Rationale The traditional way of implementing development aid, and the effectiveness, have been criticized upon during the past few decades. A new focus has risen on the alternative way of implementing development aid. This study specifically focusses on the market-led alternative development projects in the Gambia. The purpose is to the see if this type of aid is advantageous to the subjected citizens. This is of societal relevance since the target groups of both projects are the underprivileged citizens of the Gambia.

Methods A qualitative, instrumental, comparative case study was conducted. The two selected case studies were the Youth Empowerment Project (YEP), and project DOMO. A document analysis of both project reports was carried out. Moreover, a total of 10 interviews were taken with individuals related to either one of the cases. During one interview 10 other people were present, to provide their opinion. Lastly, a focus group discussion was held with 21 Gambian youths during the National Youth Conference located in the rural area Basse.

Results By supporting entrepreneurship organizations YEP was able to reach 38098 individuals, support 242 MSME’s, strengthen 4 institutions and train 1037 youths. Moreover, they add value to their project by creating a social platform for entrepreneurship organizations, improving the Gambian educational system, and integrating Gambian feedback. DOMO installed two solar dryers in the rural area of the Gambia to decrease the malnutrition problem. However, the social entrepreneurship set-up was not profitable, which negatively influences the sustainability. Other problems both projects encountered were the culture, professional expertise and local inclusion.

Conclusion Although the projects are able to provide some advantages to the Gambian citizens both face considerable problems. The rationale of YEP still partly resembles traditional development aid. It is exposed to a potential distorted principal-agent relation, increased dependency, and inability to address the poorest of the Gambia. In addition, despite the good intentions of DOMO, there are multiple limitations to the potential advantages it offers.

Implications The question rises if alternative development aid is really different from traditional development aid, and if it is able to overcome the critiques on development aid in general.

Key words:traditional development aid, alternative development aid, market-led, social entrepreneurship

Introduction

Individuals living in the Western world tend to take permanent access to clean drinking water, sanitation facilities, sufficient food, and shelter for granted. A vast part of the population however does not enjoy these privileges. According to Baylis, Smith and Owen (2013), if someone is not able to pay for these basic goods, this individual is living in poverty. A measurement of extreme poverty, proposed by the World Bank, is living under the standard of $1,90 dollar a day (World Bank, 2015). Approximately 705 million people lived in extreme poverty in 2015 (Roser, Ortiz-Ospina, 2017). One of the objectives of providing development aid is to eradicate this poverty and improve the quality of life of all individuals. A definition of development aid is: ‘Aid expended in a manner that is anticipated to promote development, whether achieved through economic growth or other means.’ (Minoiu, & Reddy, 2009 pg. 7). Traditionally this is executed by developed governments or international organizations providing financial aid flows to developing governments to help increase the economic growth of the country (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013; Sachs, 1992). Billions of dollars have been spent on development aid (de Haan, 2009).

Development aid has helped to reduce poverty rates over the past few decades, and has improved the quality of life for many people. Nevertheless, poverty remains a pressing problem (Lange, Wodon & Carey, 2018). The question that has risen is whether development aid has been effective enough (Moyo, 2009; de Haan, 2009). Providers of development aid have been pressured to change the development approach (de Haan, 2009). During the past two decades, alternative forms of providing development aid have ensued. These alternative forms attempt to spread values such as participation, equity, sustainability and empowerment to the individual, rather than the traditional form of solely granting money or material goods (Baylis, Smith and Owen, 2013). One description of empowerment is making an individual feel confident and autonomous, and claim his or her rights in life (Narayan, 2005). Examples of focus areas of alternative development aid are empowering women, sustainable livelihood approaches, or micro-financing (Baylis, Smith and Owen, 2013; de Haan, 2009). One form of the alternative development aid focuses on encouraging entrepreneurship. This branch believes entrepreneurship creates value and finances social institutions, since it creates employment possibilities, empowers individuals and increases the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of a country (Blowfield, 2012).

An example of a developing country that has received considerable amounts of development aid is the Gambia. The Gambia is the smallest country on the African continent and is located in Sub-Saharan Africa. Problems that have stimulated the underdevelopment of the Gambia are high population growth rates, political instability, an undiversified economy dependent on agriculture and tourism, and an underdeveloped private sector job creation (World Bank, 2017). As a result, a growing number of young Gambians are fleeing to other coastal countries in Africa such as Libya, to cross the Mediterranean Sea and look for a different and a possibly brighter future in Europe. In 2014 the 3^rd highest number of asylum seekers in Italy possessed a Gambian nationality (YEP, 2016).

In 2016 the Gambia received $91,6 million in Official Development Aid (ODA). Official Development Aid comprises: “flows that are provided by official agencies and each transaction of which promotes the economic development and welfare of developing countries and is concessional in its character” (OECD, 2017). Part of these funds has been allocated to finance small and large-scale alternative development aid projects (Anders, 2017).

One example of alternative development that aims to encourage entrepreneurship is a large-scale project in the Gambia named the Youth Empowerment Project (YEP). It started in 2017 and is executed by the International Trade Centre (ITC) as part of the United Nations (UN). The European Union Emergency Trust Fund (EUETF) has funded the project with 11 million euros. The main goal of YEP is to improve youth employability and entrepreneurship by use of a market-led approach. Market-led means the development is driven by the economic market of a country (YEP, 2016). They try to achieve this by: upgrading the skills of the youths through the strengthening of technical and vocational training, entrepreneurship workshops, improving local standards of products, strengthening small to medium sized enterprises and supporting the development of different economic sectors. YEP will last for four years and has major aspirations of reducing irregular migration to Europe by creating employment and improving the economic situation in the Gambia.

