[July 2026 Newsletter] Partner Meetings, Impact Collaborative, New Research, and More!

Partner Meetings, Impact Collaborative, New Research, and More!

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July 2026

NEWS FROM PEI

Strengthening Systems, Scaling Impact: Highlights from PEI's bi-annual Partner Meetings

In May, PEI convened its bi-annual Advisory Council/Technical Partner and Steering Committee meetings, bringing together partners, researchers, and World Bank colleagues to reflect on emerging trends in the economic inclusion field and help shape the Partnership's future direction. Rather than revisiting familiar questions about whether economic inclusion programs work, discussions focused on several issues that are increasingly shaping government implementation and decision-making.  Participants discussed how technical assistance is evolving from promoting program models to helping governments navigate implementation trade-offs; why peer learning, operational data, and cost-effectiveness often influence policy decisions as much as impact evaluations; and how organizations are embedding participant feedback throughout the program cycle program cycle by using digital listening platforms, qualitative learning labs, and other approaches that uncover barriers traditional monitoring can miss. Discussions also surfaced some practical challenges, including avoiding the "Christmas tree effect" of layering too many interventions onto programs and ensuring integrated approaches remain feasible for government delivery.  One takeaway resonated across multiple sessions: the greatest challenge to scaling government-led economic inclusion is often not program design, but ensuring that design is tailored to government implementation. Participants emphasized that pilots should serve to strengthen government systems—testing staffing models, coaching approaches, coordination mechanisms, and management information systems—rather than simply demonstrating that an intervention works. This shift reflects the Partnership's growing focus on generating practical operational knowledge that helps governments deliver effective programs at scale.

Scaling Economic Inclusion Programs with the Impact Collaborative

PEI’s Impact Collaborative hosted its fourth technical workshop, bringing together researchers, World Bank operational teams, governments, and NGOs to explore the latest evidence on economic inclusion programs and its implications for policy, program design, implementation, and scaling. Across two days of presentations and discussions, participants examined new impact findings and operational lessons on women and youth, participants affected by conflict, and emerging learning across different settings to help inform the replication and scale-up of effective government-led economic inclusion programs.   Watch the workshop videos and explore the workshop page to access session recordings, presentations, and additional resources.  Learn more >>

NEWS & RESOURCES FROM PEI PARTNERS

Credit: A'Melody Lee/World Bank

More RCTs Won’t Fix This: Why Evidence Alone Doesn’t Move Governments We often assume that if the evidence is strong enough, governments will act. But what if that assumption is wrong? In this thought-provoking piece, Julie Kedroske argues that evidence doesn't move policy on its own. Using examples from cash transfers and economic inclusion programs, she unpacks why relationships, timing, political realities, and the way evidence is presented often matter just as much as the research itself.  Read more >>

Credit: Village Enterprise

DREAMS RCT Results from Village Enterprise New evidence from two independent randomized controlled trials by IDinsight found that the DREAMS program from Village Enterprise and Mercy Corps significantly increased consumption, savings, and household assets among refugees and host communities in Uganda and Ethiopia. The findings demonstrate that combining poverty graduation with market systems development can help displaced populations build sustainable livelihoods and reduce dependence on humanitarian assistance. Read more >>

Credit: TrickleUp

Understanding Digital Agency This report from Trickle Up sets out a framework for understanding Digital Agency among women living in extreme poverty in rural India. It draws on a qualitative study of 93 women who had taken part in MPowered, a Trickle Up India program in Odisha and Jharkhand states, funded by Tata Communications Limited and the states’ government Rural Livelihoods Missions. The study was retrospective, looking at how each woman's relationship with a phone had taken shape, settled, or come apart over time.  Read more >>

Credit: BRAC

Coaching at Scale: Practical Guidance for Implementers of the Graduation Approach  This policy brief serves as an entry point for policymakers and technical staff to engage with BRAC's new coaching framework “Practical Pathways to Coaching in Graduation Programmes” and utilize it to design and implement quality coaching within their government-led graduation programs. The brief highlights seven key variables that shape any coaching strategy along with different options available and the evidence and implications behind them. Read more >>

Closing the Gap: What Graduation and Climate Practitioners Are Learning From Each Other Poverty and climate change are two inextricable global challenges, but our solutions tend to be siloed. End Ultrapoverty and Innovations for Poverty Action recently came together with organizations working at the intersection of graduation, climate adaptation, and nature conservation to explore how to bridge that divide. "Closing the Gap: What Graduation and Climate Practitioners Are Learning From Each Other" is a report on that dialogue. Read more >>

ABOUT PEI

The Partnership for Economic Inclusion is a global platform that unites non-governmental organizations, UN agencies, research institutions, funding partners, and the World Bank to support government adoption and scale up of economic inclusion programs that empower vulnerable people to lift themselves out of extreme poverty.

Get the latest articles, research, ideas, and events from PEI, our partners, and colleagues. Join us on LinkedIn and catch up with our PEI Open House Events series here.

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