Download or read book Can Social Cash Transfers Reduce Chronic Poverty A Case Study of the Malawi SCT Program written by Tuntufye Brighton Ndambo and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2016-04-04 with total page 73 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Master's Thesis from the year 2013 in the subject Politics - Topic: Development Politics, grade: 2.1, University of Reading (Graduate Institute of International Development and Applied Economics), course: Development Policy, Practice and Process, language: English, abstract: The purpose of this study was to explore the role that social cash transfers play in reducing chronic poverty in developing countries. The study was set up following an upsurge in development policy on the use of social protection measures including cash transfers as effective means for reducing deep poverty levels and curtailing trans-generational transmissions of poverty. The study was in a form of a case, using the Malawi Social Cash Transfers (SCTs) Scheme. It specifically aimed at exploring the targeting mechanism of the Malawi SCTs scheme, beneficiaries’ use of cash transfers, and on identifying synergies in the scheme. Using a mixed methods approach, the study was mostly based on the review of literature. This was supplemented by key informant interviews conducted by phone. The study found that overall, the Malawi SCTs scheme plays a significant role in moving chronically poor households out of their deprivations. Beneficiaries of the scheme were found to have increased capabilities in accessing food, education and health services and in acquiring assets such as livestock and permanent houses. However, the study also found that despite its positive impacts, the scheme fails to reach out to all chronically poor households in the country. This was found to be a result of the targeting mechanism followed by the scheme. As such, it was found that the scheme faces a lot of challenges in implementing complimentary services since communities, based on the understanding that everyone is poor, exclude SCT beneficiaries from benefiting from other social protection programmes. Furthermore, it was found that erratic provision of transfers to beneficiary households erodes the positive impacts of the scheme. Therefore the study concluded that although SCTs play a significant role in reducing chronic poverty, better operational designs, such as use of domestic financing and universal targeting measures, would make the schemes more effective.
Download or read book The World Bank Research Observer written by and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Social Protection Policy in Malawi written by Solomon Mkumbwa and published by LAP Lambert Academic Publishing. This book was released on 2012-08 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since independence in 1964, Malawi's social policies were universal, built in a socialist framework and delivered by the state in sectors such as education, health, food, water, housing, and energy. Following the weakening and/or dismantling in the late 1980s to early 1990s, of the heavy state apparatus and interventions in the provisioning of these social services, both poverty and vulnerability deepened and broadened. Under the advice and/or coercion of the World Bank and IMF, the down-sizing and closure of state operations were aimed at cutting public spending and enhancing government's ability to repay its bad debts so that it can borrow fresh ones. However, both the approach and speed at which these reforms ensued drove many able-bodied people into joblessness and poverty, and chronically poor into state of destitution. The book picks on the Amartya Sen's entitlement theory, to analyze the social and economic benefits of direct cash transfers vis-a-vis in-kind transfers in addressing the rising chronic poverty and vulnerability among both the able-bodied and labour-poor households. Two case studies from Malawi are used to demonstrate the field evidence."
Download or read book From Evidence to Action written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2018-10-18 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cash transfers have become a key social protection tool in developing countries and have expanded dramatically in the last two decades. However, the impacts of cash transfers programmes, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa, have not been substantially documented. This book presents a detailed overview of the impact evaluations of these programmes, carried out by the Transfer Project and FAO’s From Protection to Production project. The 14 chapters include a review of eight country case studies: Kenya, Ghana, Ethiopia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Malawi, South Africa, as well as a description of the innovative research methodologies, political economy issues and good practices to design cash transfer programmes. The key objective of the book is to enhance the understanding of these development programmes, how they lead to a broad range of social and productive impacts and also of the role of programme evaluation in the process of developing policies and implementing programmes.
Download or read book The Cash Dividend written by Marito Garcia and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2012-02-21 with total page 441 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides in-depth descriptions and analysis of how cash transfer programs have evolved and been used in Sub-Saharan Africa since 2000. The analysis focuses on program features and implementation, but it also highlights political economy issues and current knowledge gaps.
Download or read book From Protection to Production written by Paul Winters and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Malawi Social Cash Transfer (SCT) scheme is part of a wave of social protection programmes providing cash to poor households in order to reduce poverty and hunger and promote child education and health. This paper looks beyond the protective function of such programmes, analysing their productive impacts. Taking advantage of an experimental impact evaluation design, we find the SCT generates agricultural asset investments, reduces adult participation in low skilled labour, and limits child labour outside the home while increasing child involvement in household farm activities. The paper dispels the notion that cash support to ultra poor households in Malawi is charity or welfare, and provides evidence of its economic development impacts.