Another alternative development project in the Gambia is the small-scale project DOMO. They similarly make use of a market-led approach. This project started in 2013. Project DOMO was established as part of the minor program International Entrepreneurship and Development of Delft, University of Technology and is currently executed by three Dutch students. The project addresses the problem of malnutrition in the rural areas of the Gambia. A social entrepreneurship set-up is used to install solar dryers in two villages. Solar dryers are able to dry fruit and vegetables, while maintaining the nutritional value. This makes it possible for local communities to consume the dried food during the rainy season. In addition, the surpluses of the solar dried crops from the community gardens can be sold at the local market. The citizens have to pay a small fee to make use of the solar dryers, which is then re-invested in the maintenance of the solar dryers.

The Gambia has been receiving development aid since the 1960’s. Despite the fact that part of the aid the Gambia receives is alternative development aid, 48.6% of the approximately two million citizens still live in extreme poverty (World Bank, 2017). This raises questions about the benefits of alternative development aid to the citizens of the Gambia. This study will explore whether the use of types of alternative development aid such as project YEP and DOMO is perceived to be advantageous to the citizens of the Gambia through a comparative case study analysis. Document analysis, interviews, and a focus-group discussion have been used to obtain the data. The research question of this study is:

Are the small-scale and large-scale alternative ways of providing market-led development aid advantageous to the Gambian citizens that are subject to these projects?

Little attention has been given to the advantages to the citizens of market-led alternative development projects. This is interesting to research since there are critics that have argued development aid is not successful at all (Moyo, 2009; Easterly, 2006; Burnside & Dollar, 2000). It is not the purpose of this study to provide the optimal way of implementing development aid. However, this understanding could help to gain insights from potential deficiencies or achievements that are observed in alternative development aid initiatives that aim to improve the quality of life for people in developing countries. In addition, the differences between the small and large-scale development projects could be used to gain a further understanding of the functioning of the market-led development aid initiatives in the Gambia.

First this paper will provide a theoretical framework on development aid. This will explain how development aid has developed over the years, what alternative development aid is, and discuss the opinions about the effectiveness of development aid. Second, the methods of this research will be elaborated upon. This will be followed by the presentation and analysis of the research findings. Lastly a conclusion will be given, trying to provide an answer to the research questions.

Theoretical framework

What is development aid?

Aid consists of grants or concessional loans that are spent by governments, international organizations, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO’s), foundations, charities or individuals on different types of goals, programs and projects to give support to the development of a developing country (De Haan, 2007). According to Baylis, Smith & Owens (2013) development is “Economic growth within the context of a free market economy.” (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013, pg. 186). Sachs (1992) furthermore deconstructs development into keywords such as market, environment, production, equality, needs, and poverty. Moyo (2009) furthermore describes different types of aid to support development. The first type is humanitarian aid, which provides aid in case of a catastrophe. The second is charity-based aid, which is aid provided by individuals or organizations trying to alleviate the problems of poverty. The third is systematic aid, which can be subdivided into bilateral and multilateral aid. Bilateral aid indicates a government-to-government provision of financial help and multilateral aid is the financial help of an institution such as the World Bank to a developing government (Moyo, 2009).

In addition, development aid provision can be divided into two sub-groups. Large-scale development aid adopts a top-down approach. Examples are infrastructure building and capacity development (de Haan, 2009). The key actors in large-scale development aid are states, firms and markets as well as the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF), European Union (EU), OECD, and the World Trade Organization (WTO) (Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017). Part of large-scale development aid is the ODA provided by member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). In 2016 a total of $145 Billion of ODA was provided, which was an all-time high (OECD, 2017).

Small-scale development aid, on the other hand, is often non-official aid and makes use of a bottom-up and a community-based approach (Rottenburg, 2009). Examples of this are the digging of wells for communities, restoring local health care centers, or micro power generation initiatives. The key actors in these kinds of projects are individuals, communities, grassroots movements, charities and NGO’s. Development aid should be executed on a local level according to supporters of the small-scale development aid, to enable close monitoring and prevent corruption (Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017). In practice, there is an interaction between these two groups in which the smaller NGO’s projects are for example financially sponsored by ODA (Rottenburg, 2009).

Nevertheless, there are differences distinguished in the existing literature of small and large-scale development aid projects. Small-scale projects are often associated with accompaniment. This is “a form of development cooperation that goes beyond the financial relationship and is based on mutual knowledge, a common commitment and solidarity.” (Clinton, 1991, pg. 63). Small-scale project managers are less inclined compared to large-scale project managers to be influenced by economic or political interests. In addition, the project managers of small-scale projects are often intensively involved with the local citizens (Clinton, 1991). An advantage of making use of a large-scale project is the ability to rely on expert knowledge on implementing development aid and potential have access to large financial investments. This creates opportunities to make use of advanced technologies, which can improve the success of a development project (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013).

Development aid over the years

Although development aid already existed for a longer period of time, its most widely implementation started after World War II. Decolonization stimulated the political independence of previously colonized countries. These countries often received development aid from their previous colonial rulers (Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017). Over the years the ways of implementing development aid have changed, inspired by different development theories.

Initially, a liberalism view was adopted by institutions such as the IMF, UN, the General Agreements on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the World Bank. The liberalism view was supported by Rostow (1960), who argued that newly independent developing countries should adjust political strategies towards stimulating industrialization and market-driven economies to be able to develop (Sumner., & Glennie 2015). Financial aid could help to achieve this (Escobar, 1995). The World Bank and the IMF initiated the Washington Consensus in 1989. This consensus sets requirements for developing countries to liberalize and modernize before they are granted a loan (Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017; Rapley, 2007). This was the start of the high debts of developing countries. Moyo (2009) argues the Washington Consensus shows aid distorts local markets and weakens the ability to form capital for a country.

