Document of The World Bank

Report No: 35395

IMPLEMENTATION COMPLETION REPORT(IDA-29420 COFN-04390 PPFI-P9850)

ON A

CREDIT

IN THE AMOUNT OF US$ 12.5MILLION

TO THE REPUBLIC OF

INDIA

FOR A

RURAL WOMEN'S DEVELOPMENT AND EMPOWERMENT PROJECT

February 21, 2006

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CURRENCY EQUIVALENTS

(Exchange Rate Effective Ocotber 15, 2005)

Currency Unit = Indian Rupees Rs. 44.77 = US$ 1

US$ 1 = Rs. 44.77

FISCAL YEARApril 1 March 31

ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

BCC Business Counseling CentresCAS Country Assistance StrategyCPSU Central Project Support UnitDEA Department of Economic AffairsDO Development ObjectiveDPM District Project ManagersDWCD Department of Women and Child DevelopmentGOI Government of IndiaIDA International Development AgencyIFAD International Fund for Agricultural DevelopmentM & E Monitoring and EvaluationMIS Management Information SystemNABARD National Bank for Agriculture and Rural DevelopmentNGO Non-Governmental OrganizationSHG Self-Help GroupSPSC State Project Steering CommitteeSPWG State Project Working GroupWDC Women's Development Corporation

Vice President: Praful PatelCountry Director Michael F. CarterSector Manager Junaid K. Ahmad

Task Team Leader/Task Manager: Varalakshmi Vemuru

INDIARURAL WOMEN'S DEVELOPMENT AND EMPOWERMENT PROJECT

CONTENTS

Page No.1. Project Data 12. Principal Performance Ratings 13. Assessment of Development Objective and Design, and of Quality at Entry 24. Achievement of Objective and Outputs 55. Major Factors Affecting Implementation and Outcome 116. Sustainability 127. Bank and Borrower Performance 138. Lessons Learned 149. Partner Comments 1610. Additional Information 16Annex 1. Key Performance Indicators/Log Frame Matrix 17Annex 2. Project Costs and Financing 19Annex 3. Economic Costs and Benefits 21Annex 4. Bank Inputs 22Annex 5. Ratings for Achievement of Objectives/Outputs of Components 24Annex 6. Ratings of Bank and Borrower Performance 25Annex 7. List of Supporting Documents 26

Project ID: P044449 Project Name: RURAL WOMEN'S DEVELOPMENTTeam Leader: Varalakshmi Vemuru TL Unit: SASESICR Type: Core ICR Report Date: March 2, 2006

1. Project DataName: RURAL WOMEN'S DEVELOPMENT L/C/TF Number: IDA-29420;

COFN-04390; PPFI-P9850

Country/Department: INDIA Region: South Asia Regional Office

Sector/subsector: Other social services (66%); General agriculture, fishing and forestry sector (12%); General water, sanitation and flood protection sector (12%); Central government administration (8%); Health (2%)

Theme: Gender (P); Participation and civic engagement (P); Rural services and infrastructure (P); Small and medium enterprise support (P); Improving labor markets (P)

KEY DATES Original Revised/ActualPCD: 02/13/1996 Effective: 06/27/1997 04/26/1999

Appraisal: 06/15/1996 MTR: 09/15/1999 03/14/2001Approval: 03/27/1997 Closing: 12/31/2003 06/30/2005

Borrower/Implementing Agency: Government of India/Department of Women and Child DevelopmentOther Partners: International Fund for Agriculture and Development

STAFF Current At AppraisalVice President: Praful C. Patel Mieko NishimizuCountry Director: Michael F. Carter Robert S DrysdaleSector Manager: Junaid K. Ahmad Richard SkolnikTeam Leader at ICR: Varalakshmi Vemuru Ashok K SethICR Primary Author: Asta Olesen

2. Principal Performance Ratings

(HS=Highly Satisfactory, S=Satisfactory, U=Unsatisfactory, HL=Highly Likely, L=Likely, UN=Unlikely, HUN=Highly Unlikely, HU=Highly Unsatisfactory, H=High, SU=Substantial, M=Modest, N=Negligible)

Outcome: S

Sustainability: L

Institutional Development Impact: SU

Bank Performance: S

Borrower Performance: S

QAG (if available) ICRQuality at Entry: S S

Project at Risk at Any Time: YesQuality at Entry was rated Marginal.

3. Assessment of Development Objective and Design, and of Quality at Entry

3.1 Original Objective:The Overall Objective of the project is "to strengthen processes that promote economic development of women and create an environment for social change". The specific objectives would be to: (a) establishing women's self-help groups (SHGs) to build members' self-reliance and self-confidence, and to provide them greater access to and control over resources; (b) sensitizing and strengthening the institutional capacity of support agencies in government, NGOs and banks, to proactively address women's needs; (c) increasing incomes of poor women through income generating activities; (d) developing linkages between self-help groups and lending institutions to ensure women's access to credit financing; and (e) improving access to health care, education and drudgery reduction facilities.

3.1.1 Assessment. The Project Development Objective was highly relevant to the general situation of women across the states in India when the project was designed and continues to be. The project was prepared at a time when the Government of India had made attempts to operationalize the concerns for women's equality and empowerment (Seventh Five year Plan), was emphasizing women as equal partners and participants in the development process (Eight Five Year Plan) and was proposing to earmark 30% funds of certain development programs for expenditure on women (Ninth Five Year Plan: 1997- 2001). When the project was being prepared, thrift and credit or self help groups (SHGs) were being seen as vehicles for meeting the expanding need of women for improving access to credit, particularly to small loans to allow them to engage in risk-averse, multi-production strategies and thereby improving livelihoods of their families.

The project was also consistent with the Department of Women and Child Development, Government of India's women-in-development strategy emphasizing: (i) women's increased access to basic amenities and services; (ii) addressing issues of gender bias and social constraints in access and creating an effective demand for services; and (iii) linking economic and social services to enhance effectiveness. The project was consistent with the Bank's India Country Assistance Strategy (CAS), for FY96-98 emphasizing the need to support the government's development policies aimed at reducing poverty, facilitating greater private sector participation, and accelerating human resource development with special attention to gender issues. Furthermore, the FY97 progress report on CAS stressed the need for Bank operations to focus attention on the redressal of gender inequalities to enhance the quality and level of economic development in the country. The project was consistent with the policy changes pursued under the World Bank supported Rural Financial Reform Program which aimed i.a. to expand poverty-reduction activities, especially the SHG linkage program already started by National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD).

The project was also consistent with IFAD's - the co-financier of the project - Strategy for "Economic Advancement of Poor Rural Women" stressing the need for: (i) rural women to organize themselves in order to benefit from economic development; (ii) modification of social attitudes; (iii) enhanced and easily accessible financial services for poor rural women, based upon their own mobilization of savings; (iv) improved social service to contribute to their productivity; and (v) promotion of women's role in development and their control over resources at their disposal.

3.1.2 In the above context, the project was a pilot attempting to tackle some of the factors constraining the concept of SHGs taking root including (i) institutional capacity of governments and nongovernmental agencies to address both the social and economic needs of women; (ii) greater emphasis on self-reliant grassroots organizations such as thrift and credit groups, using a bottom-up rather than a target approach; (iii) provision of access to skills and resources for women, and the use of these for maximizing earnings and contributing to poverty alleviation; (iv) better access to support services like health care, education, child care and drudgery reducing technologies; and (v) social acceptance and support for women being equal partners in the family and community affairs. In spite of being a pilot, the project was ambitious in scale and scope. It was implemented across initially 6 states namely Haryana, Bihar, Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, later on to a total of 9 states including Uttaranchal, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh owing to bifurcation of three project states. It covered 57

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districts - three phases, establishing a total of 17,647 self-help groups against an original target of 7,400. While the design was uniform, the capacity, the critical issues and needs of the various states to implement the program differed widely. The multi-state nature of the project with a Central Unit was important for states like Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Haryana which benefited from central support and cross-learning from other, more advanced states.

