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57 2. With and without intervention design – this type of comparative analysis requires an organisation to first carefully select two or more geographical locations with similar socio-economic characteristics. One of the sites/locations can be exposed to the intervention while the other(s) act as a base for comparing. If the site or location receiving an intervention (herein called with- intervention) is showing improvement or change relative to the site without intervention (herein called without), the intervention is deemed to have impact. Though, this option has advantages, one of the criticisms is that it suffers from contamination; a situation that occurs when participants in one condition (i.e. without-intervention) are indirectly affected by the intervention offered to other condition (with) because they interact with participants in another condition (Leary, 2004). This design is common in evaluation studies that use the quasi-experimental design. 3. Intervention and control design - this is the most powerful yet under-utilised option for making comparative analysis. This form of establishing a baseline should only be used when an organisation is experimenting the efficacy of an intervention before it is scaled up to beneficiaries or locations. Where the efficacy of a proposed intervention is known, the first two options discussed above are recommended. This option requires the organisation to randomly select potential beneficiaries of the intervention into one arm known as intervention (also known as. experimental or project group) and the other arm known as control (group that does not receive the intervention). The control group is used as a basis for comparing change with the intervention group. Although this option is powerful in bringing out differences, it is very expensive and has ethnical setback. Other forms for establishing a basis for comparison Although the options discussed above are the most frequently used, there are other options organizations can use, these include international and national benchmarks, documents and rolling baseline profiles: 1. International and national benchmarks - poverty datum line, human development index, child developmental milestones, and carbon emission benchmarks are examples of standards that organisations can use to assess progress or impact they are making. The advantages of these benchmarks are that they are internationally or nationally accepted, as such they are acceptable to most stakeholders. Organizations do not need to spend money to establish these standards as they are readily available. 2. Documented statistics – documented data about a particular region or area can be a source of data to be used for comparisons later in a project or programme. For instance, the Zambia demographic