Assignment Name: Final Impact Evaluation of the Pathways to Prosperity for Extremely Poor People-European Union (PPEPP-EU) Project

Assignment Start Date: July 2026

Assignment End Date: December 2026

Country: Bangladesh

Client Name: Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation (PKSF)

Project Description:

The Pathways to Prosperity for Extremely Poor People–European Union (PPEPP-EU) Project is a large-scale poverty-reduction and resilient-livelihood initiative implemented by the Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation (PKSF) with financial support from the European Union. Building on the earlier PPEPP programme, the project applies a “pathways out of poverty” approach rather than a narrowly time-bound graduation model. It provides an integrated package of livelihood and enterprise development, grants and appropriate loans, nutrition and primary healthcare, nutrition-sensitive agriculture, inclusive finance, community mobilization, social protection linkages, climate resilience, women’s empowerment, and disability inclusion.

PPEPP-EU operates through 19 Partner Organizations in 145 climatically vulnerable unions across 34 upazilas and 12 districts in the north-western, south-western coastal, north-eastern haor, and selected ethnic-minority-concentrated areas of Bangladesh. The project aims to contribute to poverty reduction and resilient livelihoods, including sustained income generation, improved nutritional well-being, better access to social and nutrition-sensitive agricultural services, stronger women’s agency, meaningful disability inclusion, and increased resilience to climatic and economic shocks.

PKSF has engaged DM WATCH LIMITED to conduct the Final Impact Evaluation of the PPEPP-EU Project. The evaluation will assess the project’s overall impact, sustainability, strategic effectiveness, exit and graduation pathways, scalability, replicability, cost-effectiveness, and value for money. It will examine performance against the project logframe, EU priorities, and the OECD-DAC criteria of relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency, impact, and sustainability.

The specific objectives of this final evaluation are as follows:

• To measure the extent of change in key project achievements (impacts, outcome and outputs) across livelihoods, nutrition and primary healthcare, inclusive finance, and community mobilization, by assessing progress from baseline and differentiating changes between treatment and comparison groups.
• To analyze the causal mechanisms through which the project interventions have influenced poverty reduction, resilience-building, and improvements in social and economic well-being.
• To evaluate the inclusiveness of project results, with a particular focus on women, persons with disabilities, ethnic minorities, and households located in high climate-risk zones, ensuring that no one is left behind.
• To examine the sustainability of achievements (impacts, outcome and outputs), assessing whether achieved improvements are likely to continue following the withdrawal of direct project support.
• To determine the contribution of the project to strengthening climate resilience, social protection linkages, women’s empowerment, and disability inclusion at household and community levels.
• To review the efficiency and operational effectiveness of project delivery by PKSF and its Partner Organizations in utilizing financial and non-financial resources.
• To generate actionable lessons and strategic recommendations that can guide future policy and programmatic decision-making for poverty eradication in Bangladesh.

The assessment will build on the 2022 baseline and 2025 mid-term evaluation, which followed the same panel of 6,215 households—4,143 treatment and 2,072 comparison households. A longitudinal, quasi-experimental mixed-methods design will measure changes across livelihoods, nutrition and primary healthcare, WASH, inclusive finance, community mobilization, social protection, disaster and climate resilience, women’s empowerment, gender equality, and disability inclusion. Difference-in-Differences (DiD) will be the principal impact-estimation method, supported by regression analysis, Propensity Score Matching (PSM) as a robustness check, attrition-sensitive analysis, and qualitative triangulation.

An adapted Sustainable Livelihood Framework will guide analysis of household assets, vulnerability, livelihood strategies, institutional linkages, and durability of poverty exits. The evaluation will determine what worked, for whom, under what conditions, and why, and generate actionable recommendations for poverty-eradication policy, programme design, scale-up, and integration of effective approaches into national and development-partner systems.

DM WATCH LIMITED will implement the assignment through a structured 150-day longitudinal, quasi-experimental mixed-methods evaluation, covering inception, instrument harmonization, panel tracking, quantitative and qualitative fieldwork, data-quality assurance, impact analysis, reporting, and dissemination.

Inception, Desk Review, and Evaluation Planning

• Conduct inception consultations with the PPEPP-EU Project Implementation Unit of PKSF to confirm the evaluation scope, research questions, coordination arrangements, deliverables, and implementation schedule.
• Review the project document, Logical Framework, baseline and mid-term evaluation reports and datasets, monitoring and financial records, Partner Organization documents, relevant national policies, EU priorities, and thematic literature.
• Develop a comprehensive Research Planning Matrix linking evaluation objectives, thematic priorities, OECD-DAC criteria, indicators, data sources, tools, analytical methods, and expected outputs.
• Prepare the Inception Report, including the refined methodology, work plan, longitudinal sampling and respondent-tracking strategy, attrition-management protocol, data-analysis framework, quality-control mechanisms, ethical safeguards, training manual, safety protocols, and English and Bangla research instruments.

Instrument Harmonization and Field Testing

• Harmonize the household questionnaire with the baseline and mid-term instruments to maintain comparability across the three evaluation rounds.
• Cover key modules on socioeconomic status, poverty, income and expenditure, livelihood diversification, productive assets, inclusive finance, food security, nutrition and primary healthcare, WASH, community mobilization, social protection, disaster and climate resilience, women’s empowerment, gender equality, and disability inclusion.
• Develop qualitative guides for Key Informant Interviews, Focus Group Discussions, In-Depth Interviews, case studies, and field observations.
• Digitize the household questionnaire using an approved CAPI platform with skip logic, range checks, consistency checks, timestamps, GPS capture, and real-time monitoring features.
• Conduct field testing, document observations, refine the instruments in consultation with PKSF, and prepare detailed quantitative and qualitative data-collection guidelines.