3.2 Revised Objective:There was no revision of objectives during the course of the project.

3.3 Original Components:The project consisted of : (a) Institutional capacity building for women's development comprising; (b) Support mechanisms for women managed income generating activities; (c) Mechanisms to access social programs and leverage funds for community assets creation; and(d) Provision of effective project management systems.

(a) Capacity Building for Women's Development (US$ 14 million, 28% of base cost)

The formation of strong and sustainable self-help groups was the primary focus of this component. To facilitate this, the participating agencies were sensitized to gender equity issues, oriented to the self-help group concept and trained in specific skills which they would be required to impart to the self-help groups. Specific activities under this component were :

(i) Establishment of self-reliant women's groups involving a) formation/induction of self-help groups, b) self-help group capacity building, c) formation of new groups with the help of old self-help groups, d) promotion of self-help group clusters and associations, and e) NGO support.

(ii) Strengthen participating agencies to support women's development including a) strengthening implementation capacity of the women's development corporations, b) strengthening the capacity of partner NGOs, and c) sensitize staff at financial institutions to gender issues, participatory management and communication

(b) Women Managed Income Generating Activities (US$ 20,3 million, 40% of base cost)

Economic activities taken up were selected by the women participants from a range of on-farm and non-farm activities, individually or in groups. The uptake of income generating activities were facilitated through access to credit, skill training, technology transfer, technical support and promotion of market linkages, supported by a communications component:

(i) Mobilization of investment funds for income generating activities: The two main sources of investment funds for income generating activities would be members' own equity represented by their savings, and credit from lending institutions. Group members' expertise in credit management, which would determine a self-help group's ability to access funds from lending institutions, would be developed through a step-wise process, including provision of training to self-help groups in credit management.

(ii) Provision of business management and technical support services to self-help group members, including a ) On-farm activities, aimed at consolidating the food and income base of participating women through improved sustainability of land and water conservation measures, followed by introduction of new activities with potential for higher financial returns, and b) Non-farm activities, supporting the contracting of specialized agencies to conduct market studies and techno-economic surveys at village level to develop a menu of options for feasible, location specific, investment opportunities with market potential, based initially on local skills and resources.

(c) Community Assets Creation and Access to Social Programs (US$ 7,8 million, 15% of base cost)

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The project would facilitate group access to social services and assist in leveraging funds for the provision of community health, child care, drinking water supply, sanitation and community halls. Specific activities to be financed under the project were:

(i) Health promotion - where health care was identified as a priority and a gap in services was identified, a community selected person would be trained to promote preventive health care information at community level.

(ii) Child care for working mothers

(iii) Assistance to leverage funds for community asset creation: communities would be assisted to create needed assets such as drinking water facilities, sanitation, multipurpose halls or acquire teaching/learning materials for schools or pre-school groups, according to a set of criteria. A fixed sum of Rs. 60,000 would be provided per natural village to leverage resources from other schemes as well as community contributions, and serve as nuclei of larger community development activities.

(d) Project Management System (US$ 9 million, 17 % of base cost)

The provision for project management complemented the overall institutional capacity building interventions and were directed to the effective implementation of project activities with the support of the comprehensive M & E system. The following was included:

(i) Project management, strengthening the capability of the Department of Women and Child Development of the Ministry of Human Resource Development to support the project through the establishment of a Central Project Support Unit (CPSU). The project would similarly strengthen the capabilities of the state Women's Development Corporations to manage the day-to-day implementation of the project.

(ii) Concurrent Monitoring and Evaluation in view of the pilot nature of the project and the need to benefit from implementation experiences: A comprehensive Monitoring and Evaluation system comprising a computerized project management system, management information system, and concurrent monitoring and evaluation to assess implementation progress, quality of performance and sustainability on an on-going basis.

3.3.1 Assessment. Satisfactory. The components were well related to the Development Objective of the project, spanning a range of relevant activities from mobilization and group formation, capacity building and issue-based training, credit facilitation, mobilization of investment funds to institutional capacity building in government and partner NGOs, changes in policies, and mobilization of public and private sector services. The activities under various components were adequately linked to form a coherent set of interventions. The components incorporated the thinking among the various partners - GOI, World Bank, IFAD and different state Government experiences available at that time. The experiences from this project, other concurrent self-help group-based programs in Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, and the Uttar Pradesh Sodic Lands Reclamation Project which focused on community institutions and women's empowerment, reveal that internal lending and credit facilitation for self-help groups combined with capacity building and marketing information and support result in strengthened household livelihood strategies and improved risk management. The use of an independent agency to assist in the M & E is also essential.

3.4 Revised Components:There was no formal revision of the components. However, following the bifurcation of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh and at the government's request, the project legal documents were amended to include the new states of Uttaranchal, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh as separate legal entities under the project. The closing date of the project was extended in view of the late start of the project and to allow accomplishment of the Development Objective and achieving sustainability. While the components remained unchanged, targets of certain milestones were determined along with each state's declared commitment.

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3.5 Quality at Entry:Marginal. There was a Quality at Entry Assessment undertaken in January 1998. The final report from the assessment rated the overall quality at entry as "Marginal". Some of the other areas that were also rated "Marginal" were (i) the appropriateness of the project approach, the level of complexity, strength of borrower ownership; (ii) project design not adequately accounting for Borrower ownership, financial and institutional issues; (iii) Capacity of the executing agency to implement the project; and (iv) the realism and quality of project implementation plan and the readiness of the first year plan for implementation. Bank Inputs and Processes were rated "Satisfactory".

Though the project was approved by the Board on March 4, 1997, effectiveness could not be declared till April 26, 1999 owing to lack of Cabinet Clearance from Government of India which was received in September 1998. Other reasons for further delay included noncompliance with Conditions of Effectiveness, which required the Borrower to furnish IDA with: (i) the legal opinion of GOI and the project states on the project documents; (ii) a signed contract with the selected monitoring and evaluation agency; (iii) documentation regarding the appointment of several key staff at central and state levels; and (iv) evidence of remittance of first deposits of counterpart funds to each state’s Women Development Corporation. This delay caused considerable loss of momentum in commitment and pace of implementation, leading to slow start-up and disbursement lags and led to the project being declared unsatisfactory both on the progress of implementation and achievement of Development Objective. While these ratings were subsequently upgraded in February 2000, the areas that were rated marginal during the Quality at Entry Assessment, proved to be major obstacles in project implementation. However, early into project implementation and during Mid-Term Review of 2001, these issues were analyzed and certain corrective measures attempted.

4. Achievement of Objective and Outputs

4.1 Outcome/achievement of objective:This ICR does not make an attempt to present a comparison of project achievements across states. The nine states that participated in the project differed from one another in terms of (i) the social and cultural scenarios determining the ease/difficulty of mobilizing very poor women; (ii) poverty levels are incomparable as the poor in one state are better off than even the better off in another state; (iii) different primary focus of states – e.g. social empowerment including fighting son preference (Haryana), economic empowerment (Karnataka and Gujarat); overall empowerment (Bihar and Madhya Pradesh); (iv) different literacy and numeracy skills requiring entirely different strategies for communication and time taken to stabilize institutions; (v) extreme variations in institutional and implementation capacity such as quality of staff, WDC experience with SHGs and women’s empowerment, NGOs and their experience, state of markets, capacity building and training institutes, Universities and other Think Tanks; (vi) considerable variation in the out reach of the banking sector and responsiveness of the bankers to the poor; and (vii) differences in the overall status of service delivery in the individual states reflecting on the availability of basic services to poor women.

