LAPO, Nigeria-Final Report, September 2004

This report provides an overview of Lift Above Poverty Organization's (LAPO) work with the Imp-Act program. The paper describes:

• LAPO's target clientele and services offered;
• Its motivation to join Imp-Act;
• Its objectives under Imp-Act.

The paper discusses LAPO's activities and notes the following key components of LAPO's work with Imp-Act:

• Clarifying mission and ensuring staff buy-in;
• Developing a poverty assessment and monitoring tool;
• Modifying the LAPO participation form;
• Conducting periodic and in-depth studies of impact;
• Carrying out in-depth interviews, market research and client satisfaction research;
• Client/ staff learning process;
• Institutionalizing a social performance management system.

The paper examines outputs of the study and discusses LAPO's:

• Concept of poverty;
• Poverty targeting approach;
• Monitoring system.

It then studies the organizational changes made by LAPO in the areas of:

• Policy, practice and products;
• Institutionalizing social performance.

The paper lists the following reasons for staff satisfaction with the project. The project:

• Refocused the organization on the mission and addressed the problem of mis-targeting;
• Changed staff perspective on working with very poor people;
• Addressed the problem of client-exit;
• Provided base-line data for social development and microfinance programs;
• Developed research skills and institutional capacity.

The paper concludes by discussing LAPO's future plans for:

• Social performance management system;
• Funding.