introduction The Population Council's

The Population Council's FRONTIERS in Reproductive Health Program and Policy Research Division, in collaboration with CARE India, are conducting an operations research study of an intervention designed to improve the lives and prospects of young women in several urban slum areas of Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. The project aims to take a pre-existing reproductive health program for adolescents and test the feasibility and impact of adding four additional components to it: 1) counseling about savings formation and livelihoods, 2) training in vocational skills, 3) assistance in opening savings accounts and 4) follow-up support. CARE India is managing the larger adolescent reproductive health project, called the Action for Slum Dwellers' Reproductive Health, Allahabad (ASRHA). Previous Project Updates (November 2001) have reported on the design and implementation of the study's intervention and how it is integrated within the CARE ASRHA Project. This report presents key findings from the study's baseline survey. Approximately seven years ago CARE India began working in 65 slum areas of Allahabad to provide reproductive health services for approximately 28,000 disadvantaged women through activities that included, among others, the creation of Women's Health Associations. The CARE pilot project was renewed for five years in 1999.