Digital verification platform for Social Impact Bonds
THE QUESTION
Can an output verification platform for Development Impact Bonds increase the efficiency and effectiveness of data collection and impact evaluation?
LOCATION: South Africa
SECTOR: Humanitarian Aid, Finance
TECH: Collaborative Economy
TIMELINE: June 2020 - December 2022
PIONEERS: Radana Crhova, Seb Mhatre, Charlie Morgan, Daniella Verghese
PARTNER: Social Finance & Tiko (formerly Triggerise)
The Challenge
Development Impact Bonds (DIBs) are pay-for-success partnerships that pull in private investors to share the financing risk of delivering development outcomes. In a DIB, governments or donors pay for outcomes, whereas investors pay up front for the inputs and their capital is repaid or not depending on how many outcomes are achieved. The goal of DIBs is to increase the accountability of the investment. DIBs currently depend on a costly, time consuming verification process to validate claimed outcomes.The lengthy verification process can fail to meet the pace of delivery on-the-ground, often taking months to report. This can also be carried out by a third-party independent evaluator, which increases the overall cost.
The Idea
This pilot aims to demonstrate the effectiveness and trustworthiness of using technology platforms to verify outcomes and learn how to overcome the challenges of using technology to improve the performance and efficiency and impact bong. Ultimately, this pilot has the potential to increase the effectiveness and adaptability of international development programmes. The main benefits of improving the DIB process is increasing value for money for governments/donors, and enabling greater access to currently untapped finance. In turn, this would provide additional benefits to the many beneficiaries who can be served by DIBs.
Read more
Read the Pilot Story to explore journey, learnings, and reflections from this pilot
Learn about the challenges in using Development Innovation Bonds — “How can we use tech to verify outcomes for impact bonds?”
Read about the pilot’s initial efforts — “Investing for development outcomes”
Learn about the pilot’s final sprint — “Sprinting to the finish line”