Download or read book Learning from Diversity Social Protection Programs in South Africa and Malawi written by Bernard and published by . This book was released on 2024-06-18 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Conditional Cash Transfers written by Ariel Fiszbein and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2009-02-09 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programs aim to reduce poverty by making welfare programs conditional upon the receivers' actions. That is, the government only transfers the money to persons who meet certain criteria. These criteria may include enrolling children into public schools, getting regular check-ups at the doctor's office, receiving vaccinations, or the like. They have been hailed as a way of reducing inequality and helping households break out of a vicious cycle whereby poverty is transmitted from one generation to another. Do these and other claims make sense? Are they supported by the available empirical evidence? This volume seeks to answer these and other related questions. Specifically, it lays out a conceptual framework for thinking about the economic rationale for CCTs; it reviews the very rich evidence that has accumulated on CCTs; it discusses how the conceptual framework and the evidence on impacts should inform the design of CCT programs in practice; and it discusses how CCTs fit in the context of broader social policies. The authors show that there is considerable evidence that CCTs have improved the lives of poor people and argue that conditional cash transfers have been an effective way of redistributing income to the poor. They also recognize that even the best-designed and managed CCT cannot fulfill all of the needs of a comprehensive social protection system. They therefore need to be complemented with other interventions, such as workfare or employment programs, and social pensions.
Download or read book The Road to Results written by Linda G. Morra-Imas and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2009 with total page 611 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'The Road to Results: Designing and Conducting Effective Development Evaluations' presents concepts and procedures for evaluation in a development context. It provides procedures and examples on how to set up a monitoring and evaluation system, how to conduct participatory evaluations and do social mapping, and how to construct a "rigorous" quasi-experimental design to answer an impact question. The text begins with the context of development evaluation and how it arrived where it is today. It then discusses current issues driving development evaluation, such as the Millennium Development Goals and the move from simple project evaluations to the broader understandings of complex evaluations. The topics of implementing 'Results-based Measurement and Evaluation' and constructing a 'Theory of Change' are emphasized throughout the text. Next, the authors take the reader down 'the road to results, ' presenting procedures for evaluating projects, programs, and policies by using a 'Design Matrix' to help map the process. This road includes: determining the overall approach, formulating questions, selecting designs, developing data collection instruments, choosing a sampling strategy, and planning data analysis for qualitative, quantitative, and mixed method evaluations. The book also includes discussions on conducting complex evaluations, how to manage evaluations, how to present results, and ethical behavior--including principles, standards, and guidelines. The final chapter discusses the future of development evaluation. This comprehensive text is an essential tool for those involved in development evaluation.
Download or read book Realizing the Full Potential of Social Safety Nets in Africa written by Kathleen Beegle and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2018-07-02 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Poverty remains a pervasive and complex phenomenon in Sub-Saharan Africa. Part of the agenda in recent years to tackle poverty in Africa has been the launching of social safety nets programs. All countries have now deployed safety net interventions as part of their core development programs. The number of programs has skyrocketed since the mid-2000s though many programs remain limited in size. This shift in social policy reflects the progressive evolution in the understanding of the role that social safety nets can play in the fight against poverty and vulnerability, and more generally in the human capital and growth agenda. Evidence on their impacts on equity, resilience, and opportunity is growing, and makes a foundational case for investments in safety nets as a major component of national development plans. For this potential to be realized, however, safety net programs need to be significantly scaled-up. Such scaling up will involve a series of technical considerations to identify the parameters, tools, and processes that can deliver maximum benefits to the poor and vulnerable. However, in addition to technical considerations, and at least as importantly, this report argues that a series of decisive shifts need to occur in three other critical spheres: political, institutional, and fiscal. First, the political processes that shape the extent and nature of social policy need to be recognized, by stimulating political appetite for safety nets, choosing politically smart parameters, and harnessing the political impacts of safety nets to promote their sustainability. Second, the anchoring of safety net programs in institutional arrangements †“ related to the overarching policy framework for safety nets, the functions of policy and coordination, as well as program management and implementation †“ is particularly important as programs expand and are increasingly implemented through national channels. And third, in most countries, the level and predictability of resources devoted to the sector needs to increase for safety nets to reach the desired scale, through increased efficiency, increased volumes and new sources of financing, and greater ability to effectively respond to shocks. This report highlights the implications which political, institutional, and fiscal aspects have for the choice and design of programs. Fundamentally, it argues that these considerations are critical to ensure the successful scaling-up of social safety nets in Africa, and that ignoring them could lead to technically-sound, but practically impossible, choices and designs.
