3ie supports studies to fill critical knowledge gaps in a sector, sub-sector or in an area with limited rigorous evidence.

We are a leader in supporting the production, synthesis and uptake of high-quality evidence on what works in social and economic development. Established in 2008, we provide services and expertise to address the knowledge needs in the development sector and to help decision making in governments, NGOs, foundations, international development institutions and others working in low- and middle-income countries. We work across a wide range of sectors including agriculture, education, health, nutrition, sanitation, livelihoods, climate change and peacebuilding, among others. In all our work we believe transparency, reproducibility and ethics are core considerations and we have developed tools to bolster these efforts.

  • Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health

    Improving adolescent sexual and reproductive health requires decision-makers to have evidence on what works or not, for whom and why, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (L&MIC).

  • Agricultural Innovation Evidence Program

    3ie’s agricultural innovation evidence program supports evaluations aimed at understanding how best to encourage farmers in developing economies to adopt new inputs and practices.

  • Agricultural Insurance Evidence Program

    Agriculture is a major source of sustenance for rural populations in low- and lower-middle income countries. But owing to weather, pests, diseases and price fluctuations, farmers face numerous risks, including crop and livestock losses.

  • Aquaculture for Livelihoods, Nutrition and Women’s Empowerment

    3ie is conducting mixed methods evaluations and systematic reviews to generate evidence around interventions working with smallholder fish farmers, particularly women, to increase productivity and diversity of their aquaculture activities and promote maternal and child nutrition and women’s empowerment.

  • Development Priorities Evidence Program

    Launched in 2015, this program focused on generating evidence in priority sectors closely aligned to the Sustainable Development Goals. 3ie supported 14 rigorous, high-quality impact eval...

  • Education

    According to the United Nations estimates, 103 million youth worldwide lack basic literacy skills, and more than 60 per cent of them are women.

  • Empowering Adolescents in South Asia

    South Asia, home to 600 million children, has the highest number of young people globally.

  • Empowering Adolescents: A Collaborative Research Partnership

    India has more than 250 million adolescents constituting over 20 percent of the country’s total population.

  • Evidence for Curbing Democratic Backsliding

    Over the past 30 years, while advocacy for democracy and democratic freedoms has spread, countries across the globe have been experiencing democratic backsliding. There are more contexts ...

  • Evidence Mapping for Democracy, Human Rights and Governance

    3ie worked with USAID’s Center of Excellence on Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance (DRG Center), and NORC at the University of Chicago to increase knowledge on the global advancement of democracy, human rights and governance.

  • Food Systems and Nutrition Evidence and Gap Map

    To address the challenge of malnutrition and food insecurity, decision-makers need to understand what evidence exists on various interventions.

  • Gender and Women’s Empowerment

    3ie projects and programs are uncovering ways to promote gender equality and women’s empowerment.

  • Gender intentionality in large-scale digital public infrastructure in India

    Digitalization has taken place at an unprecedented rate in many low- and middle-income countries (L&MICs), including India. However, the gender gap is still substantial as 265 million...

  • HIV Combination Prevention Program

    3ie, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is supporting studies and other work on HIV combination prevention to maximize the useful knowledge and policy implications from these interventions.

  • HIV Self-Testing Evidence Program

    To gain a better understanding of whether providing HIV self-tests to people would increase HIV testing rates, and who might benefit most from availability of tests, 3ie funded seven pilo...

  • Humanitarian

    3ie supported seven impact evaluations under this program that provided rigorous evidence to improve the quality of life of people living in fragile and conflict-affected contexts.

  • Immunization

    Vaccines prevent millions of child deaths each year. Over the past few years, however, global immunization coverage has stagnated and even slipped, particularly in low- and middle-income ...

  • Improving Lives of Waste Pickers in India

    This 3ie-led evaluation will inform future design and scale-up of the Saamuhika Shakti or Collective Impact initiative that aims to improve the lives of waste pickers in Bengaluru, in Ind...

  • Innovations in Data for Impact Evaluation

    The accessibility and use of big data and data science methods such as geospatial analysis, machine learning, and generative AI are increasing rapidly in the field of international develo...

  • Integrating Cost Evidence in Research and Evaluation

    3ie’s Cost Evidence Group designs and implements rigorous cost analysis, including as an integrated part of impact evaluation, provides training on measuring and analyzing costs, and supports partners in better use of cost evidence in decision-making.

  • Integration of HIV Services Evidence Program

    Much of the evidence surrounding the integration of HIV services with maternal, neonatal, and child health services, as well as with sexual and reproductive health and family planning ser...

  • Mapping Evidence to Address Root Causes and Drivers of Irregular Migration

    Massive irregular migration continues, along with more migrant tragedies. While interventions seeking to address its root causes have grown, there is limited evidence of their effectivene...

  • Mapping the Evidence on Resilience and Food Security

    Widespread hunger, malnutrition, and water insecurity have devastating and long-lasting impacts on the health and well-being of millions of people around the globe.

  • Maternal and Child Health

    3ie, the World Health Organization and the Partnership for Maternal Newborn & Child Health worked together to create a gap map to assess the evidence available on social, behavioural and community engagement interventions related to reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health programs in low and middle-income countries.

  • Mitigating and Adapting to Climate Change

    3ie’s climate change research program focuses on promoting evidence-informed policies and programs to strengthen climate mitigation and adaptation efforts.

  • Nutrition and Food Security

    Everyone needs reliable access to sufficient, safe and affordable nutritious food, coupled with a sanitary environment, adequate health, education and care. However, all too often, this need is not fulfilled.

  • Peacebuilding

    Fragility has expensive, long-term consequences and trying to build peace in situations of protracted conflicts is becoming the norm. In 2020, 1.8 billion people – nearly a quarter of the...

