This document outlines a 7-step business plan for reaching at-risk girls in socially and economically disadvantaged communities. The steps include: 1) Identifying hotspots of at-risk girls, 2) Generating maps of these communities, 3) Paying attention to numbers and risk intensity, 4) Determining eligible girls within locations, 5) Calculating project investment requirements, 6) Identifying stakeholders to invest in reaching one-third of girls in each risk category, and 7) Counting direct and indirect program beneficiaries. The goal is to efficiently target resources to improve outcomes for vulnerable girls through community-based programming.

1. A Business Plan for Girls: A Quick 7 Steps
1. Identify hotspots of socially-excluded, economically
poor, at-risk girls, such as:
• Girls in sub-national districts with high levels of child and forced
marriage
•Girls 10-14 out of school or significantly behind grade for their age,
especially those living apart from one or both parents
•Girls and young women 10-24 in high HIV zones
•Married girls, subject to high levels of unprotected sex, putting them at
risk of sexually-transmitted diseases including HIV, facing substantial
pressure for early and rapid childbearing

2. 2. Generate maps by sub-region and by urban community
Percent of Girls 10-14 not in school and not living with either parent in Mozambique (137,768 )
Source: “The Adolescent Experience In-Depth: Using Data to Identify and Reach the Most Vulnerable Young People” New York:
Population Council, 2009. http://www.popcouncil.org/publications/serialsbriefs/AdolExpInDepth.asp

3. 3. Pay Intelligent Attention to
Numbers and Intensity of Risk
The focus on sub-national regions and
specific communities with high
concentrations of effected girls is vital to the
efficient targeting of scarce resources. We
must finally get over a sometimes exclusive,
“big country” focus. The focus on big
countries carries with it the assumption that
they bring automatic leverage and numbers.

4. Consider This: There are Large Populations of Girls
who are Out-of-School and at High Risk who Do Not
Live in Big Countries
Region Estimation of girls 10-14 who are out of
school and “off-track”
Francophone West Africa
(Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Togo) 2,737,575
Central America 220,775
(Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua)
Large countries
Bangladesh 457,156
Ethiopia 2,418,472
India 12,965,088
Kenya 237,649
Nigeria 2,817,995
Tanzania 375,680
Sources: United Nations Population Division. World Population Prospects.: The 2008 Revision. Latest DHS data available for given countries cited from “The Adolescent
Experience in-Depth”, by Population Council. Tabulations by Sarah Engebretsen.

5. Step 4: Within your potential project locations, determine number of
eligible girls in key categories to inform recruitment plans and set
threshold goals
During the Burkina Capacity Building Workshop in 2010, a participant from Benin created a table to illustrate
the categories of vulnerable girls in Benin per region, and thereby number of eligible program beneficiaries
Source: Joseph Avocat, UNFPA Benin. “Apercu des groupes cibles Benin.” June 2010

6. Step 5: Project Investment
Requirements
A notional range of costs for girl programming based on five programs in five
different settings which had reach some scale generated a range (heavily
conditioned by context) of per hour per girl from $0.29 to $2.45 with an
average cost of $1.47
The $0.29 figure was from a fairly “low-touch” girl savings program and the
$2.45 figure was from a relatively ambitious second-chance schooling
program for girls
Effective program-based intervention can be as little as 31 hours.
These costs vary by program ambition and type but it is not unusually costly
to produce measurable results at level of the girl, some of which can, if
scaled effectively, translate into changing community norms and indicators.
Source: Editors: Sewall-Menon, Jessica and Bruce, Judith. “The Cost of Reaching the Most Disadvantaged Girls:
Programmatic Evidence from Egypt, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Kenya and Uganda, and South Africa.” Forthcoming

7. Step 6: Identify Key Stakeholders Willing to Make
Sequential Investments which Reach at Least One-Third of
Girls in Each Key Category in Highly Affected Zones
Country Zone Category of Girls Donor
Niger A Girls 10-14 at risk X
of child marriage
Mozambique B Out of school girls Y
8-16 at risk of
poor reproductive
health outcomes
Tanzania C Bar girls 16-20 at Z
risk of sexual and
economic
exploitation

8. Step 7: Count Access and Results
Estimate the girls who are direct program
beneficiaries
Estimate the indirect program beneficiaries--
girls in relevant geographic and social
relationships to girls most directly reached

9. We can think of access for a girls’ program (like a health
service) as having both direct and indirect beneficiaries as
measured in geographic and social access
Another 400 girls 10-14
3 km radius
200 Another 600 girls
8-9 & 15-18
Girls

10. Scaling Out and Up: A state of 3 million people of which 7% are girls 10-14 (210,000
girls) has 100 places which serves 200 girls 10-14 each per year (about a 1/3 of the
girls in the community within the age segment). These programs have 20,000 direct
beneficiaries and another 100,000 girls living in range of a girls’ platform.
v
v
Total program access:
v 20,000 girls w/direct access
v + 40,000 w/ indirect access same age
v
v 60,000 w/ indirect access and older
v v
v v 120,000 girls (10-19)
v
v v
v
v v
v v