Faceless

Faceless

In India, as well as in the developing nations across Asia, Africa & Latin America, the drive towards achieving a more substantive equality for citizens at the bottom of the pyramid ultimately depends on how their capability is measured, developed and transformed. 

DATA is the new first mile for development.

In the act of gathering developmental insight, a respondent fills up a form. A stack of forms end up on a desk and are converted to rows on a spreadsheet. An analyst crunches the rows and comes up with an insight — 35% of girls drop out from school in Std VIII

This percentage then becomes the basis for policy and intervention. What happens to the individual behind the percentage, behind the rows, behind the forms? 

They constitute the forgotten demographic.

DATA is collected to validate policy or design forward looking interventions. It is seldom actionable at an individual level. Individuals in the forgotten demographic remain excluded and add to the numbers from the previous year.

The unit of analysis in policymaking is a deeply dependent vulnerable subject. 

Assuming universality and constancy of vulnerability is a dangerous starting point for insight, as it treats citizens as recipients of development rather than as stakeholders. The gathering of data comes up against a range of biases. Flaws and inaccuracies creep into problem formulation & ultimately, result in suboptimal outcomes for developmental interventions. 

The WHO/UNICEF JMP influences WASH policy in 200+ countries. It uses the following question to gather data on availability of drinking water. 

In the last month, has there been any time when your household did not have sufficient quantities of drinking water when needed

An approach like this is bound to result in flawed data as it doesn’t place any additional cognitive burden on the respondent.

The unit of intervention is usually an institution.

Information, Distribution & Empowerment constitute the last mile for development. Accentuating the role of institutions rather than the capability of individuals is the usual norm in the developing world. An asymmetry of information, distribution and empowerment restricts inclusion, leading to developmental interventions that may be lead by efficient institutions but are seldom effective

According to the Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy — 63 million people in India are pushed over the brink every year into extreme poverty for lacking medical insurance. While a National Health Insurance cover is universally available, it suffers from serious asymmetry in awareness, inclusion and most important of all, actual usage. The asymmetry of information, distribution and empowerment in the National Health Cover in India is representative of many developmental programs in the Global South. 

This asymmetry can slow growth, and cripple an entire country over time.

There is a need to enhance the cognitive participation of citizens as stakeholders, enable focus on the capability of individuals rather than their vulnerability, to ultimately equip developmental analysis, policy and interventions with smarter, deeper & richer insight.

Right down to the individual. 

An important livelihood indicator for families living in rural areas is the kind of house they live in. This information is the tip of an iceberg for what can be discovered in correlation to a host of other indicators ranging from hygiene to financial inclusion, perhaps even very difficult to measure matters like happiness.

Questions like this are often very uncomfortable to ask and answer.

THE PROBLEM OF ASYMMETRY 

A key objective for education in developing nations across Asia, Africa and Latin America is to ultimately graduate young adults with the ability to contribute directly and substantially to the livelihood of their families. The cycle of poverty in the Global South span only a year. If crops fail, families encounter financial catastrophe immediately.

The cycle of education on the other hand is 16 years, or at least 12 years. It takes that much time for a young adult to connect her education to livelihood outcomes for her family in a direct and substantial way. 

So what happens in these 12 years? 

The failure of crops is not the only trigger for catastrophe.

The asymmetry of information, distribution and empowerment marks developmental interventions in almost all livelihood areas ranging from Financial Literacy to WASH, but unlike Health Insurance, which is better understood and managed, deficiencies in other areas reflect in a creeping, cumulative effect on individuals and their families.

The ASER Annual State of Education Study reports how over 70% of young adult women in India between the ages of 14 and 18 do not know how to calculate a 10% discount on a Rs. 300 T-shirt. Neither do they know how to read expiry dates on medicine strips or the instructions on an ORS Rehydration Kit, or if a food item has expired or not. These women are unable to understand how a simple interest rate on a loan works. 

The asymmetry of Information, Distribution & Empowerment impacts demographic dividend across the global south in a terrible way. 