This ICR draws on certain key documents including (i) Swa-Shakti. Impact Evaluation Report. prepared by the Lead Monitoring and Evaluation Agency and (ii) In-depth Evaluation of Swa-Shakti Project by International Institute of Development Management Technology (Annex 7).

The overall rating is Satisfactory. The major achievements of the project include: (i) creation of 17,647 against an original target of 7,400 SHGs with a membership of 240,000 women with 79% belonging to vulnerable population groups; (ii) 90% women members could freely articulate their thoughts - opinions, needs, suggestions; (iii) 90 % women reported access to and control over domestic resources like land, house and livestock; (iv) 77% women participated in decision making regarding sale or purchase of movable assets; (v) 9% of SHGs had their members elected to the Gram Panchayats; (vi) average annual incomes of women increased by as much as 100% in nominal terms and 60% in real terms; (vii) dependence on wage labor reduced from 64% to 33% with greater reliance on owner cultivation, animal husbandry and allied activities and enterprises as livelihood options; (viii) 70% groups accessed bank linkages; and (ix) significant increases in access to services - 96% girls were in schools, 96% of eligible

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pregnant women had availed pre-natal care, five fold increase in access to sanitary toilets, etc.

The above stated assessment of the achievement of the Overall Development Objective is made on the basis of the achievement of specific objectives 1-5 detailed below.

DO 1: Establish women's self-help groups (SHGs) which build self-reliance and self-confidence and provide them greater access to and control over resources. Highly Satisfactory. The project has exceeded the original target of 7 400 self-help groups with more than 100%. By project end on an average across the project states, 78% groups report regularity in meetings, maintenance of records and savings; over 80% report awareness of social issues, such as "legal age for girls' marriage" and 89% reported ability to travel outside village for reasons of training, visits, meetings etc. as compared with the baseline of 25%. More than 90% of the women stated access to and control over domestic resources.

The increase of self-confidence among women and their access to and control over various resources have been determined through eleven indicators ranging from 'women being vocal', 'voicing demands' to 'control over income', 'confidence in handling cash' and 'ownership, control over and access to assets'. The project has had significant impact on strengthening group members' self-confidence, awareness of a range of important issues related to women's rights and strengthened their ability to address these both inside their households and in the wider community.

An assessment of the extent of awareness, perceptions and attitudinal changes among the members of self-help groups, has not been possible due to data not being available.

DO2: Sensitize and strengthen the institutional capacity of support agencies (government, NGOs and banks) to proactively address women's needs. Satisfactory. The impact of institutional strengthening is reflected in the sustainability of the self-help group activities, especially those related to financial aspects and the effectiveness of the support provided by the intervenors (Women Development Councils, NGOs and line departments). This is reflected in women's ability to visit banks, their capability to hold meetings in absence of NGO worker, their level of satisfaction, the functional status of Business Counselling Centers and on the maturity of the self-help groups. While these indicators reflect the sensitization and institutional strengthening of the support agencies, they are a function of the self-confidence of the group members, too.

Women members able to visit banks: By project end, 94%-97% of group members were able to conduct financial transactions by visiting banks, with the lowest rating being Chhattisgarh with 77%.

Members capable of holding meetings in absence of NGO worker: Between 83% (phase I) and 91% (phase II and III) of group members were confident in holding meetings without NGO workers present. The lowest ranking was in Jharkhand with 73% (phase II and III districts). Business Counselling Centers: Establishment of Business Counseling centers at block level was one of the major interventions, taken up during the third year of the project. The target set for number of project blocks possessing Business Counselling Centers has been met 100%, again with huge variations among states. Further, among the self-help groups, 15% accessed services from the Business Counseling Centers regularly. Alternative modes of financing (rent and fees) of the Business Counselling Centres are being developed to ensure sustainability of the BCC after project closure, in terms of BBC being handed over to clusters or charging for services. More than 80% of the Business Counselling Centers were established during 2003/04, which was too late for the Business Counselling Centers to prove their viability before project closure.

Group Members' satisfaction level regarding nurturing: Group members' satisfaction with the support and nurturing received from NGOs and banks as well as the guidance received for income-generating activities (IGA) was rated as average by 52% and good by 37%. 11% groups claimed not to have received any support. The support from banks was rated as good' by 30%, as average by 53% and 17% informed that no support had been received. The above ratings indicate an average performance by the

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NGOs with whom the project partnered to support the self-help groups. However, such ratings are not only indicative of actual performance but also of the respondents' expectations to the particular institution.

Clusters: While 1,213 cluster as compared to a target of 1244 were formed, only 5% of these have been able to provide forward and backward linkages to the members (with a variation between 0% and 30% among states). However, 48% of the clusters are performing inter loaning and 27% are accessing benefits from other programs. However, there are huge variations among the participating states for example the number of clusters interloaning raged from 30% in Chhattisgarh to almost 100% in Madhya Pradesh; quite unrelated to the shorter project participation of the three new states Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Uttaranchal.

The sensitization of government to proactively address women's needs is reflected in the fact that several state governments have started self-help group programs based on their RWDEP experiences. Additionally, some of the very weak NGOs from the poor blocks, e.g. in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar, where RWDEP was implemented have built up their capability and capacity and are now involved in implementing many other development projects including World Bank-funded projects.

DO3: Increase incomes of poor women through income generating activities. Satisfactory. The number of members engaged in income-generating activities have reached 77% of target (for non-farm activities) and 74% (on-farm activities) by project end. It is however difficult to asses the impact of project-initiated activities due to the absence of comparable data. Hence, the rating has to be understood in this context, where considerable uncertainty exist about which level of outcomes are caused by project interventions and which are a product of general economic improvement in the project areas, as control groups also have progressed economically.

Targeting: The project has mainly benefited the poor who include landless households (29%), marginal farmers (43%), and small farmer (22%). The self-help group members have also comprised a high proportion of disadvantaged groups with 27% Scheduled Castes, 18% Scheduled Tribes, 11% female-headed households. Participation of larger land owners was insignificant except in Uttar Pradesh (10%), Karnataka (9%) and Madhya Pradesh (7%).

Improved livelihood. Before the project, around 74% of the households were below the poverty line (defined by Government of India (2000) as an average of Rs. 327.56 per capita income) whereas at the time of the Impact Evaluation, 37% of households were below the poverty line. Self-help group members experience improved livelihood opportunities as reflected in both increased savings and incomes of its members. In 2000, 62% used to save regularly growing to 80% of women in 2004 with savings ranging from Rs. 10 to Rs. 100 per month/member. By project end, the total savings generated by the women was Rs. 258 million with members average savings of Rs. 225. 94% of groups are regularly involved in inter-loaning and the ratio of savings to group inter-loaning is now at 1:2.5. By project end, gross amount interloaned was Rs. 615 million and the average loan size per SHG was Rs. 21,973.The target for consumption vs. production loans was set at 30:70 for end of project, and it has reached an average of 36:64 whereas the mature self-help help groups report only 20% consumption loans. Of the total interloaning, Rs. 221.40 Million was used for consumption purposes and nearly Rs. 385 million for productive purposes. There are no comparable data from control villages.

By project end, 103,246 members were engaged in on-farm IGAs and 60,165 members were engaged in off-farm activities. The number of individual IGAs generated by the women were 163,411.As a result, the average annual income per woman engaged in income generating activities/micro-enterprise development has increased from the baseline of Rs. 4,399 to Rs. 7,013 in real terms (compared to an increase from Rs. 4,459 to Rs. 5,556 in real terms in control villages), but with huge variations among the states ranging from around to around Rs. 1,380 in Jharkhand to Rs. 9,500 in Uttaranchal . The average annual income per household has increased from Rs. 20,833 to Rs. 35,737. The overall picture appears to be of generally increased household incomes among both project and non-project villages, and with women in the project households experiencing a limited increase in their average

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share of household income. Variations are seen across states, but within each state, project villages and control villages display very similar developments, with women managing slightly better in improving their relative role as income earner in the household. Similarly, project and control villages display almost identical improvement (5%-7%) in reported equity in food consumption among male and female household members.