As part of the liberalism view, a trickle-down idea was applied to aid during the 1960s by major institutions and governments. This is based on the assumption that the increase of a country’s GDP automatically benefits the poor. This idea led to the development of the traditional and orthodox development aid initiatives during the 1960’s. Traditional development aid attempts to reduce poverty by stimulating economic growth (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013). Financial aid should be provided to governments to enhance capital availability (Escobar, 1995). These types of initiatives were characterized with an orientation on the actions of the aid, rather than the outcomes. The aid would only be provided in certain circumstances (Koeberle, Stavreski, & Walliser, 2006). Despite the increase of GDP overall, poverty did not decrease during this time (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013).

Meanwhile, the modernization theory, related to the liberalist theory, emerged. It considers a developing country to be in a primary stage of development. The West should convey knowledge about democracy and capitalism, to help developing countries to progress into a new stage (Rapley, 2007). Part of this view were Scandinavian, Dutch and Canadian aid donors. They shifted their attention toward agriculture. Development projects tried to increase food production in developing countries by for example removing technical constraints (de Haan, 2009).

The perspectives regarding development aid progressed into a predominantly neo-liberalism view (Rapley, 2007). The increased interconnectivity of a globalized world makes it possible to share ideas and common liberalist goals. Developing governments should not be provided with financial aid since the free economic market would already lead to development according to this view (Dunne, Kurki, Smith, 2013; Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017).

In contrast to potential positive effects of development aid according to the liberalism view, Frank (1969) argued in favor of the dependency theory, which can be classified as a left-wing Marxist perspective. According to this view Western countries have put the developing countries in a state of dependence, because western countries require cheap labor and raw natural resources from developing countries (Escobar, 1995). This dependent state started in the 16^th century during the colonization time. The colonialists, the bourgeoisie, imposed a new economy upon the colonies, the periphery nations. Financial profits gained in slavery-trade and natural resources from the colonies were often shipped back to the homeland of the colonial rulers.

After the colonies gained independence the bourgeoisie kept the decolonized countries in a dependent and weak state by providing loans and financial development aid (Escobar, 1995). Critics state that this theory is too simplistic. The dependency theory was the start of the skeptic views toward the effectiveness of traditional development aid (Rapley, 2007).

Besides the dependency theory, neo-institutionalism was initiated at the same time. It proposes that government intervention is the means to achieve economic growth and alleviate poverty. Examples of successes can be observed in various Asian countries such as China, South-Korea, and Singapore. Development aid according to this view could be reduced since the government possesses the power to develop a country (Rapley, 2007). This is related to the realism view. Statism, self-help, and survival will help a country develop rather than aid (Baylis, Smith, & Owens, 2013). However, the realist view on aid also emphasizes the use of aid to establish and maintain global power structures. It was argued that during the cold war, for example, development aid was used to create ties with other countries (de Haan, 2009).

During the 1990’s many studies claimed there was a non-linear relation between aid and growth. A lack of good governance was regarded as the main reason why development aid was not effective (Moyo, 2009). Countries such as China showed economic growth of developing countries could also be achieved without much development aid. Much of the capital that helped to develop the Chinese economy came from offshore Chinese (Rapley, 2007).

This initiated a new view, the post-development theory, which was supported by Escobar (1995). He takes on a de-constructivist perspective (de Haan, 2009). Escobar states development theorists should focus on endogenous discourses. Discourse analysis is the interpretation of language and text according to the underlying structures of thoughts and presuppositions (Pieterse, 2000). Escobar was inspired in this line of thinking by Foucault. Discourses could help explain why countries started to perceive themselves as underdeveloped (Escobar, 1995). He thinks an alternative to development needs to be identified. He puts the emphasis on the anti-development discourse, which argues development is the cultural westernization and homogenization of developing countries (Escobar, 1995). Wolfgang Sachs (1992) contributes to post-development by stating that developing countries desire to be like developed countries (Sachs, 1992). Although the rejection of development aid was not widely accepted, the importance of decentralization, emancipation and participation that post-development stressed, inspired the rethinking process of traditional development aid (Rapley, 2007).

A recent trend is the focus on human development. One of the leading theorists in this department is Amartya Sen (1999) with Development as Freedom. Sen argues that the main goal of development should be the expansion of social, political and economic freedom. Institutions should focus on providing social opportunities, such as quality education, quality healthcare, transparency guarantees and safety security (Sen, 1999).

As part of the focus on human development, alternative ways of providing development aid have occurred. Alternative development thinks aid should be need-oriented in both a materialistic and non-materialistic way. It should offer what is requested and it should be endogenous to the local communities. Alternative development is often applied by NGO’s and grassroots movements. The importance of this group has significantly increased over the past two decades (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013). The ineffectiveness of traditional aid according to this view is caused by the manner in which aid was previously implemented. Aid often did not address the poorest of a country because of a lack of good governance of the recipient country. In addition, a lack of coordination caused unpredictable aid flows that were responding more to the supply of the donor countries than the demand of the recipient countries (De Haan, 2009).

Traditionally donor countries predominantly consist of the United States and European countries. Recently, however, emerging economies, such as China and India have joined forces, as well as major charities such as the Gates Foundation (Hatton, 2017; de Haan, 2009). The Millennium Development Goals that were established in 2000, and agreed upon by 189 countries provide a framework of the goals and measurements of development aid (Smith, El-Anis & Farrands, 2017).

Since World War II different perspectives have dominated the implementation of aid. The approach this study focuses on is the alternative aid approach.

Alternative Development Aid Projects

(Figure 2. Categorization of mentioned types of development aid and case studies)

As mentioned before alternative development aid can have various objectives. The branch this study is limited to perceives entrepreneurship to be a way for citizens to develop themselves and is subsequently market-led. This can be executed by encouraging citizens to engage in entrepreneurship, such as YEP. A different approach is to adopt a social entrepreneurship approach, such as DOMO. A social entrepreneurship is set up similar to a business while addressing a social or sustainable issue. A social entrepreneurship should acquire a clear social mission and try to achieve this by continuous innovation and adaptation (Seelos & Mair, 2005). Dahan et al. (2010) suggest that multinational enterprises should cooperate and partner with NGO’s since they could benefit from the experience of NGO’s while implementing innovative solutions (Dahan, Doh, Oetzel & Yazi, 2010). Another important factor that should be included in the set-up of a social entrepreneurship is innovation according to Fyvie & Ager (1999). Social entrepreneurships currently, however, often struggle to be self-sustaining and to generate revenue, since they often target low-income customer groups (Blowfield, 2012). These are problems that DOMO possibly faces.

