MEMBER REPORTS

Embedding scaling into evaluation methodology and practice: A call to action

As it faces the current development finance crisis, the development community is looking for diversified funding sources, including domestic resources, private investment, and charitable giving. However, the crisis also demands that we focus intensively on spending the available resources effectively, and in particular that development initiatives are structured to support long-term sustainable impact at scale. This, [...]

The Classroom Revolution: Rewriting Gender Narratives in Punjab at Scale

Consider this: An Indian child spends eight years in school—eight years that have the potential to either reinforce outdated norms or challenge them. For a country like India, ranked 129th on the World Economic Forum’s 2024 Gender Gap Index, these formative years are critical. So, could the solution to gender inequality begin in the classroom?  [...]

Rethinking the Role of Funders in International Development

Speakers  Moderator: Larry Cooley, President Emerits of Management Systems International  Keynote speaker: Dzingai Mutumbuka, Chair of the Association for the Development of Education in Africa  Presenter: Johannes Linn, Senior Fellow at Brookings Institution  Panellists:   Anita Sundari Akella, Director of Impact at Scale at CARE  Matthew Will, Senior Technical Advisor for Adaptive systems at Scale at [...]

DAC Guidance on Scaling Development Outcomes

FOREWORD Too few development cooperation initiatives in low and middle-income countries focus on testing solutions and implementing them on a scale that effectively addresses systemic constraints and sustains a positive impact over time. This is why the practice of scaling has been receiving growing attention in the sector over the past years. Scaling describes the [...]

Breaking Barriers to Scale: Insights from FAO’s Pathways to #ZeroHunger Forum

Figure 1 - Session's digital scribing by Cristoph Kellner   Figure 2 - Mr. Juan Moreno from PROCASUR, Chile At the Science and Innovation Forum on October 18, 2024, FAO’s session entitled “From Start-up to Scale: Pathways to #ZeroHunger” sparked vital conversations on scaling innovation in the agrifood sector. Held at FAO’s headquarters in Rome, [...]

Nutrition in the Next Decade of CAADP: A Nutritional Transformation for African Food Systems

As Africa faces a growing nutritional crisis alongside the challenges of climate change, rapid urbanization, and population growth, the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) is taking a bold step into its third decade with a renewed focus on nutrition. In an ambitious forward-looking prioritization, CAADP’s leaders and member states are increasingly advocating for “nutrition-sensitive” [...]

Digitizing Medical Logistics Management Systems at Scale in India and Indonesia

Countries need to develop digital solutions at scale to manage their health systems Digital solutions and platforms are critical for scaling effective logistics management in health systems globally. This blog summarizes how two countries – with the support of UNDP and other international partners –introduced and scaled digital logistics management systems in India and Indonesia. [...]

Scaling the Centre for Girls’ Education Program in Nigeria: Insights and Lessons Learned

Since 2009 the Centre for Girls' Education (CGE) in Nigeria has made significant strides in advancing girls’ education, particularly in Northern Nigeria, where cultural and socio-economic barriers often hinder educational access. CGE implements community-based interventions aimed at increasing enrollment and retention among girls ages 4-24. The program's holistic approach—incorporating mentorship, scholarships, and community engagement—has fostered [...]

The Urgency of Scaling Biodiversity and Climate Finance – Instruments to Raise Ambitions Exist. We Just Need to Be Bolder

South America is burning. From Brazil – the largest Amazonian country – to Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Surinam, and Venezuela, there are fires everywhere. This year so far, some 30 million hectares (74 million acres) have gone up in flames[1]. That’s an area the size of Italy. Cities as distant as São Paulo (Brazil), [...]

Sparking system change: the role of a catalyst

Over the last 12 years Grand Challenges Canada’s Saving Brains program has invested $70M CAD in more than 140 social innovations to foster early childhood development in the Global South. We have taken a portfolio approach—not every program reaches scale effectively—but taken together our innovators have now reached more than six million people in 39 [...]

Book Talk: Scaling Up Development Impact

About the sessionSpeakersRecordingAdditional ResourcesAbout the session Description This webinar was originally held under by the Center for Global Development (CGD). The view the original post click here.   Today, nearly one billion people lack electricity, more than three billion lack clean water, and 750 million lack basic literacy skills. Many of these challenges could be [...]

Transitioning from Implementer to TA Provider: The Tensions and Benefits of a Necessary Approach to Scale-up through Public Sector Institutions

Introduction It is imperative that the development community move beyond boutique, unscalable program designs towards sustainable scale-up of promising interventions, particularly through the public sector. However, pursuing sustainable scale through the public sector often puts organizations at cross-roads. The transition from direct project implementer to technical assistance (TA) provider, capacitating the government and system to [...]

Reflections on The Messy Middle of Scaling Education Innovations

By Fares Georges Khalil, HundrED The process of scaling up education innovations is of increasing importance to both practitioners and researchers who are interested in education transformation. Without scale, it would be difficult to achieve the SDG 4 goals related to attaining inclusive and equitable quality education and promoting lifelong learning opportunities for all. To [...]

Scaling Actions that Link Smallholder Food Production and Value Chains

By Feed the Future Food Systems for Nutrition Innovation Lab, [email protected] Smallholder farmers, typically characterized by limited resources and production capacities, play a significant role in global food production. However, smallholder farmers in low-income countries face particular challenges that include low productivity, limited access to markets, and disproportionate vulnerability to climate change. There is a […]

Revisiting Nigeria: A Snapshot of the AflasafeTM Market and its Unrealized Potential

According to a 2020 study, aflatoxin contamination levels in maize in Nigeria can be as high as 85.9%, depending on the region. Executive Summary More than 4.5 billion people in developing countries are exposed to aflatoxins, one of the world’s most carcinogenic substances, through their diets. Produced by a group of molds called Aspergillus fungi, [...]