The livelihood sources of the households showed a declining trend for wage work both for the women and for the household as a whole in project villages and in control villages, too. The activities which showed declining importance in both project and control villages were share cropping, farm labor, nonagricultural wage labor and forest based activities. A parallel increase in self-employment was found in general across project and non-project villages. This situation is reflected in the fact that women are now able to secure regular wage employment for an average of 9 months per year as compared to 6 months before the project.

The generally improved economic situation of the households is reflected in the increase in average monthly expenditures from Rs. 1130 at baseline to Rs. 1837 at project end, an increase of 62.6% - compared to Rs. 989 at baseline in control villages rising to Rs. 1597, an increase 61.5% .The overall improved economic situation of the households is also reflected in an average of 40% of women having purchased assets from surplus income, whereas it is 90% in UP and 74% in Karnataka.

DO4: Develop linkages between SHGs and lending institutions to ensure women's access to credit financing. Highly Satisfactory. By project end, 95% of self-help groups had established sound financial management practices. The number of self-help groups availing loans directly from financial institutions rose to 97 percent by project end, as a result of focussed attention. The total amount of loans received by 12,256 SHGs from Banks was Rs. 345.6 million through the Cash Credit Limit. 1,991 SHGs mobilized Rs. 32.5 million as Term Loans. A further Rs. 78 million were mobilized from other financial institutions. The credit mobilization ratio was 1:4 in mature SHGs and 1:2 in young SHGs.

Before the project, around 31% to 46% of households (phase I, II and III districts) reported that they were availing loans from money lenders. At Impact Evaluation, only 2% of sampled members in both initial and expanded districts informed that they would turn to money lenders for emergency loans, while 85%-88% received loans from the self-help groups. As a reflection of this, at project start some 32% of sampled households had loans from private moneylenders while this percentage among members now has been reduced to 8.5%, and almost 20% of members have settled their old loans from moneylenders after joining the self-help group. In comparison, the control villages saw a smaller reduction from a baseline situation of 36% of dependent households to 18.3% - but with a slightly smaller amount of money borrowed (average loan of Rs. 12 539 as compared to Rs 14 530 in project villages). Again the variation between states by far exceed the variations between project and control villages.

DO5: Improve access to health care, education and drudgery reduction facilities. Satisfactory. This component picked up very slowly, partly because the guidelines were not properly understood. It is rather difficult to asses the actual impact of the project on a range of the reported improvements, since it covers areas of indirect rather than direct project intervention, with a host of other factors are at play. Furthermore, part of the reporting also reflect increased awareness among members, e.g. resulting in a reported higher incidence of more common diseases like cold.

Health care: 85% members state that they now access appropriate health services as compared to 37% in 2000. Significantly, the number of self-help group members accessing antenatal services has increased from 53% in 2000 to 85% in 2004.

Education: Literacy level remained constant during the project (30%), while changes occurred in functional literacy (increased from 2% to 5%) and the number of women able to sign increased from 4% at baseline to 28% at project end. School enrollment has gone up from 74% at baseline to 93% at project end. This reflects a general pattern as control villages reflect a parallel growth from 67% at baseline to 90% at project end. At baseline 66% of project households spent on average Rs. 80 per month on

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children's education, which by project end had changed to 89% of households spending on average Rs. 194 per month on children's education. In control villages, 56% of households spent at baseline an average Rs. 71 per month increasing to 85%, spending an average of Rs. 141 per month at project end. Hence, both control villages and project villages have seen a substantial growth in household expenditures on children's education, but the growth is clearly higher in project households (142% as compared to 99% in control villages) - but the increase is mainly due to generally improved household economy as percentage of education expenditure to total household expenditure remains largely constant over time and across project and control households (7%-9%).

Drudgery reduction: 49% of members stated they have benefited from drudgery reduction initiatives. A total of 1934 assets were created under the project worth Rs. 75.6 million. Nearly Rs. 36.3 million of this amount was leveraged by the women from other programs. The percentage of project households using biogas or LPG increased from 3.75% at baseline to 12.8% at project end. For control villages the increase was from 1% at baseline to 5.85% at project end.

Interacting with government institutions: The improved access to services is a result of group members having become more vocal and interacting with relevant institutions and agencies to forward their claims: 34% of self-help groups interact with the Panchayati Raj Institutions and 28% with the Block offices to access services and information from line departments, 20% have received benefits from other programs, 9% are office bearers in the Panchayati Raj Institutions as compared to a baseline of 0.7%. The variation between states is significant, partly due to the difference in duration of program.

4.2 Outputs by components:The overall rating is Satisfactory based on the following assessments for the components:

4.2.1 Capacity Building for Women's Development. Satisfactory. The project has successfully established 17,647 self-help groups as against the target of 7,400 covering around 244 000 women from 57 districts in nine states. All the self-help groups have received basic training in constituent concepts of self-help group formation, book keeping etc. About 95 percent of all groups have now been formed into clusters and Karnataka and Bihar have created federation and cluster associations. A total of 1,224 clusters have been formed. 617 of these clusters have been registered as against the target of 492. Over 45 percent of the clusters have a bank account and about 34 percent are inter - loaning. Close to 50 percent are channelizing benefits from other programs and about 255 are providing forward and backward linkages to members. About 50 cluster associations/federations have been formed, of which about 45 have been registered under the appropriate legal provision in each state. 301 Business Counseling Centers have been established and 197 of these have been provided with training. While some of the states have been able to establish Business Counseling Centers as independent entities, in others it appears that the roles of these and of clusters are overlapping. Hence, there is a need to distinguish between the skills, values, practices, statutory norms, accounting policies and day-to-day management imperatives for social and business activities.

4.2.2. Women Managed Income Generating Activities. Satisfactory. A total of 93 055 members (72% of original target) have received training in usable skills which is around 38% of actual self-help group members, but with a huge inter-state variation from 19% in Jharkhand, 23% in Haryana to 59% in Karnataka. States like Bihar (51%), Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh (56%) are doing well, while Jharkhand, Gujarat (31%), Haryana, Chhattisgarh (31%), Uttaranchal (27%) and Uttar Pradesh (35%) are performing poorly in this respect. Some 36%-38% of members trained in income-generating activities initiated such activities after the training. While the coverage of skills-based training is fairly good, this component seems to have suffered from the lack of linkage between skills training and support and guidance in how to prepare, plan and implement income-generating activities. Linkage to market and marketing surveys have also been missing. The overwhelming risk is to train the self-help group members in skills, which they are not able to use or that they initiate income-generating activities without proper assessment of the economic soundness of an enterprise. This will be counter-productive and constitute both an economic and motivational risk for the involved women. A reflection of this lack of linkage is i.a. the comparative low increase of income generated from these activities.

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A total of 136,074 women are involved in Micro Enterprise Development of which 85,779 are on-farm and 50,295 are off-farm activities. Business development plans have been prepared for 17% of the groups, and Business Counselling Centers have been established in 192 Blocks out of 335. 4.2.3 Community Assets Creation and Access to Social Programs. Satisfactory. A total of 14 743 self-help groups (around 80% of actual number of self-help groups) have channelized benefits from various programs namely literacy, sanitation, health , forestry and so forth. The number of self-help groups which have channelized benefits from other programs have reached 78% of the target - with Haryana being the weakest performer reaching only 47% of target. 1 093 self-help groups (less than 20%) have benefited from community asset creation, which has helped women to meet some of their basic needs and create some sense of ownership in the community. Assets such as bathrooms, meeting halls, hand pumps, drains, soak pits and check dams have been created. 15% of groups have adopted drudgery reduction measures.