Effectiveness of development aid

Many theorists and studies have emphasized the fact that development aid, in general, might not be effective. According to this position development aid increases corruption, erodes democracy, and even decreases the economic growth of a country. Burnside and Dollar (2000) think development aid is not able to achieve its goals. Recipient countries have become too dependent on foreign aid (John & Storr, 2009). Another opponent of development aid is Moyo (2009). Moyo argues development aid distorts the natural working of the economic market and undermines domestic capital formation because it makes developing countries too dependent. Rather, Moyo proposes a dead aid model in which financial aid flows should decrease over time. Developing governments will be forced to find other financing possibilities (Moyo, 2009).

On the other hand, some theorists still believe in the potential of development aid. Lensink and White (2001) for example identified a positive relation between economic growth and aid with diminishing returns. According to Sachs (2005) development aid should be approached similarly to clinical economics. Economies are complex systems and developing countries should be treated as unique cases. Aid should be specifically designed for the ailments of that country. To be able to achieve effective development, monitoring and evaluation of provided aid are crucial, since this reduces potential corruption (Sachs, 2005; John & Storr, 2009). Sachs thinks financial aid support should increase, for it to become effective. The government needs to invest in infrastructure and human capital. It can however not rely on its low-income citizens, and will therefore need aid (Sachs, 2005). Sachs’ view, however, does not explain the growth of economies such as China and India (John & Storr, 2009). Furthermore, Collier (2007) for example argues development aid could be successful if major institutions and countries would collaborate.

Another view of the effectiveness of development aid is proposed by Easterly in The White Man’s Burden (2006). He thinks aid is often misallocated and developed countries possess paternalistic misperceptions of economic development. Easterly, therefore, suggests aid should be executed by small NGO’s and projects that will closely monitor their actions. Individuals should be funded rather than governments (Easterly, 2006). Easterly makes a distinction in his argument between planners and searchers. Planners are individuals that apply a top-down approach in development aid. They claim to make major changes but are not able to achieve this. A distorted principal-agent relation is present. The IMF, the World Bank, and the UN have operated as planners according to Easterly (Easterly, 2006). Rather than planners, financial aid organizations should enforce searchers. Searchers are social entrepreneurs that try to solve a problem in a market. They apply a bottom-up approach and have measurable goals they wish to achieve. Searchers are demand-driven and acknowledge the importance of feedback and accountability (Easterly, 2006). Easterly is a supporter of the alternative way of providing development aid. In real life, it would however be difficult to distinguish between planners and searchers. In addition, successful searcher groups will most likely expand to bigger organizations and suffer from the same problems as the planner approach. (John & Storr, 2009).

Many of these opinions regarding the effectiveness of aid have been constructed by Western development theorists. A different perspective is provided by looking at the public opinion of the recipient countries. A study conducted in nine Sub-Saharan African countries, including Senegal the neighboring country of the Gambia, showed a generally optimistic opinion about development aid. Healthcare and education are recognized as major concerns and require more foreign aid according to 68% of the people. The majority of the people in the research did think however their own government should take the lead in implementing the received aid (Wike, & Simmons, 2015). A different study confirms these findings in Uganda (Nielson, Milner & Findley, 2012).

Limitations of development aid projects

There are multiple problems that are associated with the effectiveness of development aid projects. These problems have also occurred in alternative ways of implementing development aid. De Haan (2009) identifies some of the main problems. The first is the possibility that development project undermines local ownership, which increases dependency. The second is the sustainability of a project. Many projects are not well maintained or monitored. Thirdly, recipient countries of development aid are often burdened by the reporting requirements. Fourthly, projects often do not contribute to overall policy improvements because they are limited to one focus area. Fifthly, developing governments provide less support to areas that receive project aid (de Haan, 2009). Ashwell & Barclay (2010) furthermore conducted a case study in Papua New-Guinea on a market-led, large-scale project. They argued the result of the project was negatively influenced by overly ambitious goals, limited flexibility and limited time available (Ashwell, & Barclay, 2010). Conyers and Mellors (2005) identified similar limitations of development projects in Sub-Saharan Africa. The main problems observed were the ownership of the project, the flexibility, quality of technical expertise, organizational structures, and the responsiveness of the intervention to the local environment. Lastly, Khwaja (2009) discusses the potential unfavorable cultural environment of a developing country involving inequality, a lack of leadership and social fractures. He states projects can overcome this problem by adopting the right design (Khwaja, 2009).

Based on the existing literature it is hypothesized that YEP and DOMO are part of the latest developments in development aid, and are therefore able to overcome previous critiques of traditional development aid. They will however be subject to other problems project implementation possesses.

Research Methods

A qualitative, instrumental, comparative case study was chosen as the research method of this study. This indicates the cases were selected carefully. An instrumental case can be used to gain insights into a certain issue. (Denzin, & Lincoln, 2005). First, to represent a large-scale alternative development aid project with a market-led approach YEP was chosen. Since it is part of an international organization and possesses a great financial capacity it is an interesting case to observe. Second, to find a small-scale alternative development aid project with a market-led approach in the Gambia was more challenging since many small-scale development projects in the Gambia adopt a traditional form. Eventually, DOMO was chosen. It makes use of a market-led approach by adopting social entrepreneurship set-up. Triangulation was used in this study. This is a process of using multiple perspectives on the case to ensure the repeatability of the research (Denzin, & Lincoln, 2005). Different methods can be used as a means to achieve triangulation (Bowen, 2009). The data gathering consisted of document analysis of the projects reports of both cases, interviews, and a focus group discussion.

