2017 ICT4D Conference

Evidence-based programming is the core of most international development projects. Over the past 3 years, World Vision Canada (WV) has moved beyond paper based systems to a digital approach for monitoring and evaluation in an attempt to improve efficiency and data quality. Use includes small surveys of health facilities to large scale baseline surveys with twenty thousand participants. WV has made great strides in improving data quality and plausibility, but still face challenges with data storage, security and ownership rights, as well as meta-analysis and interface across platforms. WV has compiled lessons learned from numerous large-scale surveys conducted, leveraging different functionalities of the Open Data Kit platform. WV has tried many different methods to specifically improve data quality of anthropometry measurement including the use of digital scales, programming Z-Score calculation directly into mobile device and building in plausible data ranges, as well as increased training on mobile data collection. Increasing adoption on the use of mobile data collection by field staff has been a challenge. Strategies employed to overcome these challenges have included capacity building around survey design, the use of tutorial videos for enumerators, and development of recommended data collection policy and procedures. Overall, mobile data collection improved quality and access to real time data, and was shown to be cost-saving for WV.

Given the improvement on efficiency and data quality, WV is now developing an enhanced web-based data discovery and visualization portal for the various WV grant data stores to provide transparency into activities. The aim is to improve the transparency, completeness, historical accuracy, and timeliness of data on grants via a highly usable tool that makes such data available to the international development community, meeting the need to provide high-quality evidence on maternal and child health and nutrition programming globally.