4.2.4 Project Management System. Unsatisfactory.The Project has suffered from weak management throughout the project duration, such as problems of recruitment of staff at state level, frequent turn-over of staff and delays in filling key post at state level, delays in getting clearances, lack of coordination with the Lead Training Agency and poor understanding by the Lead Training Agency of its role. Bureaucratic procedures further slowed down progress, e.g. that all files have to be passed through the Department of Women and Child Development's Finance Department.The bifurcation of the states furthermore added the challenge of building capacity in the new states to implement the program, which have resulted in differing degrees of success. The financial management performance also remained weak throughout the life of project - partly on account of the inability of the CPSU and the States to appoint and retain qualified accounting staff, which also caused less than optimal use of the computerized project financial management system developed at the start of the project. Financial reporting remained weak and while audit reports continued to highlight weaknesses in the accounting and internal control functions, inadequate follow-up actions taken by the implementing units meant that corrective actions were not taken in a meaningful manner or on a timely basis.

4.3 Net Present Value/Economic rate of return:Not applicable. Given the multifaceted nature of the project, many of the benefits are not readily quantifiable.

4.4 Financial rate of return:Not applicable.

4.5 Institutional development impact:4.5.1 The project has been instrumental in introducing moderately substantial changes with regard to the user communities, planning and implementation processes and public institutions as well as introducing key policy changes. Formation of women's self-help groups has contributed strongly to the expansion of economic roles for women, strengthened their decision making role in the household and local community, and led to diversification of income sources along with a reduction in their dependency on informal sources of credit. Experience with RWDEP has triggered changes in the National Women's Empowerment Program currently being implemented across all 25 states, which the DWCD and Government of India intends to redesign on the RWDEP model and the Government of India has requested World Bank support in this. States like Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are implementing and to some extent Bihar is designing livelihood programs with women's empowerment as the foundation. However, the project states, other states and the Government of India need to not only support groups formed under the project but substantially scale-up the model to reflect institutional development impact.

4.5.2 An assessment of the maturity of sampled groups indicates that 10 percent of the groups are highly mature, while another 70% of the groups are mature enough to sustain themselves after project-end. Only 20% of the groups need further support. About 97% of all groups have been formed into clusters, and in some states federations and cluster associations have been established. Clusters are providing support to the self-help groups by facilitating credit linkages, financial intermediation, social

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intermediation, technical support and so forth. Seven states, excluding Gujarat and Chhattisgarh, have decided to provide an additional two years support to the clusters to ensure more effective performance.

5. Major Factors Affecting Implementation and Outcome

5.1 Factors outside the control of government or implementing agency: (i) Considerable variation across participating states in prevailing socio-cultural situation, women's status, levels of poverty and rallying points for mobilization. These differences have during the project required increased flexibility of project planning to respond to the needs of the individual states i.e. Gujarat and Karnataka wanted to start with economic activities three months after SHGs formed, Haryana wanted inputs on social empowerment, while Bihar and Madhya Pradesh were keen on investing in group formation and internal lending for meeting critical needs of members. The project therefore had to move away quickly from a uniform design and sequence of activities and bring expertise on emergent needs. (ii) Shortage of credible local NGOs. The shortage of credible NGOs delayed implementation in certain areas. However, the projects strategy of identifying and building capacity of smaller committed NGOs resulted in effective implementation. A number of these NGOs are now involved in the implementation of many Bank-funded projects across different project states.

(iii) Frequent turn-over of bank officials led to dissipation of project investments in sensitizing Bankers towards the needs of the poor, which delayed achievement of project goals.

(iv) Lack of technical and institutional expertise and capacity to respond to project needs. In a number of states, the quality of expertise available was poor which impacted the progress of the project. Poor network of Banking system, absence of capacity building institutes, credible M&E agencies, active private sector, all impacted the pace of the project.

5.2 Factors generally subject to government control:(i) Delays from the beginning.The Board approval took place in March 27, 1997, but the Government of India did not get the final Cabinet approval to sign the project agreement until September 14, 1998. This was followed by delays in meeting conditions of effectiveness,the main point of which was signing of a contract with an independent agency for Monitoring and Evaluation. The date of effectiveness was extended twice, until the project finally was declared Effective on April 26, 1999. While the project should have been launched in 1997, it only became operational in 1999 due to delays in appointment of staff in SPMUs and particularly in DPIUs.

(ii) Establishment and inclusion of the three new states of Jharkhand, Uttaranchal and Chhattisgarh halfway through the project necessitated an amendment of the project legal documents whereby the new states were included as separate legal entities under the project with their own legal, administrative, implementation, cost and accounting structures. Limited institutional capacity and lack of specialist resource agencies further hampered project implementation.

(iii) Insufficient delegation of authority to state level implementing agencies (WDCs) and unclear division of roles and responsibilities among different project partners slowed down project implementation in the beginning. The In-depth Evaluation of Swa-Shakti Project (Sep. 2005) conducted by International Institute of Development and Management Technology for the Department of Women & Child Development pointed out that the Central Project Support Unit (CPSU) did not become a fully autonomous unit under the Ministry of Women & Child Development, and neither was it conceived as an independent registered society nor was it part of the National Institute of Public Corporation and Child Development. The report sums up that the "....concept of institution development remained elusive and strategically missing at every level. ."

(iv)) Absence of staff. Project management has been unsatisfactory during most of the project, notably due to absence of staff in management and coordinating positions in several states and at the Central Support Unit, which jeopardized the overall achievements of the project. The absence of staff also

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caused insufficient monitoring of performance resulting in activities like training, inter-organizational dealings being less productive than would otherwise have been the case.

(v) Uncompetitive salary structure. The government salary structure inhibited the recruitment of sufficiently qualified staff.

(vi) State level WDCs. The state Women Development Corporations functioned poorly from the beginning and the plans for restructuring and professionalizing them met with limited success.

(vi) Hurdles in releasing funds from Government of India to the states and from the states to the NGOs were also affecting implementation.

5.3 Factors generally subject to implementing agency control:(i) Lack of mutual understanding and trust between DPIU and NGOs was reported from several districts, impairing the concept of partnership which was an essential ingredient in the project.

(ii) Delays in implementation of drudgery related activities, which involved more than one organization and the procedures were considered cumbersome,affecting the project performance and outcome.

(iii) Frequent turn-over of staff including lack of stability in leadership, affected project momentum .

5.4 Costs and financing:Total project costs at appraisal was estimated at SDR 13.5 million of IDA credit later revised to SDR 8.427 million and SDR 13.3 mill of IFAD loan, later revised to SDR 8 mill. Disbursement has been 79.58% of the revised principal, thus leading to a saving of IDA credit of SDR 1.7 million. Savings out of the IFAD loan are at SDR 1.531 million. The total project cost at closure were SDR 12.9 million .

6. Sustainability

6.1 Rationale for sustainability rating:The overall rating for the probability of maintaining project achievements is Likely, based on the following considerations:

(1) About 85% of the self-help groups are self-sustainable as they are able to conduct regular meetings and manage savings, repayment and interloaning. The far majority of self-help groups (80%) are federated into clusters parallel with a gradual phasing out of NGO support, as the clusters will assist the self-help groups in credit linkages, financial intermediation, linkage to government line departments and technical support for livelihood and retailing.

(2) The widespread appreciation of the project's benefits by women, rural communities, the Department of Women and Child Development has created a commitment to sustaining project achievements. This is reflected in the fact that all states, with the exception of Gujarat and Chhattisgarh, have decided to provide an additional one year of support to the self-help group clusters in order to ensure their effective performance, and the Department of Women and Child Development, Government of India is following up with all states on these arrangements. The commitment to the self-help group model is also reflected in the Government of India's request to the World Bank for support for a National Women's Empowerment Program based on the Project promoted Women's Self Help Group model.

