Youdi Schipper

Youdi Schipper

  • Senior Fellow
  • Manager KiuFunza Evaluation, Twaweza
  • Investigator, RISE Tanzania country team

Dr. Youdi Schipper is a senior development economist and project manager specializing in the impact evaluation of development interventions. The focus of his work is on quantitative impact evaluations of development interventions, with a particular emphasis on education and agriculture in Africa. He is a senior expert in quantitative evaluation methods and evaluation management, including the implementation of household surveys. He is experienced in the design and use of experimental and quasi-experimental methods of evaluation, which incorporate the counterfactual analysis crucial to impact evaluation. Youdi has designed and conducted rigorous impact evaluations in a range of settings and sectors, including food security, education, and water in various African countries.

 

Youdi also has wide experience implementing complex research projects in Africa. Youdi has recently led evaluations of food security programs in Rwanda (Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and Kenya (RVO, Netherlands Enterprise Agency).  He currently manages the Twaweza KiuFunza randomized control trial evaluating the learning impact of a teacher incentive program in Tanzanian primary schools. He is also a principal investigator on the Tanzania Country Research Team in the DFID funded Research on Improving Systems of Education (RISE) program. In 2012, Youdi and his team at Twaweza, Tanzania, set up Sauti za Wananchi, the first nationwide mobile phone panel survey in Africa. Sauti subsequently expanded to Uganda and Kenya, where it regularly informs citizens and decision-makers.

KEY PUBLICATIONS

Mbiti, I., Muralidharan, K., Romero, M., Schipper, Y., Manda, C., Rajani, R., 2019. Inputs, Incentives, and Complementarities in Education: Experimental Evidence from Tanzania. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 134, 1627–1673. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjz010.

Dabalen, Andrew; Etang, Alvin; Hoogeveen, Johannes; Mushi, Elvis; Schipper, Youdi; von Engelhardt, Johannes. 2016. Mobile Phone Panel Surveys in Developing Countries : A Practical Guide for Microdata Collection. Directions in Development–Poverty. Washington, DC: World Bank.

Jones, Sam, Youdi Schipper, Sara Ruto and Rakesh Rajani (2014). Can your child read and count? Measuring learning outcomes in East Africa. Journal of African Economies, 23(5), 643-672.

Isabel Guenther and Youdi Schipper (2013). Pumps, germs and storage: the impact of improved water containers on water quality and health. Health Economics, 22(7):757-74.