Results Based Financing in Education
We undertook, with Mokoro Ltd., one of the largest pieces of research on the use of results based financing (RBF) in education to date globally. The research was commissioned by the Results Based Financing in Education (REACH) Trust Fund Program, hosted at the World Bank. It focussed on the experiences of using RBF in the education sector in Nepal, Mozambique and Tanzania.
High-level responses to the research…
“The report has relevance well beyond the education Global Practice. It has been a useful stimulant to those of us in other parts of the World Bank who are asking the same questions.”
— Thomas Kenyon, Senior Economist, Operations Policy and Country Services VP, World Bank
“This report should be widely disseminated especially for World Bank teams that would envisage or prepare RBF operations in education.”
— Gael Raballand, Lead Public Sector Specialist, Nairobi, Kenya, World Bank
“The matrix with recommendations and lessons is absolute key value of the report and should be disseminated widely within the Global Practice. It could function as a checklist for our use of RBF.”
— Andreas Blom, Practice Manager, Education, Middle East and North Africa, World Bank
The research
Consortium: Foresight with Mokoro Ltd. and the University of East Anglia.
Client: RBF in Education programme (REACH) trust fund, implemented by the World Bank.
Year: 2019-2021
The research focussed on the use of RBF by development partners to support government education sector development programmes. In Tanzania this included the Education Programme for Results (EP4R), which has been ongoing since 2013; this $416 million programme is financed by the Government of Tanzania, and includes RBF from the UK, Sweden, and the World Bank. In Mozambique, the focus was on the World Bank’s (2014-2018) Mozambique Public Financial Management for Results Program for health and education, as well as RBF used by the Global Partnership for Education (GPE). In Nepal the focus was on the School Sector Development Plan (SSDP), the 2016-2021 strategic planning period, with RBF from the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, GPE, Finland, European Union, and USAID; SSDP objectives included to improve equity, quality, efficiency, governance and management of basic and secondary education.
The research integrated qualitative and quantitative methodologies, with extensive document review, interviews, and regression analysis of a subset of results. The Synthesis aimed to bring together insights from across the three country experiences, and provided a range of lessons and recommendations for the use of RBF in education as well as globally in other sectors.
The reports provide an important evidence base for practitioners in the field and development partners choosing to use RBF approaches (including PbR and others) to incentivise improved results.
The reports
RBF in education: Nepal Report