Assessing the impacts of a training program for women in Peru: are there social networking effects?

The general goal of this study is to assess the impacts on women’s economic and social participation of a peer-to-peer training program in Cañete Province, Peru. We use a quasi- experimental methodology applied to treatment and control groups. The study evaluates three areas of potential effects: (i) participation and returns from economic activities (use of time, labour market participation, family business, savings); (ii) indicators of women’s autonomy, family cohesion and social participation; and (iii) living standards. The impacts we found are mixed. We only detected robust impacts on the propensity to engage in savings and participate in local social organizations by treated women. The channels behind these impacts require more specific research, but we hypothesize that it may be related to expanded social networking. We observe a few specific impacts related to autonomy (negative) and family cohesion (positive), which can be linked to the religious nature of the program. We evaluate differentiated effects by some features of the treatment group as self-assessment of economic usefulness by women as well as trainers’ education and age. In terms of policy, we consider that peer-to-peer programs of this type may have limited impacts in terms of broad development goals like increased income, labour participation and business activity by women, but these can also show some advantages for expanding women’s social networking and access to savings and local organizations. Improved peer-to-peer programs more clearly linked to the economic advancement of women may be more efficient in achieving broader development goals.