Sample Selection and Setting:

(Figure 3. Main activities and stakeholder identification YEP. Inspired by Denzin, & Lincoln, 2005)

The first case is the YEP project, the Gambia. It tries to reduce irregular migration by encouraging entrepreneurship and employability of the youths in the Gambia. YEP cooperates with namely the Ministry of Trade, Industry & Employment and the Ministry of Youth and Sports of the Gambian government. Furthermore, they cooperate with a total of 21 Gambian organizations that focus on entrepreneurship. The interviewees were carefully selected, based on their relation and influence on YEP.

To gain insight in the YEP project in the Gambia five interviews were conducted. First, an interview was conducted with the Swiss project manager of YEP at the main office in Bakau. He was previously employed as an innovation manager at the ITC. This interview was of importance in order to obtain the perspective and experience of the executive body of the project.

YEP states that one of its key activities is supporting local Gambian organizations involved in encouraging entrepreneurship (YEP, 2016). In order to observe the activities of these organizations, and their cooperation with YEP a total of four representatives were interviewed of Global Youth Innovation Network (GYIN), Start-Up Incubator, National Enterprise Development Initiative (NEDI) and Empretec. These four organizations were chosen since they closely cooperate and receive funding from YEP. NEDI is publicly supported by the government, the other organizations are private organizations. They are often involved in organizing training to teach the youths about entrepreneurship, monitoring new start-ups, or helping start-ups to obtain a starting capital. These organizations are located in Bakau, Banjul, and Serrakunda in the Kombo area. In addition, the principal of the vocational skills center President International Award (PIA) was interviewed. This school is financially sponsored by the YEP project. Due to unfortunate circumstances, however, the recordings were not completed. This interview will therefore not be taken into consideration.

Furthermore, to be able to integrate the perspective of the Gambian youths that are subjected to YEP, a focus-group discussion was held at the seven-day National Youth Conference (NAYCONF) in the rural area of Basse in the Gambia, organized by the National Youth Council (NYC). This conference annually attracts approximately 2000 youths from different regions of the country. YEP was one of the sponsors of this year. During the Entrepreneurship & Employment workgroup, a focus-group discussion was held with 21 Gambian youth entrepreneurs and students. The discussion was hosted by a member of the NYC. The main subject of the discussion was the level of satisfaction of the current entrepreneurship environment and organizations in the Gambia, including YEP.

Lastly, a document analysis of the project plan of YEP provided additional information to this study.

(Figure 4. Main activities and stakeholder identification DOMO. Inspired by Denzin, & Lincoln, 2005)

The second case is the DOMO project. This is an initiative to tackle the problem of malnutrition in the rural areas in the Gambia in an entrepreneurial way. Annually, three Dutch students are selected to participate. These students will first conduct desk research regarding solar drying for two months in the Netherlands and will proceed to go to the Gambia for three months. Currently, they have installed two solar dryers in two villages Ndokey and Jakabah in the rural area of the Gambia.

To be able to answer the research question regarding small-scale development projects a total of four interviews have been conducted. The three Dutch members of the 2017/2018 project team were interviewed individually after they returned from the Gambia to obtain information about the experience and perspective of the executive body of the project. Both Ndokey and Jakabah were visited. Several days were spent in Ndokey to get familiar with the project members and their activities. In addition, the chief of Ndokey, Khaleef, was interviewed to be able to integrate the perspective of the local citizens. During this interview, approximately 10 other citizens of the village were present, to provide their opinion. Furthermore, a document analysis was carried out on the project plan of project DOMO.

Interview Instrument and Protocol

The interviews consisted of semi-structured, open-end questions focusing on the different sample groups, and were given face-to-face (Merriam, 2002). The managers of both projects received similar questions to make it possible to compare the answers. GYIN, Start-Up Incubator, NEDI and Empretec received different questions focusing on their main activities and relation to YEP. Lastly, the chief of Ndokey received questions about the benefits he experienced from project DOMO. The conducted interviews were given in English, which is the official language of the Gambia. Chief Khaleef, however, did not speak English, therefore a translator was asked to translate the questions and the answers to this interview. The translator was an English teacher from the neighboring village Jakabah. All interviews were tape-recorded after getting consent from the interviewees.

Data Analysis Strategy

First, a document analysis of the project reports of both YEP and DOMO was executed. The data in the reports were selected, evaluated, and synthesized in order to gain an understanding of both projects (Bowen, 2009). Second, the interviews were transcribed and coded accordingly. A table with the themes and accompanying codes can be found in Appendix B. Complete coding was used to identify all the relevant components and to be able to answer the research question. The MAXQDA tool was used to analyze the obtained information of the interviewees and the focus-group discussion. Thematic analysis was applied to analyze the obtained data of both the interviews and the document analysis. This consists of identifying themes and patterns related to the research questions (Braun, & Clarke, 2013). Furthermore, the focus group discussion discussed the opinions of the Gambian youths on entrepreneurship and organizations involved with encouraging entrepreneurship for four days. These outcomes were collectively summarized into three main objectives and themes (Appendix C).

Results

The main findings of the document analysis, interviews and focus group discussion can be sub-divided into five main themes. The identified themes all influenced the outcomes of the project and the potential advantages the Gambian citizens experienced. The following section summarizes the results accompanied with associated quotes.

Development project approach

Both YEP and DOMO adopt a different market-led approach to increase development. The project manager states that the set-up of the activities is part of human design project development and is demand-driven.

R: “I am a great supporter of the human design project development.”

