Impact evaluation of the SHARPE Programme in Ethiopia: Academic report
About this ebook
The report finds evidence that robust markets for digital financial services are emerging in refugee hosting areas near Jijiga and are a little farther behind in Dollo Ado. Enrolment in the mobile money product, HelloCash, has been quite robust, though lower among women and refugees. HelloCash users are more likely to report financial inclusion (beyond inclusion through Hello Cash); they are 8.8 percentage points more likely to report being self-employed; they are 6.1 percentage points more likely to report typically having enough income; and they appear less food insecure than non-users. To try to enrol more women and refugees and catalyse HelloCash use among those groups, we conducted two randomized trials, one which allowed high volume customers to refer customers and receive a small bonus for doing so, and one which provided inactive customers with small incentives to start using the system. The former trial led to increased enrolment, but the share of women and refugees enrolling did not change; the latter led to increased use among women, but not refugees. We conclude with some ideas about further experiments to catalyse more use among refugees.