  • Philippines Evidence Program

    3ie, in partnership with the Philippines National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) and Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, is implementing a multi-year Philippines Evidence Program (also known as Policy Window Philippines).

  • Promoting and Mapping Rigorous Evaluations in Humanitarian Settings

    3ie is working on mapping the evidence on food security interventions in humanitarian settings.

  • Promoting and Mapping Sustainable Energy Evidence to Achieve SDG7

    Delivering sustainable energy for all (SDG7) is key to making progress on several sustainable goals.

  • Promoting Latrine Use in Rural India Evidence Program

    Safe sanitation is a key determinant of many public health outcomes and ending open defecation is necessary in order to achieve safe sanitation. To this end, the Indian government has led...

  • Promoting Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights

    One’s health and well-being are related to one’s sexual and reproductive rights, which are human rights. However, many people still encounter challenges to bodily autonomy, sexual choice ...

  • Replication

    We set up our Replication Program to address the need for a freely available global public good that helps improve the quality and reliability of impact evaluation evidence used for development decision-making.

  • Rural India Livelihoods Project

    India's Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Rural Livelihoods Mission aims to link the rural poor to sustainable livelihood opportunities and financial services. 3ie has been generating rigorous evidence since 2019 on the impacts of this large-scale program on livelihood promotion and social mobilization.

  • Sanitation and Hygiene Evidence Program

    Globally, more people have access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) than ever before. But we are still a long way from achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of ensuring t...

  • Sanitation-Linked Livelihoods Program

    Various state governments in India are providing sanitation-linked livelihoods programs to empower economically and socially marginalized sections in urban areas such as women, transgenders and the differently-abled.

  • Social Protection

    This program supports impact evaluations to build the evidence base on the effectiveness of interventions that reduce the risks faced by the poor through participation in public works and employment programs.

  • Strengthening Evidence and Economic Modelling Partnership Project

    3ie, in partnership with the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), is working to strengthen evidence use in MCC’s program designs and investment decisions.

  • Study of the COVAX Facility and Advance Market Commitment

    3ie worked with a consortium led by Itad to conduct a baseline review and formative study of the design, implementation and emerging results of the COVAX Facility and AMC to support accountability and learning for course correction.

  • Studying Impacts of a Humanitarian Cash Transfer Program in Colombia

    People displaced because of humanitarian crises around the world face immense challenges meeting basic needs, accessing public services and livelihood support.

  • Studying the effects of market access on smallholder farmers

    Around 80 percent of the world’s poor reside in rural areas (FAO), with many dependent on small-scale and subsistence farming. While development actors have prioritized efforts to integra...

  • Swashakt: Empowering Indian Women’s Collectives

    India has one of the lowest female labor force participation rates in South Asia. 3ie’s Swashakt Program is supporting interventions to identify what works to enhance viability, scalability and returns of women’s collective enterprises and promote women’s economic empowerment.

  • Training Initiative for Evidence-Informed Policy

    We work with governments and partners around the world to strengthen their capacities in evaluation and evidence-informed decision-making.

  • Transparency and Accountability in Natural Resources Evidence Program

    The natural resource governance sector is under-researched and programs in it are under-evaluated. 3ie supported seven impact evaluations to fill critical knowledge gaps on what works to ...

  • Transparent, Reproducible and Ethical Evidence (TREE)

    3ie champions the research transparency and reproducibility movement as a means of understanding and mitigating challenges to the credibility of social science research, while also workin...

  • Uganda

    3ie, in partnership with the Uganda Office of the Prime Minister (OPM Uganda), implemented a multi-year program to strengthen the production and use of evaluation evidence with selected ministries.

  • Understanding Impacts of El Niño and the Indian Ocean Dipole in the Indo-Pacific

    Climate events have significant consequences on societies and economies, deeply affecting people’s livelihoods, income, food security, and health conditions. Climate patterns can influenc...

  • Understanding the Evidence on Climate Change, Biodiversity and Livelihoods

    3ie and the UK Government’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) are producing a series of synthesis projects to understand the evidence base to inform future programming and research.

  • Voluntary Male Medical Circumcision Evidence Program

    It is widely recognized that preventive measures are crucial in tackling the HIV epidemic in Sub-Saharan Africa. Three randomized controlled trials and numerous observational studies have...

  • West Africa Capacity-building and Impact Evaluation

    The West Africa Capacity-building and Impact Evaluation (WACIE) program is a regional initiative that supports and promotes the culture of evidence-informed decision-making among high-lev...

Featured

Journal of Development Effectiveness: walking the talk on TREE (Transparent, Reproducible and Ethical Evidence)

Blog
We are excited to launch the special issue of the Journal of Development Effectiveness on Transparent, Reproducible and Ethical Evidence. Through the Journal, 3ie has promoted the publica...

Navigating ethical considerations in evaluations: 3ie's TREE Review Framework in practice

Blog
Earlier this year, the TREE team at 3ie collaborated with the Education Endowment Fund (EEF) and Effective Basic Services Africa (eBASE Africa) to implement the TREE Review Framework in t...

American Evaluation Association Conference 2024

Event
The American Evaluation Association's Evaluation 2024 is taking place from 21-26 October in Portland, Oregon. This conference will bring together new evaluators and established profession...

Improving women’s empowerment through food systems and nutrition interventions

Blog
Food insecurity, hunger, and malnutrition persist globally, with 783 million people facing chronic hunger in 2023. Women are particularly affected, making up 60 percent of the food-insecu...

Asian Evaluation Week 2024

Event
Asian Development Bank's Independent Evaluation Group, and the Asia Pacific Finance and Development Institute are organizing the Asian Evaluation Week 2-5 September in Shanghai, China and...