PSDF and the research team worked to fully understand both the skilled labor Providers’ minimum education requirements market and the market for skills training in Punjab. The labor market was moving away from agriculture towards more technical sectors, where labor supply fell short of demand. Meanwhile, workers were unable to meet most of the skill qualifications that employers required, yet if they sought training to improve their job prospects, they found inadequate supply of training programs.

The research team launched a set of surveys of households, trainers and employers. Demand for skills training among individuals appeared high: 90% of household survey respondents stated that at least one household member would attend a training, if offered. However, there appeared to be a mismatch between the kinds of training needed and the training supplied. A majority of the training courses required Trainee’s education profile basic schooling as a prerequisite, yet many respondents, particularly women, lacked basic numeracy and literacy skills and had not attended school.

Based on the market mismatch that the surveys identified, PSDF worked with training institutions to adjust both what they required and what they offered. Training providers adjusted their prerequisites to include trainees who lacked basic schooling, and integrated basic literacy and numeracy components into their trainings. They also designed and launched a pilot of a diverse set of courses to attract different segments of the population.

Researchers designed an evaluation of these courses to test impact on earnings, employment, and participation of women and marginalized groups in the labor market. They offered randomly selected individuals in target districts vouchers to enroll in training courses.

In spite of the previously observed high demand for skills training, of those who received vouchers, only 5% actually enrolled in and completed courses. The percentage was even lower among target groups like women and the poor.

The low redemption rate of vouchers clearly indicated that the program was not likely to be successful at scale, particularly among women. Therefore, the research team and PSDF embarked on a series of pilot experiments that specifically addressed the accessibility challenges among women. Data from the accessibility pilot experiments identified that the social and financial costs of travel to and from training centers constrained women from enrolling in training courses. The research team further diagnosed the causes through field visits to rural households involving interviews and focus groups with women, which then helped PSDF to design interventions to alleviate those constraints. PSDF expanded its pilot training program for rural women to a much larger sample and to a wider variety of treatments, as identified through researchers’ qualitative efforts. PSDF implemented this expanded program and collaborated with the research team to test voucher take-up by randomly varying access to:

• Physical distance, tested by setting up training centers in selected villages

• Safe and reliable transportation, tested by offering the option of free group transportation

• Information, tested by distribution of leaflets and holding informational sessions with trainees

• Social norms, tested through community mobilization efforts

• Financial stipends, tested by offering various levels of stipends to trainees The most effective approach was in-village training, raising voucher take-up as high as 50%. In second place—but at half the impact—was group transportation. Information and community support did not have any effect.