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At present, no clear consensus exists on how to assess resilience interventions in the field. In this paper we propose to measure the impact of the ECOFISH project, the objective of which was to strengthen the resilience of local fishing communities affected by recurrent crises in Bangladesh. The evaluation was based on a difference-in-difference (DiD) framework. The DiD analysis indicates that households who benefited from ECOFISH have a higher propensity to adopt positive responses than non-beneficiaries when hit by a shock. Those beneficiaries also report a statistically higher recovery rate (resilience). The analysis indicates however that the project did not manage to reduce the propensity of households to engage in detrimental coping strategies and that the long-term food and nutritional security of the beneficiaries has not yet visibly improved compared to the control group. Those different results are discussed in the light of the wider literature on resilience evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently shaping a large part of the development and humanitarian agenda the concept of resilience has been embraced by a large number of donors, development agencies, and international NGOs. As a consequence, an increasing number of development interventions that aim at strengthening the resilience of vulnerable households and communities are now being implemented across the globe. Along with these interventions, a growing and urgent call for rigorous monitoring and evaluation has emerged. Unfortunately, the very few resilience measurement frameworks that are available are often too “academics”, data-demanding, and therefore poorly adapted to the reality faced by practitioners on the ground. In this paper we develop a resilience impact assessment framework which addresses this challenge. Using an ex-post treatment vs. control approach, the framework satisfies the requirement for rigor that should be found in any proper impact assessment framework, but remains operational in the data- and resource-constrained situations which characterize most of the current interventions in the field. We illustrate the approach through the case of the Enhancing Resilience program that was implemented by the World Food Programme and its partners in Bangladesh during 2011–13. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]