While executing and expanding our work in education across India, we observed this asymmetry. One of the key interventions we designed is a livelihood curriculum covering these abilities, delivered using a postcard. Our aim was to enable children and young adults to become agents of change back in their homes, for their families.

We discovered that if we teach a child or a young adult to identify expiry dates on food and medicine, to calculate a simple discount or interest rate, and countless other livelihood abilities which are not covered in their school curriculum, then lessons learned and abilities earned permeate to families quickly. 

Using just a postcard. 

The postcard became a powerful, new way of learning and communication. It became a method to develop a target ability, as well as a way to inform & empower families. For example, to inform about the National Health Cover that they can access and to empower them, telling them how to use the policy and how not to be scared about using it.

But the most transformational outcome of our experience happened when we discovered that asking a question on the back of the postcard can be a path breaking method to draw deep, rich livelihood & developmental insight. 

THE PROBLEM WITH DATA 

We have known for some time now that night time illumination over a city reflects the economic and social well- being of its people. Today, scientists use satellite imagery to measure developmental indicators in amazing new ways. In Uganda for example, the UN Global Pulse Lab uses imagery directly from Google Maps to analyze roofing in villages and assess livelihood standards in order to optimize the distribution of financial inclusion programs. 

The results are mixed. 

While an expensive means like satellite imagery is now available to be applied with ease, there is on the other hand, a problem of accuracy and validation, in this case given the quality of shape files. 

Kiran is a bright 10 year old. She lives in Sayla village, 150 Kms away from Ahmedabad. 

Kiran studies in Std in Samatpara High School. We learned from her that Sayla means the Village of the Pilgrims. We also told Kiran that her name means Sunshine. We wanted to know more about her village, her family and the people who live in it. 

We wanted to know whether Kiran lives in a kuchha or a pucca house to begin with.

But the question we had in mind was kind of different. 

Kiran can you see the stars from the roof of your house at night? 

If Kiran says NO we can infer that her house (probably) doesn't have a pucca roof to climb up to and watch the beautiful stars that surround her village at night. 

How probable is this? 

The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene maintains the JMP global database that includes 5000 national datasets enabling national, regional and global analysis for WASH policy and interventions in over 200 countries.

The 2030 SDG for WASH to ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all is driven in all countries on the basis of data gathered around the JMP Core Questions. 

Take W5. for example.

The JMP question -- In the last month, has there been any time when your household did not have sufficient quantities of drinking water when needed?

What if we ask these questions with an increased cognitive burden? 

What if we asked Kiran --

Do you like to bathe in cold water? Of course, she is going to say No! You do not need a lot of insight to say that children in general do not like to bathe in cold water. Perhaps they do. Who knows?

But what if we asked --

How many times did you bathe in the last week, Kiran? 

She will give us a number. And this number may be quite probable!

The accuracy of data increases if there is a cognitive burden on the respondent.

In this case, when we work with children, education creates a conducive, trusting environment for participation and increases the accuracy of responses. In Sayla village some women still carry water for their homes every day. Finding out the number of times Kiran and her friends take a bath over a week, month or year will help create a water scarcity map for Sayla. If this question is asked not to Kiran, but to her parents in the context of an intervention to optimize the location of public water taps in the district, the response may be equally accurate if the respondent is informed well how her participation will help optimize the layout.

It is possible to drive a richer understanding of individuals, families and communities with this approach.

The algorithms, tools and methods of our day allow us to go deeper into Data.

But the human nature of our approach makes it a powerful complement for technology — making either approach a starting point for meaningful analysis or means of validation for the other. 

Our methods are applicable in a diverse set of respondent scenarios ranging from school children to young adults to women workers in a textile factory. Innovation on a range of devices that will be human like the postcard and path-breaking in what insights they can gather is currently underway in our living laboratory of 200 centers across India.

These devices range from a smart rope to a smart radio. But the questions will always remain cute. 

For what we could ask and find out this way, the sky's the limit. 

This is what we are trying to do at wallobooks.org

Noel Benno Joseph

AI & Data Strategy at Monitor Deloitte | William J. Clinton Fellow | TEDx Speaker

2y

Wonderful read Sanjukt Saha

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