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The overarching methodology of this research is comparative case study. The purpose of a comparative case study is to uncover and compare mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion of extreme poor people, and what this implies for development interventions in the selected research locations.

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A recent research project on the development of a new methodology for monitoring and evaluation, namely Participatory Assessment of Development (PADev), presented a striking conclusion, namely that extreme poor people are not reached by the bulk of development interventions (Pouw et al., 2016; Pouw and Baud, 2012). One of the partners in this research was the Dutch Non-Governmental Organization (hereafter, NGO) Woord en Daad. This organization aims to reach extreme poor people through their development interventions. The conclusions of the PADev project were reason enough for Woord en Daad to support further research into the difficulty of effectively reaching extreme poor people. Therefore, four case studies are conducted in three of Woord en Daad’s partner countries, respectively, Bangladesh, Benin and two cases in Ethiopia. Although, Woord en Daad partner organizations have been selected and used as entry points into the respective communities, the research is carried out in a scientifically independently manner.

There are solid reasons for including Bangladesh as the first case study in this research. Firstly, Bangladesh is still amongst the poorest countries of the world. With an HDI of 0.579, it ranks 139 out of 188 (UNDP, 2016a). Even though improvement in social-economic indicators are visible, Bangladesh scores below average in comparison to other medium human development countries in South Asia. According to Bangladesh’s Household Income and Expenditure survey of 2010, 17.6 per cent of the population belong to the extreme poor category (Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, 2012). Secondly, there is an enormous NGO presence in the country and, in particular, many interventions that specifically address extreme poor people. Any successful interventions in this regard generally originate from the NGO BRAC. With a history of 41 years of doing development work, BRAC has considerable experience of undertaking participatory development work and experimenting with the targeting of extreme poor people. Over the years, BRAC has developed a method to target extreme poor people, called: ‘Targeting the Ultra Poor (TUP)’ programme (see Chapter 3.5).

It is worthwhile scrutinizing whether these attempts have indeed been successful and, if so, whether it is possible to reproduce this success in a different context, specifically in an African context. For obvious reasons, the research cannot include all NGOs in Bangladesh, but it takes the ‘potential influence’ of BRAC into account in the research areas and especially with regard to Woord en Daad’s Bangladeshi partner and their approach to targeting extreme poor people.

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The second location that was selected for a case study is Benin. The country is classified as a low human development country with an HDI of 0.485 (UNDP, 2016b). Despite improvements in the HDI, the country scores below average in comparison to other low human development countries (average HDI of 0.497) (UNDP, 2016b).

Benin was also selected on the basis of Woord en Daad’s Beninese partner, which is implementing multiple types of interventions, e.g. in the education, economic and agricultural sector. This provides an opportunity to compare different types of interventions and examine whether certain interventions have greater potential than others to effectively reach and include extreme poor people.

Lastly, Ethiopia is included as a case study. Like Benin, Ethiopia is classified as a low human development country with an HDI of 0.448 (UNDP, 2016c). Two Ethiopian partner organizations of Woord en Daad were selected for this case study due to their experience in targeting extreme poor people. One of the partner organizations is also active in an urban context. Given that the other two case studies are in a rural context, it is important to include an urban environment as well, since 54 per cent of the world’s population resides in an urban environment. It is estimated that the majority of Africa’s and Asia’s population will reside in urban areas by 2050, an expected 56% and 64%, respectively (UN DESA, 2014). The other Woord en Daad partner organization works in a rural area and was selected in an attempt to draw comparisons and differentiate with the two other rural case studies in Bangladesh and Benin.

The fieldwork for this research was carried out in three blocks in 2012 and 2013, amounting to approximately 28 weeks. The first fieldwork block was in Bangladesh from the beginning of April to mid-May 2012. From mid- October to mid-December 2012 the fieldwork in Benin was conducted. The third block of fieldwork was conducted at the beginning of February until the beginning of May 2013. During these three blocks both primary and secondary data for this research was collected.