Project DOMO makes use of a social entrepreneurship set-up. The chief of Ndokey confirms that the problem of food spoilage and malnutrition in Ndokey was present before the arrival of DOMO. The citizens of Ndokey and Jakabah did not propose solar-drying to be a solution to their problem, instead, it was suggested by the DOMO project three years ago. Other problems were actually identified to be more pressing by the executive bodies of project DOMO of 2017, such as installing new water wells in the community gardens. Nevertheless, the chief did consider the solar dryer to be useful since it helps to solve the malnutrition problem faced in Ndokey.

L: “: I think if you go back to three years ago, the project was based on western ideas who wished to implement something in the Gambia”

Translator: “Food. That is the biggest problem they face every day.”

Scope of the project

Both projects mention the respective objectives and scope of their projects. The project plan of YEP shows that the target goal of YEP is to reach 10.000 youths with creating awareness, skills development, and training activities. The project manager furthermore explains YEP desires to create and improve 4000 jobs in the four-year time frame. It has 11 million euro available and cooperates with 21 Gambian organizations to achieve this. Figure 5 shows the achievements of YEP since early 2017:

(Figure 5. Visualizations of achievements YEP in cooperation with other organizations based on the website: https://www.yep.gm/, research report, and the interviews)

The project manager, in contrast, stated YEP has helped to train 700 youths on skills development and entrepreneurship training. This involves developing a curriculum, creating the content, and training the trainers with official ITC experts. In addition, a mini-grant program in cooperation with NACCUG has just been launched. The youths of the Gambia have the ability to obtain a small starting capital if they present a good and sustainable business plan.

YEP provides entrepreneurship organizations with financial, capacity, and service support. Figure 5 includes the number of youths the partners of YEP have reached and trained. The interviewees of Empretec, NEDI, GYIN and Start-up Incubator think the help from YEP is useful. Empretec annually provides 700 individuals with a six-day entrepreneurship training. The number of youths NEDI trains depends on the funding they receive in a year. Start-up incubator help approximately 20 young entrepreneurs to develop start-ups every six months. GYIN has given a 12-day entrepreneurship training to 192 people in the age-group of 15 to 35 years past year. 40 individuals have started their own business after receiving this training.

The 21 participants in the focus group discussion were all aware of the existence of YEP. Around 5 participants were interested in opting for the mini-grant program of YEP and NACCUG. 7 participants were trained by organizations such as GYIN and NEDI. They experienced these trainings to be useful.

The scope of project DOMO is considerably smaller. The project plan shows DOMO built 2 solar dryers in Ndokey and Jakabah. 200 to 300 citizens live in Ndokey, and 947 citizens live in Jakabah. The people that make use of the solar dryers most often are the women that work in the community gardens. The project managers think there are not enough surpluses at this moment to be able to generate a profit from the solar dryers. One of the citizens in Jakabah explained that the solar dryer that was built 1,5 years ago in Jakabah was used approximately 25 times. The chief, and the 10 people present during the interview, all agreed however that the contribution of project DOMO was valuable.

Perceived added value

Although the main focus of YEP is encouraging entrepreneurship, they have contributed to the Gambian citizens in other areas as well.

The focus group discussion during NAYCONF stressed the importance of the creation of a social platform to bring together all entrepreneurship organizations. They perceived the lack of cooperation and communication to be a major problem since youths were able to abuse this opportunity by receiving training and grants from multiple organizations. Such a social platform could be provided by YEP. Interviewees of Empretec, Start-Up Incubator, NEDI and GYIN state YEP has started with bringing together the organizations.

M: “We do not have meetings together. Only one time we had a meeting organized by YEP”

The project manager of YEP thinks cooperation and co-creation should be the pillars of YEP.

Another department in which YEP attempts to add value to the Gambian citizens is by improving the educational system. One of the most recent initiatives, as mentioned by the project manager of YEP, is the attempt to establish a general curriculum in cooperation with NAQAA. Furthermore, Empretec is also involved in improving entrepreneurship education in schools. GYIN and Empretec have tried to make their trainings accessible to non-educated Gambians by teaching in the local language. Normally, however, trainings do require a minimum amount of education.

During the focus group discussion at NAYCONF, the Gambian youths proclaimed the importance of a general curriculum implemented at all schools, which is currently not present in the Gambia. They think basic education conveys knowledge that is required to successfully start a business. Mathematics is for example needed for book-keeping.

Focus group: “the quality of the educational system is not sufficient, and does not provide a solid starting point for future entrepreneurs.”

A third added value of YEP is the openness to feedback from the Gambian citizens. YEP possesses a project team of 5 members, of which 2 are foreigners and 3 are Gambians. They run the project for four years, after which the project will be stopped. The project manager of YEP stated that solutions to development issues should come from within the Gambia. This is why YEP makes use of a consultative mechanism with different social groups in the Gambia. The focus group discussion concluded that Gambian youths should actively be involved in the decision-making process on the entrepreneurship environment in the Gambia since it is their future.

The project managers of DOMO consider their added value to be different. They do not perceive the solar dryers or the social entrepreneurship as their biggest contribution. They think they have added value to the Gambian citizens by exchanging cultural ideas and showing them a different mindset.

Furthermore, the project managers of DOMO taught 60 students at the Armitage Senior Secundaire School (ASSS) in the subjects of solar drying building and entrepreneurship for one week. No solar dryer has yet been built by these students, however, three solar dryers have been built by students who were taught in 2015 and 2016, and were donated to two community gardens. In addition, the project managers showed citizens in Ndokey how to build the solar dryer. The chief is convinced he knows how to fix a solar dryer if he would have access to the right tools.

P: “We really tried to let them think critically, which is quite hard in the Gambia, as the educational system is set-up very different compared to ours.

Lastly, project DOMO has actively tried to increase local ownership. A committee was established consisting of Gambian citizens. This committee is responsible for the management and maintenance of project DOMO in Ndokey from now on. The citizens have appointed the committee members themselves. Two of the project managers agree that the Gambian citizens are capable of helping and solving problems together. The chief of Ndokey explains the women will adopt a self-created system to be able to work with the solar dryer.

