The Digital Finance team has initiated an annual effort to identify models or examples of digital finance support at the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) that demonstrate development outcomes catalyzed by digital finance, improved service delivery, and lessons learned for replication and scale. In partnership with USAID’s Digital Finance (DFS) Team, Headlight co-implemented a Positive Deviance evaluative effort on the team’s work with USAID/Liberia. The Digital Payments in Liberia case study is one of the bright spots identified and evaluated in 2020, presenting a pathway, business case, and catalyzation of development outcomes for public-private partnerships in digital finance.
This report provides an overview of the methods, context, verified pathway, barriers and enablers, and key takeaways from USAID’s involvement with the Government of Liberia and Lonestar Cell MTN in expanding digital payments and mobile money services in Liberia from 2014 to the present day. The digital ecosystem has a bright, sustainable future in Liberia, and the advancement of digital finance offers a catalyst for development outcomes.
Headlight is always excited to help clients identify and share exemplary work in development grounded in evidence and conducts various fit-for-purpose evaluative case studies using rigorous methods, in addition to the firm’s more expansive work in Collaborating, Learning, Adapting, Monitoring, and Evaluation (CLAME).
