IFC’s Development Results

Positive development outcomes are the principal measure of IFC’s success. IFC’s strategy, activities, investments, and incentives all emphasize development results.

We assess our development effectiveness principally through:

1. Standard indicators, which capture the investment’s development reach to affected stakeholders and track our achievement against expected development objectives defined at the beginning of the project
2. An overall development outcome assessment, which captures economic,environmental and social, and financial performance of the project along with broader private sector development impacts.

More about how we measure results.

Impacts on Stakeholders – Standard Indicators
To assess how our investments touch the lives of stakeholders, we collect data across standard development reach indicators. In 2006, for example, our clients treated 4 million hospital patients, educated 353,000 students, and provided electricity to 9.5 million customers. Different projects impact stakeholders differently, and our analysis shows how these impacts differ by industry given the nature of their operations. When we can, we quantify these benefits and costs to society overall by calculating the project’s Economic Rate of Return but not all benefits can be monetized easily.


Development Reach of IFC-supported Client Companies, 2006 – Some examples

Beneficiaries	Results in 2006*
MSMEs (Micro, small, and medium enterprises)	$57 billion in loans to over 5 million recipients
Patients	4 million patients reached
Telephone customers	53 million new customers connected
Governments	Received $9.9 billion in payments
Local suppliers	Sold $31 billion worth of their goods and services to our client companies

*Reach data for selected industries; reporting periods vary somewhat across select industries


IFC’s Overall Development Success
The overall development outcome rating is an important measure of IFC’s institutional effectiveness. It is based on ratings for four underlying performance areas – financial, economic, and environmental and social performance, along with an assessment of broader impact on private sector development. IFC rates all portfolio companies to know how we are doing and to answer questions, for example, what proportion of our projects is successful in terms of development outcome, and which regions or sectors perform better and why.


Development Outcome of IFC’s Investment Operations



In fiscal year 2007, 63 percent of IFC’s investment operations were successful in terms of overall development outcome. This does not mean that the remaining 37 percent "failed," but rather that they did not meet IFC’s high standards. Among the four performance components that inform the overall development outcome, satisfactory financial performance was hardest to achieve: 56 percent of our projects met our benchmark, a financial return that exceeds the company’s cost of capital. Environmental and social performance was strongest overall: 75 percent of IFC projects were rated successful.

More about IFC's success rates.
More about our analysis and findings.
More about Results in IFC in Context.