L: “the ideal way is the people themselves helping each other”

Sustainability of project

Another theme that arose during the interviews and is of importance to the potential advantages to the Gambian citizens, was the sustainability of the projects. The project report of YEP shows the project will last for a total of four years. The project manager of YEP thinks that the Gambian government or other projects might continue with providing similar services after YEP is finished. The interviewed organizations emphasize the issues they often face due to a lack of financial capabilities. They think YEP could provide a solution by offering funding during the upcoming years due to their large budget. This financial aid flow will stop after the termination of the project.

The project managers of DOMO think the solar dryer in Ndokey will at least last for some years. The benefits the citizens of Ndokey experience of the solar dryer will stop if the solar dryer breaks down. It, however, is possible the students of ASSS are able to build a new solar dryer if they have access to the right equipment. It is stated in the project plan that the project is not sustainable right now. The chief of Ndokey however thinks the project can be sustained.

P: “I’m not very sure if it is sustainable right now.”

Problems encountered during project implementation

One of the factors that was mentioned as a problem in the execution of the development projects was the Gambian culture. The project manager of YEP thinks western people possess a capitalistic education and culture, centered around individual economic prosperity. He has experienced that this drive for making money is not omnipresent among Gambians. Another cultural challenge he mentions is the presentation of misinformation. The Gambian interviewee of NEDI also thinks culture is an issue in entrepreneurship. Many people do not possess an entrepreneurial attitude according to him.

Two of the project managers of DOMO mention that project DOMO also observed cultural obstacles. They explain that the Gambian citizens grow up in a culture in which it is common to ask Westerners for material goods or money. This is because they have often received it in the past.

I: “What I also noticed, is that people expect western people will do projects and will help them”

The project manager of YEP also commented on the potential problems that small-scale projects face. He thinks that small-scale projects often possess less professional expertise in executing a development project and possess less capacity to make an impact in the development of a country. A problem of large-scale projects that are initiated by international organizations, however, is that they often have less motivated project managers according to him.

R: “At an individual level you sometimes do not have the same level of research and expertise.”

The project managers of DOMO, on the other hand, think that large-scale project managers are personally less involved with the local citizens. This is why they may adopt a more western view. They agree however in thinking that small-scale projects have a smaller impact on development.

Discussion

Based on the existing literature it was expected that both DOMO and YEP were part of the alternative development aid projects. Moreover, they were most likely to suffer from similar limitations of previous studies on development aid projects. The results show that both projects provide some advantages to the Gambian citizens but not necessarily are part of the alternative development aid.

YEP

The set-up of the YEP project resembles the approach of Sachs in the End of Poverty (2005). The project plan of YEP shows that it regards entrepreneurship as an ailment to unemployment, which they think is one of the main causes of irregular migration to Europe. By improving technical and vocational skills and sponsoring entrepreneurship trainings the human capital of the Gambia is enhanced (YEP, 2017). Moreover, the advantages of being a large-scale development project are present within YEP. By being part of the ITC it is possible for YEP to make use of expert knowledge on development aid. They also receive large financial funding of the EUETF (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013).

By providing financial, capacity and service support and cooperating with 21 organizations, project YEP claims to have trained 700 to 1037 youths, created 242 MSME’s, strengthened 4 institutions, and reached 38098 youths with creating awareness since early 2017. By supporting Start-up Incubator YEP annually will help to establish at least 40 entrepreneurships, and by supporting GYIN approximately 40 entrepreneurships. A question can be raised if this would not have happened if YEP did not exist. The interviewed organizations exist for a longer period of time compared to YEP. Without the help of YEP they most likely would have continued with their previous activities. Therefore, one can argue YEP cannot take credit for all the above-mentioned numbers. The interviewed organizations, however, emphasized they often face financial issues. YEP helps to solve this problem and strengthens the services and capacity of the organizations. Furthermore, the organizations now have the possibility to forward youths to the recently launched YEP mini-grant program when guiding start-ups. One can therefore say YEP helps to train the youths and helps to start new entrepreneurships. Furthermore, YEP also indirectly adds value to its project by helping to create a social platform for entrepreneurship organizations, improving the educational system and integrating feedback from the Gambians. All of which were requested by the youths of the focus group discussion in Basse.

Despite the observed advantages that YEP provides, issues related to the existing academic literature on development aid can also be identified. The traditional way of implementing aid was criticized upon, based on the dependency theory during the 1970’s (Escobar, 1995). Part of this criticism can also be applied to the YEP project. One of the main activities of YEP is the provision of financial aid to both individual Gambian citizens and Gambian organizations. These individuals and organizations are potentially being pushed into a dependent state. Project YEP will only last for a total of four years. Afterward, the individuals and organizations will face the issues of financing shortages once more.

In addition, project DOMO possesses other similar characteristics of the traditional way of implementing aid (De Haan, 2009). It is doubtful whether YEP addresses the poorest of the Gambia. The trainings and grants offered often require a minimum education, which the poorest people of the Gambia cannot afford to pay for. Therefore, YEP only provides benefits for a certain segment of the Gambian population.

YEP adopts a top-down approach, similar to the planners’ approach identified by Easterly (2006). This increases the probability of a distorted principal-agent relation. YEP cooperates with 21 implementing partners, and financially gives support to part of them. It is not feasible to constantly monitor the actions of all partners. A matter of information asymmetry is present since YEP does not know what the intentions of the partners are. The chances increase that aid will be misallocated (Easterly, 2006).

