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El Salvador: Addressing Poverty and Economic Development

The government of El Salvador, with financial and technical support from the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), implemented an initiative to address poverty and encourage economic development in El Salvador's Northern Zone, which has been marginalized for decades. The initiative had two components: (1) human development, and (2) productive development.

For the human development component, Mathematica is evaluating three programs: (1) a scholarship program for technical high school and vocational students to increase their enrollment, persistence, and completion of technical secondary and post-secondary education; (2) infrastructure and programmatic improvements in 20 selected technical high schools, which could affect whether youths can gain marketable skills and pursue postsecondary education, better employment, and increased earnings; and (3) improvements to a vocational institute, which could increase the supply of qualified students to meet the needs of a growing and diversifying economy.

Within the productive development component, we are evaluating programs that provide (1) technical assistance and training to support to micro-, small-, and medium-size producers in agricultural and nonagricultural commercial activities; and (2) material and technical assistance to help producers adopt more efficient technologies and pursue higher-profit activities. We are also conducting a case study of financial support services to micro-, small-, and medium-size entrepreneurs in agricultural and nonagricultural commercial activities.

For our education evaluations, we have worked with local and government agencies to design a survey to collect information about key outcomes for technical high school students. Survey information includes students’ socioeconomic status and demographic characteristics, as well as key study outcomes (enrollment, grade progression, graduation, income and employment). In addition, we will use administrative records collected by the Salvadoran Ministry of Education for measuring school outcomes. For our productive development evaluation, we have collaborated with local and governmental agencies to produce surveys that collect key productive outcomes: business income, job creation, and household income of program beneficiaries.