(3) The emphasis of the Income Generating Activities/Micro-Enterprise Development component of the project has been on developing capacity in grassroots institutions through training and support, reducing a large number of women's dependency on labor as their main source of income. The IGA/MED has resulted in the establishment of several enterprises, formation of partnerships with partners ranging from unorganized, local private sector to organized private sector, specialized NGOs, banks and

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government departments.

6.2 Transition arrangement to regular operations:Following the closure of the Loan/Credit, Government of India is following up with all states to arrange for an additional two years of support to the clusters in order to ensure their effective performance.

7. Bank and Borrower Performance

Bank7.1 Lending:Moderately Satisfactory. The Bank provided valuable assistance to the borrower and the implementing agency through frequent and detailed consultations during the duration of the project. Apart from ensuring that the project was consistent with national and state priorities and the Bank CAS, the dialogue also resulted in relevant lessons from other Bank and IFAD funded projects being incorporated into the design. However, greater emphasis could have been paid to issues related flexibility in design to accommodate considerable variation among project states, better assessment of Borrower ownership and institutional capacity issues, which did prove to be bottlenecks in project implementation.

7.2 Supervision:Satisfactory. Bank supervision played a key role in assisting the borrower and implementing agency, and guiding the project in various stages of implementation. The project had a slow start with disbursement well below target. Supervision of a six-state and then a nine-state project was a challenge for the Bank’s Task Team. Some of the crucial factors that determined the pace of implementation in the different states were: (i) presence of qualified staff; (ii) institutional capacity of the Women’s Development Corporations to implement the project; (iii) availability of quality NGOs and other partner organizations - capacity building, communication development, agriculture universities; (iv) the banking sector network and the sensitivity of the Bankers to the Micro finance needs of poor women; and (iv) the development of the market and the private sector entrepreneurs.

Despite a slow start to the project, Bank supervision teams worked closely and intensively with the State Project Management Units to eventually implement the project very successfully. The supervision brought to the project: (i) visit to all the state program in a year covering at least 50% of the project districts to encourage states and also provide requisite on-site assistance and advise; (ii) bring in critical technical inputs to meet emergent needs; (iii) proactive resolution of problems between the centre and the state units during missions and otherwise and by participating in the monthly Project Directors meetings ; (iv) development of the Monitoring and Evaluation framework by bringing in technical expertise to work with the project staff and the external Monitoring and Evaluation agency; (v) encouraging greater flexibility in implementation thus enabling different states to capitalize on their strengths and innovate; (vi) creating, nurturing and supporting platforms for inter-state learning and sharing through a two-day meeting during every mission with all states and central unit on key project interventions of mobilization strategies, group processes, income generation activities, bank linkages, communication strategies, interaction and convergence with line-departments, etc.; and (vii) concerted effort to share project strategy, products and outputs with other similar efforts at national and individual state-levels to enhance the spread of the project model. This continuous exchange of experiences and lessons-learned enabled the project to end up with a majority of states performing “extremely well” and others doing “well”.

7.3 Overall Bank performance:Satisfactory

Borrower7.4 Preparation:Satisfactory. Setting aside the procedural delays that led to delayed effectiveness, the overall performance of the Borrower during preparation was satisfactory. The project was based on the positive experiences regarding women's empowerment and the proposal was formulated in consultation with the

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project states, implementing agencies, NGOs and, Department of Economic Affairs and IFAD/IDA. Before the actual launching of the project, some pre-project activities were undertaken in different areas, including engagement of some technical and support people, survey of the area, identification of prospective beneficiaries and so forth.

7.5 Government implementation performance:Unsatisfactory. Project has faced problems in recruitment of staff and frequent staff turn-over throughout the project, and Project Management was rated as Unsatisfactory in the early stages of the project. The absence of staff in management and coordinating positions in several states and at the Central Support Unit hampered the overall achievements of the project. There was initially insufficient delegation of authority to state level implementing agencies and unclear division of roles and responsibilities among different project partners. Financial management performance remained weak throughout the project with weak financial reporting, internal control functions and inadequate corrective actions taken.

7.6 Implementing Agency:Satisfactory. In the initial stages, the project was lagging behind in implementation, but gradually built up both in terms of competence and commitment. During the one year extension period, the milestones were exceeded by all states.

7.7 Overall Borrower performance:Satisfactory

8. Lessons Learned

The greatest strength of the project has been in mobilizing poor rural women, facilitating their organization in self-help groups, providing a range of training and exposures which altogether has had tremendous impact in terms of creating self-confidence, awareness of a range of social and gender related issues among the participating women, greatly increasing their mobility and capability to initiate action both jointly and vis-à-vis local institutions in order to improve their living conditions.

Behind this overall achievement, there are a number of lessons learned:

Institutional

Long-term commitment at the Central and state levels ensure the long-term sustainability of project outcomes and impacts. The commitment at both the levels needs to be reflected in maintaining a well-staffed project management unit, stable leadership, timely flow of funds and prevent/ limit frequent change in management and turn-over of staff.

In a multi-state project, clearly defined functions and responsibilities of the Central Hub and the individual states are necessary for successful implementation. The value of clearly defining roles, proper delegation of authority and building in adequate autonomy is critical. The Central Hub provides handholding support to states with lower capacities to catch up but then move into facilitating mode when the threshold capacities have been achieved. The Hub also has an important responsibility in setting up the Monitoring and Evaluation systems, facilitate regular monitoring of progress and sharing of both successful and failed experiences and competencies across states.

Mapping and assessing the expertise and capacities of partner organizations for implementing/supporting different project objectives is critical. Identifying and building the capacity of NGOs for project implementation in especially poorer and remote areas where NGO presence is almost absent, is important. The value of co-opting multiple stakeholders through project preparation and implementation is critical for not only better implementation of project components but also for helping community organizations build long-term relationships beyond project life. The

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learning from the project was that while NGOs were competent in community mobilization and institutional development they were not able to support income generation activities. On the other hand unorganized, local private sector actors proved to be good partners and resource persons for economic activities, but were neither concerned nor had the capacity for social mobilization. Organized private sector partners likewise were useful in linking rural communities to external markets, processes and technologies. Certain specialized NGOs provided useful training and capacity building inputs. In several cases, sensitive or sensitized bankers and government officials provided valuable inputs and support.

To assist poor move out of poverty it is critical to sensitize various government line departments to the needs of the poor and to SHGs and Clusters as platforms of the poor. Projects make critical investments in mobilizing and capacity building of the poor, however, investments to meet their needs for basic services and facilities should be leveraged from existing projects and schemes, which are already meant for the poor. The SHG platform along with sensitive public service provision is essential for poverty reduction.

Under the project, SHGs of the poor and their Clusters have emerged as important platform for various public sector providers and private sector entrepreneurs to both deliver services and seek partnerships. Facilitating this convergence has been critical for the improvements in the quality of life and increase in chances of the poor coming out of poverty. The factors which were instrumental in promoting convergence for channeling benefits from other development programs to the self-help group members was a comprehensive and systematic approach incorporating: (i) proper orientation of field functionaries; (ii) sensitization of line departments; (iii) active involvement of clusters; (iv) orientation of the counselors at the Business Counseling Centers; and (v) participation of District Project Managers of the Women Development Corporations in the district-level review meetings for updating knowledge of the ongoing development programs in the district and to advise partner NGOs to initiate action to channel benefits.

Operational

Providing women the capacity and opportunity to overcome social barriers at household and community level, and share their concerns and aspirations, is a powerful entry point for social mobilization. Using this concept of social empowerment as point of entry in group formation has been an important vehicle for the self-help group approach. Access to information, knowledge and awareness of their legal rights, of the programs and benefits they can avail, as well as of the responsibility of various service providers, have had remarkable impact on the status and position of women. Increased physical mobility and ability to act in the public domain has enabled women to demand for better services, approach line departments and the PRIs to benefit from programs and schemes, influence the functioning of the school and health facilities in their villages, link up with Banks to get loans, and enter the market and set-up transactions.