Project DOMO

Project DOMO’s rationale in development aid is similar to the human development view of Development as Freedom from Sen (1999). They try to provide social opportunities to the citizens of Ndokey. Furthermore, the importance of decentralization, emancipation, and participation that became apparent from the post-development theory are observed in the project implementation of DOMO, since the team increased local ownership by making a committee responsible for the management of the solar dryer in Ndokey (Rapley, 2007). Another comparison can be drawn in respect to Easterly’s book The White Man’s Burden. The project managers of DOMO assumingly act as searchers in the project. They make use of a bottom-up approach and adopt a social entrepreneurship set-up.

The DOMO project provides advantages to the citizens of Ndokey and Jakabah by having produced two solar dryers. Citizens can use the solar dryer to dry their crops. Although no profits are gained of the social entrepreneurship yet, it does help to partly solve the problem of malnutrition. Furthermore, the project team emphasized the benefits of broadening the cultural horizon of the citizens. The actual benefits of this have not been measured. The advantage of small-scale development project of accompaniment is however present (Clinton, 1991). DOMO has taught 60 students about entrepreneurship and solar drying. This knowledge transfer is potentially beneficial since three solar dryers already have been built by former students of 2015 and 2016.

Nevertheless, project DOMO possesses limitations regarding the advantages it offers to the citizens of Ndokey and Jakabah. First of all, adopting an alternative way of providing development aid entails possessing a need-oriented view (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013). Although DOMO tries to incorporate feedback from the citizens of Ndokey and Jakabah, they acknowledge the supply of the solar dryer was not necessarily demand-driven.

Other limitations that have been identified in previous studies on development aid projects are the sustainability of a project, flexibility, quality of technical expertise and the time available to execute a project (De Haan, 2009; Ashwell, & Barclay, 2010). Similar problems are present in project DOMO. The social entrepreneurship set-up of project DOMO does not provide the citizens with a revenue since there are not enough surpluses of the crops. The first installed solar dryer was used 25 times in 1,5 years, which is not considered to be much. The project is therefore not sustainable. Furthermore, annually three months in total are spent in the Gambia to execute the project. This restricts both the flexibility and the time available of the project. Lastly, the project is being executed by three students without any prior experience in providing development aid. The technical expertise is therefore limited.

Limitations

The first limitation of this research is the sample set. To be able to represent the Gambian citizens more interviews ought to be conducted. In addition, most of the youths that were present during the focus group discussion in NAYCONF have had an education (YEP, 2017). Approximately 60% of the Gambian youths are not educated. The focus group discussion, therefore, does not represent all opinions of the Gambian youths. Second, the study relies mostly on subjective data. The interviews have been interpreted by only one person. Third, the interviews were conducted in English. This is not the native language of both the interviewer and the interviewees. This complicated communication possibilities and might have influenced the results. Lastly, these case studies cannot represent all small and large-scale, market-led, development aid projects in the Gambia. Nevertheless, useful insights can be gained from them.

Future Research

Many previous studies looked into development aid (de Haan, 2009). This study solely focused on the market-led alternative way of implementing development aid in the Gambia. Future research could look into the potential benefits of for example micro-financing to the Gambian citizens. This study furthermore has shown there are advantages of making use of alternative development aid, yet also some considerable disadvantages. An interesting future research would be to examine if the disadvantages outweigh the advantages, which might provide implications for the implementation of other projects in the Gambia.

Conclusion

The purpose of this study was to identify whether small and large-scale, market-led, alternative development aid projects are advantageous to the Gambian citizens.

The findings of the case studies show that both YEP and DOMO provide certain advantages to the Gambian citizens to a limited extent. Although it is uncertain how much YEP accounts for it did support the training of a considerable amount of Gambian youths, and contributed to the Gambian economic market by creating MSME’s and strengthening institutions. In addition, they respond to the demands of the youths regarding improvements in the entrepreneurship environment of the Gambia. The potential advantages are however limited by the implementation of the project. Although YEP tries to adopt a market-led, alternative approach, it still possesses similarities with the liberalism, traditional way of implementing aid (Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013). YEP is involved in stimulating the economic growth of the Gambia by creating employment opportunities. This is one of the main goals of traditional development aid. Criticisms on the traditional way of implementing aid involved opinions about the dependent state of receiving parties of development aid and the inability of traditional development aid to address the poorest of a country (Frank, 1969; de Haan, 2009). YEP has not been able to overcome these critiques yet. Furthermore, YEP might be susceptible to a distorted principal-agent relation, which in the worst-case scenario could give opportunities to corruption.

DOMO is less advantageous to the Gambian citizens compared to YEP. It solely addresses two small villages in the rural area of the Gambia. Nevertheless, they slightly improved the quality of life of the citizens of Ndokey and Jakabah by decreasing the problem of malnutrition. Furthermore, by teaching students about entrepreneurship and solar drying they have created awareness and provided opportunities to 60 youths to develop their own solar dryers.

Although project DOMO’s approach seems to be similar to the searcher approach of Easterly, and the alternative development approach, it is different in practice (Easterly, 2006; Baylis, Smith & Owens, 2013). Project DOMO has tried to adopt a social entrepreneurship approach to their project. Despite the good intentions, this market-led approach did provide the Gambian citizens with revenues. Furthermore, the project was not demand-driven. Project DOMO also experiences similar limitations to their project that have been identified in previous studies (de Haan, 2009).

A question that can be raised, and should be re-evaluated, is whether the alternative way of providing development aid is really different after all.

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Market-led Alternative Development Aid in the Gambia A comparative case study analysis of small and large sized alternative market-led development aid projects

Table of contents

Abstract

Introduction

Theoretical framework

What is development aid?

Development aid over the years

Alternative Development Aid Projects

Effectiveness of development aid

Limitations of development aid projects

Research Methods

Sample Selection and Setting:

Interview Instrument and Protocol

Data Analysis Strategy

Results

Development project approach

Scope of the project

Perceived added value

Sustainability of project

Problems encountered during project implementation

Discussion

YEP

Project DOMO

Limitations

Future Research

Conclusion

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