How do we achieve real change?

As a recommended charity of The Life You Can Save and Giving What We Can, and formerly of GiveWell, we at IGN often face questions about the impact of our work.  Frequently, we are asked about how many people are impacted, or more explicitly, how many lives we have improved, and at what cost per person.

Recently, Bill Gates recommended checking out GiveWell’s research, saying the organization offers suggestions for cost-effective, evidence backed charities that save or improve the most lives per dollar.  This approach is also taken by many other funders in this space when choosing charities to donate to.

There is undoubtedly a humanitarian need for largely externally funded commodity-driven interventions, such as donation of bednets or deworming tablets, which have uncertain sustainability once external support ends.  But we believe this should be balanced by support for organizations which, like IGN, work towards achieving nationally owned large-scale interventions which rely on a country’s own resources, supported by external technical advice and initial coordination.

The problem with this approach in terms of appeal to donors is that prioritizing national ownership and sustainability takes longer and is harder to measure.  Because our work often starts with identifying and uncovering problems, investment in us doesn’t always give an immediate impact.  Sometimes, it starts with a country visit that identifies a problem and then working with partners to fix it as in Madagascar.  We’re just beginning to understand the lack of iodized salt on the market in Cambodia, and hope to work with government to address it.  And with the World Health Organization and Kiwanis International, we are producing a major, in-depth report on iodine deficiency in Europe, which will be released later this year.  All these initiatives have and will ultimately impact millions of lives.

Beyond costs and lives saved, there are other imperatives. Speaking about Gaza, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken pointed out that the effects on young, growing children of a prolonged period without sufficient food can have lifelong consequences.  This is certainly true of iodine deficiency, which can significantly affect the developing brains of children and impact their capacity to learn and later influence how to live productive lives as adults.  There are others who support this perspective: Michael Plant, who founded and leads the Happier Lives Institute, part of the effective altruism movement, believes well-being should be part of the equation. Ensuring adequate iodine nutrition to allow children to achieve their full potential to learn, earn and live better lives, aligns with this thinking.

Our goal is for every country to make iodized salt available to everyone, with plans and resources to sustain it without external support.  The existence of IGN is vital, not just to achieving but sustaining real change, because we are there to monitor the situation when others inevitably move on to other priorities, to uncover impending problems, and to create partnerships and leverage national resources to address them, so that progress can be protected.

We can’t always immediately bring it down to dollars or numbers impacted, IGN’s way of working certainly increases the likelihood of sustained improvement. And we know that without our work and watchfulness, children may once again face the lifelong impacts of iodine deficiency.