Due recognition and importance to basic group processes - both social (dealing with violence, discrimination) and business (records maintenance, decision making, financial discipline); are critical for not only strengthening the foundation but also enabling SHGs to access facilities like credit from other institutions.

Financial management capacity and financial discipline through Internal lending in self-help groups without dependence on subsidized credit, is critical for SHGs to link with banks, access credit and maintain good repayment rates. Under the project, this approach has resulted in a gradual but more sustainable outcome, where the consolidation of self-help groups and the federating into clusters have proven itself as a viable exit-strategy, eliminating dependence on NGO facilitation.

The need to support awareness raising and skills training among women with support in marketing and business development. While capacity building and improved access to market

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information lead to diversification of household livelihood strategies and improved risk management, increased and more professional support and guidance in terms of market analysis, marketing and business development is required to ensure more comprehensive economic impact at household level.

Facilitating the emergence of Support Organizations during project implementation. The development of local institutional support ‘nodes’ is very critical so that the poor can benefit from these for inputs like social issues, communication, logistics (for example, collective procurement, distribution, storage), information flow, and accumulation of capacities on various livelihoods, beyond the project period. Assistance to critical Support Organizations to emerge and stabilize in order that the poor could get continuous support - even on a payment basis, beyond the project period would be necessary to sustain social, political and economic empowerment.

Simplicity of Pilot Projects. Pilot projects should not be very ambitious in their scope and should be designed to be focussed and targeted without compromising on their basic principles of targeting in poor and remote areas and working with marginalized sections.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Robust monitoring and evaluation systems that provide critical information on the process and outputs and outcomes are the basics for any project to learn as it is implemented. The setting up of proper baselines preferably during preparation or not later than six months after effectiveness, and undertaking meaningful Mid Term and End line Assessments offer a wealth of information for all stakeholders in a project but also to practitioners in general.

In addition to a Project Implementation Team, a dedicated cell within the Nodal agency vested with the responsibility of undertaking cutting edge research and analysis, respond to emergent issues during implementation, provide quality control support and also facilitate greater internal learning for the Nodal agency is necessary. A major reason for the successful performance of the project vis-à-vis the Governments' own program was a dedicated project implementation team. A dedicated cell within the Nodal agency would have facilitated quality and internal learning. A clear learning is that this does not happen otherwise by itself and needs to be designed.

In conclusion, based on the lessons it is clear that replication beyond project area by the Centre and the State Governments is very critical for scaling up of the model to benefit a much larger needy population. The project model was replicated by the National Government through the "Swayamsiddha" program with a much wider reach beyond the project states and districts. Further individual states have replicated the model with their own funds beyond project districts. This is a reflection of both the success of the project model but also the commitment of the National and state governments involved.

9. Partner Comments

(a) Borrower/implementing agency:The “Borrower’s Evaluation Report”is provided as an attachment. Borrower’s comments are generally in

line with the Bank’s assessment of the project as given in this ICR.

(b) Cofinanciers:IFAD, the co-financiers for the project, have conveyed their agreement with Bank's assessment of the project and have no major objections to the assessment.

(c) Other partners (NGOs/private sector):

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Not available

10. Additional Information

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Annex 1. Key Performance Indicators/Log Frame Matrix

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Key Objectives Output Outcome Indicator Value Indicator Value (i) Establishment of Women Self Help Groups to build member’s self –reliance and Self Confidence

(i) Number of Self Help groups formed (ii) Average membership per SHG (iii) Total membership (iv) Number of Clusters formed

17,647 14 240,000 1,213

(i) Groups with Regular Meetings (ii) Average attendance (iii) Volume of savings (iv) Average individual saving (v) Gross amount inter-loaned (vi) Average value of Bank Loans (vii) Repayment rates (viii) Confidence of holding meetings without assistance (ix) Confidence of undertaking financial transactions by themselves (avg) (x) Groups with members elected to Panchayats

80% 80% Rs. 258 Million Rs. 225 Rs. 615 Million Rs. 21,973 99% 91% 97% 9%

(ii) Sensitizing and Strengthening the institutional capacity of support agencies in government, NGOs and Banks

(i) Number of sensitization program undertaken

674 (i) Number of groups linked with government programs during the project (ii) Number of groups linked with NGO programs during the project (iii) Number of SHGs with Sound Financial Practices

14,404 5,278 16,764

(iii) Increasing incomes of poor women through income generating activities

(i) Number of Business Counseling Centres established (ii) Number of Business Counselors trained (iii) Number of members received usable skills

333 335 97,422

(i) Proportion of loans used for IGA versus Consumption purposes (ii) Increases in income from IGA – annual average (iii) percentage of members with access to and control over domestic resources

66: 34 Rs. 8, 766 (nominal) Rs. 7013 (real) 90%

(iv) Developing linkages between slef help groups and lending institutions to ensure women’s access to credit financing

(i) Number of SHGs linked with Banks for CCL (ii) Amount of loan mobilized through CCL (iii) Number of SHGs linked with Banks for Term Loans (iv) Amount of loan mobilized though Term Loans

12,256 Rs. 345.6 Million 1,991 Rs. 32.5 Million

(i) Credit Mobilization ratio (ii) Number of members engaged in on-farm IGAs (iii) Number of members engaged in

1:4 mature SHGs and 1:2 young SHGs 103,246 members 60,165 members

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Annex 2. Project Costs and Financing

Project Cost by Component (in US$ million equivalent)AppraisalEstimate

Actual/Latest Estimate

Percentage of Appraisal

Component US$ million US$ millionInstitional Capacity Building for Women's Development 3.40 3.82 112.4Establish Support Mechanisms for Women Managed Income Generating Activities

8.98 3.05 34

Establish Mechanisms to Access Social Programs and Leverage Funds for Community Assets' Creation

2.49 0.84 33.7

Provide Effective Project Management System 3.54 1.65 46.6

Total Baseline Cost 18.41 9.36Total Project Costs 18.41 9.36

Total Financing Required 18.41 9.36

Project Costs by Procurement Arrangements (Appraisal Estimate) (US$ million equivalent)

Expenditure Category ICBProcurement

NCB Method

1

Other2 N.B.F. Total Cost

1. Works 0.00 0.00 5.79 0.00 5.79(0.00) (0.00) (5.51) (0.00) (5.51)

2. Goods 0.00 2.51 5.90 0.00 8.41(0.00) (2.32) (5.67) (0.00) (7.99)

3. Services 0.00 0.00 22.78 1.12 23.90(0.00) (0.00) (22.78) (0.00) (22.78)

4. Miscellaneous 0.00 0.00 27.33 0.21 27.54(0.00) (0.00) (4.46) (0.00) (4.46)

5. Miscellaneous 0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

6. Miscellaneous 0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

Total 0.00 2.51 61.80 1.33 65.64(0.00) (2.32) (38.42) (0.00) (40.74)

Total for IDA, GOI and COF

Project Costs by Procurement Arrangements (Actual/Latest Estimate) (US$ million equivalent)

Expenditure Category ICBProcurement

NCB Method

1

Other2 N.B.F. Total Cost

1. Works 0.00 0.00 1.92 0.00 1.92(0.00) (0.00) (0.38) (0.00) (0.38)

2. Goods 0.00 0.14 1.32 0.00 1.46(0.00) (0.07) (0.63) (0.00) (0.70)

3. Services 0.00 4.31 8.90 0.00 13.21(0.00) (2.02) (5.00) (0.00) (7.02)

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4. Miscellaneous 0.00 0.00 6.34 0.00 6.34(0.00) (0.00) (1.28) (0.00) (1.28)

5. Miscellaneous 0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.22(0.22)

0.00(0.00)

0.22(0.22)

6. Miscellaneous 0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

0.00(0.00)

Total 0.00 4.45 18.70 0.00 23.15(0.00) (2.09) (7.51) (0.00) (9.60)

1/ Figures in parenthesis are the amounts to be financed by the IDA Credit. All costs include contingencies.2/ Includes civil works and goods to be procured through national shopping, consulting services, services of contracted staff

of the project management office, training, technical assistance services, and incremental operating costs related to (i) managing the project, and (ii) re-lending project funds to local government units.