Field-Team Recruitment, Training, and Deployment

• Recruit qualified enumerators, supervisors, qualitative researchers, anthropometry personnel, field coordinators, and data-quality staff.
• Train field personnel on the PPEPP-EU results framework, longitudinal interviewing, panel tracking, CAPI operation, qualitative facilitation, anthropometric measurement, informed consent, safeguarding, referral protocols, and quality assurance.
• Conduct mock interviews, practical exercises, field simulations, and competency assessments before final deployment.
• Prepare field movement plans and deploy teams across the project’s north-western, south-western coastal, north-eastern haor, and ethnic-minority-focused areas.

Longitudinal Household Survey and Panel Tracking

• Track and revisit the original panel of up to 6,215 households, comprising 4,143 treatment households and 2,072 comparison households, across 145 unions, 34 upazilas, and 12 districts.
• Use previous household identifiers, contact records, Partner Organization databases, telephone follow-up, community contacts, and physical household visits to minimize attrition.
• Maintain the original panel structure without replacing households lost to follow-up, thereby preserving the validity of the Difference-in-Differences
• Document migration, mortality, refusal, non-response, contamination, and any exposure of comparison households to similar interventions.
• Collect household-level data on livelihoods, income, assets, financial inclusion, food security, nutrition, healthcare, WASH, social protection, resilience, women’s agency, and disability inclusion.
• Conduct standardized anthropometric measurements for relevant household members.

Qualitative Inquiry and Case Documentation

• Conduct KIIs, FGDs, IDIs, case studies, and targeted observations with PKSF, Partner Organizations, local government representatives, service providers, market actors, financial institutions, community organizations, and project participants.
• Include women, persons with disabilities, ethnic minorities, elderly persons, female-managed households, and households experiencing successful, stagnant, or constrained poverty-transition pathways.
• Examine the mechanisms behind livelihood transformation, nutrition practices, access to services, financial behaviour, resilience to climatic and economic shocks, women’s decision-making, disability inclusion, and community mobilization.
• Develop outcome-oriented case studies illustrating sustained poverty exits, microenterprise development, resilience-building, and cases where benefits remained limited or vulnerable to reversal.

Data Quality Assurance, Ethics, and Safeguarding

• Operate a real-time monitoring system covering survey progress, response rates, GPS location, interview duration, missing values, logical inconsistencies, outliers, and enumerator performance.
• Conduct supervisor spot checks, accompanied interviews, daily data reviews, and corrective follow-up.
• Back-check at least 10% of household interviews, re-interview approximately 10%, review approximately 10% of collected data for consistency, and independently re-measure around 5% of anthropometric observations.
• Apply automated and manual logical checks and undertake retraining, record verification, or repeat interviews where required.
• Ensure informed consent, confidentiality, anonymization, secure data storage, restricted access, GDPR-aligned data protection, child safeguarding, enumerator safety, and referral mechanisms for malnutrition, gender-based violence, and other protection concerns.

Data Management and Longitudinal Impact Analysis

• Clean, validate, label, and link baseline, mid-term, and final-round records using unique household identifiers to construct a three-wave longitudinal panel dataset.
• Prepare raw and cleaned datasets, respondent-tracking files, codebooks, variable labels, output tables, qualitative transcripts, and reproducible Stata or equivalent analysis syntax.
• Apply descriptive and inferential statistics and estimate project impact primarily through Difference-in-Differences.
• Use regression analysis and Propensity Score Matching as complementary robustness checks.
• Conduct attrition diagnostics and apply weighting, multiple imputation, and sensitivity analysis where appropriate.
• Assess heterogeneous effects by gender, disability, ethnicity, region, climate-risk exposure, household type, and livelihood pathway.
• Apply the adapted Sustainable Livelihood Framework to examine changes in livelihood assets, vulnerability, institutional linkages, resilience, and durability of poverty exits.
• Undertake thematic analysis of qualitative evidence and systematically triangulate it with household survey results, administrative records, and project monitoring data.

Evaluation, Reporting, and Dissemination

• Assess project performance against the Logical Framework, EU priorities, and the OECD-DAC criteria of relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency, impact, and sustainability.
• Examine operational effectiveness, cost-effectiveness, value for money, sustainability, exit and graduation pathways, scalability, replicability, and potential integration into national systems.
• Prepare preliminary findings, logframe-aligned output tables, and a presentation of raw and quality-checked results.
• Produce the Draft and Final Impact Evaluation Reports, incorporating comments from PKSF, the European Union, and dissemination participants.
• Organize and facilitate the dissemination seminar and prepare presentation materials and meeting documentation.
• Submit cleaned quantitative and qualitative datasets, analytical syntax, finalized output tables, and a concise infographic report on major outcome and impact findings.
• Provide prioritized and actionable recommendations for policy improvement, future programming, replication, and scaling of effective pathways out of extreme poverty.

Key Deliverables

• Inception Report with methodology, work plan, tools, sampling, and analysis plan.
• Finalized quantitative and qualitative data-collection instruments.
• Completed household survey, anthropometric measurements, KIIs, FGDs, IDIs, and case studies.
• Raw, cleaned, and linked longitudinal datasets with codebooks and analysis syntax.
• Data-quality assurance and back-check report.
• Preliminary findings, logframe-aligned output tables, and presentation.
• Draft Final Impact Evaluation Report.
• Dissemination seminar and presentation materials.
• Final Impact Evaluation Report incorporating stakeholder feedback.
• Three-page infographic report on key outcome and impact findings.