To reach the Sustainable Development Goals and global climate goals we have to scale up the impact of investments

Introduction The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were agreed upon unanimously in 2015 by the United Nations General Assembly and are due to be achieved by 2030. However, progress has been too slow and incomplete, with recent events such as the COVID-19 pandemic and the global economic crisis caused by the Ukraine war further setting back [...]

Localisation and scaling: Two movements and a nexus

Introduction ‘Localisation’ and ‘scale’ – two of the most dominant themes in recent development debates – are born of separate but related frustrations with the legacy and architecture of international development. In localisation’s case, this frustration begins with a rejection of the proposition that the wisdom and legitimacy to shape the destiny of a country, [...]

A concerted push to achieve the SDGs needs a practical scaling approach

Reposted from A concerted push to achieve the SDGs needs a practical scaling approach, 10/5/2023, https://www.brookings.edu/articles/a-concerted-push-to-achieve-the-sdgs-needs-a-practical-scaling-approach/ To achieve the sustainable development goals (SDGs), we need a concerted push to scale In their recent opinion piece, Shameran Abed and Esther Duflo argue that “[e]xtreme poverty cannot be eradicated by relying on piecemeal development programming limited to the [...]

Intermediation in the replication of RUDI

Introduction  In 2004, SEWA in Gujarat established the Rural Urban Distribution Initiative (RUDI), one of its most successful enterprises. RUDI integrates the agricultural value chain, connecting local producers with local consumers to generate employment opportunities for women and retain wealth within rural communities. Women process agricultural raw materials at processing centres (PCs) to make pulses [...]

The Broken Part of the Business Model in Taking Development Outcomes to Scale

It’s as if someone suddenly flipped a switch. Discussions about scale and scaling, previously considered esoteric topics, now appear in almost every conversation about ending poverty, saving lives, or protecting the planet. Whether focused on social enterprise or governmental action, social investment or fortunes at the base of the pyramid, these conversations acknowledge the need [...]

Scaling Up Through Aid-The Real Challenge

Summary At the Gleneagles Summit in 2005, leaders of the G8 group of nations committed to increase aid to poor nations by $50 billion per year. During the same year, in a meeting in Paris, donors promised to coordinate their interventions for more effective delivery. Th ese commitments are now often referred to as the [...]

System-level scaling lessons from the Real-time Scaling Labs

Too often, the complex multistakeholder work of scaling is not captured by typical monitoring and evaluation or research studies, and lessons learned are not systematically documented. In response, in 2018 the Center for Universal Education (CUE) at Brookings launched a series of Real-time Scaling Labs (RTSL) to generate more evidence and provide practical recommendations on [...]

Scaling up in the justice sector. Achieving SDG 16.3: equal access to justice for all

Each year an estimated 750 million people have a justice problem that they are unable to solve (1.5 billion people  over 2 years). The Task Force on Justice and the Hague Institute for Innovation of Law have pointed out that if SDG’s promise of ‘equal access to justice for all’ is to be achieved, low-cost [...]

Ahlan Simsim Scaling Journey Takeaways – the perspective of the originating organization

In 2018, the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and Sesame Workshop came together to support children’s healthy development by pairing mass media resources with service provision through the Ahlan Simsim initiative. Ahlan Simsim aims to ensure that children ages 0 to 8 affected by conflict and crisis in the MENA region are supported by cost effective, [...]

Scaling innovations to accelerate progress towards development and climate goals

The full article was originally posted on the OECD Development Matters site. Limiting global warming to 1.5°C necessitates radical, quick and large-scale transformations, as echoed throughout the IPCC’s 1.5°C Special Report. The same is true for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. To achieve these transformations, we need disruptive, context-fitting, technological and social innovation, and [...]

Scaling up the impact of development and climate interventions

Introduction Over the last 50 years there have been a variety of successful efforts to scale up development interventions to a national, regional and even global level. Among public sector-driven initiatives, China stands out for its systematic scaling approach (eg the Loess Plateau Watershed Rehabilitation Project), as does India with its large-scale rural development and [...]

Fracture points in scaling sustainable development

The case of “evergreening” and carbon restoration The reckoning in 2030 on the Sustainable Development Goals is just around the corner, and once again the mid-term monitoring is a cause for concern. The recently published Sustainable Development Report 2022 comments on slow and steady progress until 2019, followed the previous report by two years without [...]

Evidence Action’s Dispenser for Safe Water doubles in size

“Water treatment is one of the most cost-effective ways to improve child survival.” - Nobel Laureate Micheal Kremer For many years, Evidence Action’s Dispensers for Safe Water (DSW) program has provided over 4 million people in rural Kenya, Uganda, and Malawi with free and reliable access to safe drinking water. Thanks to a remarkable new [...]

How to help them help themselves

Pumpkin Plus Move4Million by combating extreme poverty, hunger & climate change Background Bangladesh has an estimated 1723 square kilometers of newly accreted lands, locally known as char land along the banks of Brahmaputra / Teesta River system in the North and along the southern coastal districts of the country. These transitional char lands in the [...]

Scaling and Systems Change Have to Go Hand-in-hand

The relationship between scaling and systems change has been much debated within the scaling literature over the last few years. Those who focus on systems change, have argued that most scaling efforts are flawed because they ignore or underappreciate the role of systems. Too often they narrowly consider only how to increase the number of [...]