Project Financing by Component (in US$ million equivalent)

Component Appraisal Estimate Actual/Latest EstimatePercentage of Appraisal

IDA Govt. CoF. IDA Govt. CoF. IDA Govt. CoF.Institional Capacity Building for Women's Development

3.40 0.21 3.25 3.82 0.33 3.30 112.4 157.1 101.5

Establish Support Mechanisms for Women Managed Income Generating Activities

8.98 8.44 3.05 2.45 34.0 29.0

Establish Mechanisms to Access Social Programs and Leverage Funds for Community Assets' Creation

2.49 0.26 2.38 0.84 0.23 1.25 33.7 88.5 52.5

Provide Effective Project Management System

3.54 3.19 3.24 1.65 3.28 1.48 46.6 102.8 45.7

Total 18.41 3.66 17.31 9.36 3.84 8.21 50.8 104.9 47.4Surrendered 7.33 7.66 0.0 0.0Disbursement against revised project costs

12.50 3.66 11.34 9.36 3.84 8.21 74.9 104.9 72.4

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Annex 3. Economic Costs and Benefits

Not analyzed.

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Annex 4. Bank Inputs

(a) Missions:Stage of Project Cycle Performance Rating No. of Persons and Specialty

(e.g. 2 Economists, 1 FMS, etc.)Month/Year Count Specialty

ImplementationProgress

DevelopmentObjective

Identification/Preparation02/13/1996 9 TASK TEAM LEADER (1),

SOCIAL DEVELOPEMNT (2), PROCUREMENT (1), AGRICULTURIST (1), ECONOMIST (1), POVERTY AND SOCIAL POLICY (1), FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1), LOGISTICS (1)

Appraisal/Negotiation06/24/1996 12 TASK TEAM LEADER (1),

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (2), PROCUREMENT (1), AGRICULTURIST (1), EDUCATION (2), HEALTH (1), ECONOMIST (1) POVERTY AND SOCIAL POLICY (1), FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1), PROCUREMENT (1)

11/30/1996 8 TASK TEAM LEADER (1), LAWYER (2), SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (2), HEALTH (1), POVERTY AND SOCIAL POLICY (1), FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1)

07/22/996 4 TASK TEAM LEADER (1), SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (1), ECONOMIST (1), AGRICULTURIST (1)

Supervision01/31/1999 3 TASK TEAM LEADER (1);

PROCUREMENT (1); LAWYER (1)

U U

10/30/1999 7 MISSION LEADER (1), SOCIAL (1); FINANCIAL MGMT (1); PROCUREMENT (1); PARTICIAPTORY PROCESS (1) TRAINING (1); LOGISTICS (1)

S U

02/25/2000 5 TASK TEAM LEADER (1); SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (1); PARTICIAPTORY PROCESS (1); NGO SPECIALIST (1); TRAINING (1)

S S

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06/24/2000 7 TASK TEAM LEADER (1); SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (1); PARTICIAPTORY PROCESS (1); NGO SPECIALIST (1); M&E SPECIALIST (1); TRAINING (1)

S S

03/19/2001 7 TASK TEAM LEADER (1); GENDER (1); INSTITUTIONAL DEVP. (1); NGO SPECIALIST (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); M&E SPECIALIST (1); MICROENTERPISE DEVP (1) TRAINING (1)

S S

12/05/2001 7 TASK TEAM LEADER (1); GENDER (1); HEALTH (1); EDUCATION (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); M&E SPECIALIST (1); MICROENTERPISE DEVP (1) TRAINING (1)

S S

06/06/2002 3 TASK TEAM LEADER (I); GENDER (1); INSTITUTIONAL DEVP. (1);

S S

01/30/2003 8 TASK MANAGER (1); GENDER (1); INSITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (1); M & E (1); MICRO-ENTERPRISE (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LAWYER (1)

S S

06/19/2003 5 TASK TEAM LEADER (1); SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT (1); ECONOMIST (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LOGISTICS (1)

S S

12/10/2003 8 TASK TEAM LEADER AND GENDER (1); INSITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (1); ECONOMIST (1); M & E (1); MICRO-ENTERPRISE (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LOGISTICS (1)

S S

05/28/2004 8 TASK TEAM LEADER AND GENDER (1); INSITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (1); M & E SPECIALIST (1); MICRO-ENTERPRISE (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LOGISTICS (1); ICR PRINCIPAL AUTHOR (1)

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01/11/2005 8 TASK TEAM LEADER AND GENDER (1); INSITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (1); M & E SPECIALIST (1); MICRO-ENTERPRISE (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LOGISTICS (1); ICR PRINCIPAL AUTHOR (1)

S S

ICR22/06/2005 8 TASK TEAM LEADER

AND GENDER (1); INSITUTIONAL DEVELOPMENT (1); M & E SPECIALIST (1); MICRO-ENTERPRISE (1); PROCUREMENT (1); FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT (1); LOGISTICS (1); ICR PRINCIPAL AUTHOR (1)

S S

(b) Staff:

Stage of Project Cycle Actual/Latest EstimateNo. Staff weeks US$ ('000)

Identification/Preparation 81.00 150.60Appraisal/Negotiation 71.90 141.00Supervision 129.61 522.49ICR 13.37 43.38Total 295.88 857.47

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Annex 5. Ratings for Achievement of Objectives/Outputs of Components(H=High, SU=Substantial, M=Modest, N=Negligible, NA=Not Applicable)

RatingMacro policies H SU M N NASector Policies H SU M N NAPhysical H SU M N NAFinancial H SU M N NAInstitutional Development H SU M N NAEnvironmental H SU M N NA

SocialPoverty Reduction H SU M N NAGender H SU M N NAOther (Please specify) H SU M N NA

Private sector development H SU M N NAPublic sector management H SU M N NAOther (Please specify) H SU M N NA

Partnership with NGOs and private sector

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Annex 6. Ratings of Bank and Borrower Performance

(HS=Highly Satisfactory, S=Satisfactory, U=Unsatisfactory, HU=Highly Unsatisfactory)

6.1 Bank performance Rating

Lending HS S U HUSupervision HS S U HUOverall HS S U HU

6.2 Borrower performance Rating

Preparation HS S U HUGovernment implementation performance HS S U HUImplementation agency performance HS S U HUOverall HS S U HU

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Annex 7. List of Supporting Documents

Staff Appraisal Report. Rural Women's Development and Empowerment Project. World Bank 1997

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, October 1999.

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, February 2000

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, June 2000

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, October 2000

Mid Term Review , World Bank, March 2001

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, December 2001

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, May-June 2002

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, January 2003

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, June 2003

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, December 2003

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, May 2004

Aide Memoire. Supervision Mission. World Bank, January 2005

Aide Memoire. Final Supervision Mission. World Bank, June 2005

Diagnostic and Evaluative Study of the Women Development Corporations. Institute of Applied Manpower Research, New Delhi, 2001

Implementation Completion Reports. (Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Uttar Pradesh ), June 2005

Swa-Shakti. Impact Evaluation Report. Lead M & E Agency, Agricultural Finance Corporation Limited, New Delhi, June 2005.

Final Report. In-depth Evaluation of Swa-Shakti Project. International Institute of Development Management Technology, New Delhi, September 2005

Borrower's Evaluation Report - Final. Ministry of Human Resource Development, October 2005

Communication from IFAD, February 2006

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