Download or read book Increasing Efficiency of Malawi s Cash Transfer Programme written by German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) Division 304 - Health, Population Policy and Social Protection and published by . This book was released on 2017 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book New Directions in Economic Anthropology written by Susana Narotzky and published by Pluto Press (UK). This book was released on 1997 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Narotzky is particularly compelling in her discussion of the relation between the counted andunaccounted as it enters practices and ideology in the informal economy, family business and home life' Anthropology Today (RAI)Using an historical perspective, Narotzky highlights the interdependent nature of the contemporary world economy, and includes case studies of Western societies. She gives special emphasis to current issues such as the anthropology of work, the informal economy, and the cultures of industrialisation.
Download or read book Just Give Money to the Poor written by Joseph Hanlon and published by Kumarian Press. This book was released on 2012-03 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: * Argues strongly for overlooked approach to development by showing how the poor use money in ways that confound stereotypical notions of aid and handouts * Team authored by foremost scholars in the development field Amid all the complicated economic theories about the causes and solutions to poverty, one idea is so basic it seems radical: just give money to the poor. Despite its skeptics, researchers have found again and again that cash transfers given to significant portions of the population transform the lives of recipients. Countries from Mexico to South Africa to Indonesia are giving money directly to the poor and discovering that they use it wisely “ to send their children to school, to start a business and to feed their families. Directly challenging an aid industry that thrives on complexity and mystification, with highly paid consultants designing ever more complicated projects, Just Give Money to the Pooroffers the elegant southern alternative “ bypass governments and NGOs and let the poor decide how to use their money. Stressing that cash transfers are not charity or a safety net, the authors draw an outline of effective practices that work precisely because they are regular, guaranteed and fair. This book, the first to report on this quiet revolution in an accessible way, is essential reading for policymakers, students of international development and anyone yearning for an alternative to traditional poverty-alleviation methods.
Download or read book Energy Poverty written by Antoine Halff and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2014-11-27 with total page 476 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited volume looks at energy poverty, an issue whose pivotal role in the fight for human development is only now being recognised by policymakers. Nearly one quarter of humanity still lacks access to electricity. Close to one third rely on traditional fuels like firewood and cow dung for cooking, at great cost to their health and welfare. While most prevalent in parts of Africa and Asia, energy poverty is a global problem which concerns us all. This book, which brings together economists, policymakers, entrepreneurs, and other practitioners from all over the world, is dedicated to a single goal: finding a solution to this haunting problem. It is part history, part economics, part political analysis, part business case review, and part field handbook. Part One focuses on defining and measuring the problem and benchmarking progress in solving it, an obvious prerequisite to any successful energy-access policy. Part Two reviews past and current energy access programs, with an eye towards finding out what worked and what didn't and what can be replicated elsewhere. These case reviews are told as seen on the ground - China's experience by top Chinese officials and Africa's by African regulators and scholars. Based in part on those cases, the book's last, more forward-looking section aims to present practitioners with a tool kit, a menu of options to speed up their efforts. The energy access agenda is gaining traction at a time of rising concerns about climate change and resource constraints. This book shows that bringing modern energy to those who lack it not just a moral imperative, but will likely benefit the world as a whole without harming the environment or unduly stretching finite resources.
Download or read book Social Assistance in Developing Countries written by Armando Barrientos and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-08-15 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rapid spread of large-scale and innovative social transfers in the developing world has made a key contribution to the significant reduction in global poverty over the last decade. Explaining how flagship anti-poverty programmes emerged, this book provides the first comprehensive account of the global growth of social assistance transfers in developing countries. Armando Barrientos begins by focusing on the ethical and conceptual foundations of social assistance, and he discusses the justifications for assisting those in poverty. He provides a primer on poverty analysis, and introduces readers to the theory of optimal transfers. He then shifts the focus to practice, and introduces a classification of social assistance programmes to help readers understand the diversity in approaches and design in developing countries. The book concludes with an analysis of the financing and politics of the emerging institutions and of their potential to address global poverty.
Download or read book Promoting Access to Medical Technologies and Innovation Intersections between Public Health Intellectual Property and Trade written by World Intellectual Property Organization and published by WIPO. This book was released on 2013 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study has emerged from an ongoing program of trilateral cooperation between WHO, WTO and WIPO. It responds to an increasing demand, particularly in developing countries, for strengthened capacity for informed policy-making in areas of intersection between health, trade and IP, focusing on access to and innovation of medicines and other medical technologies.
Download or read book Are Cash Transfers a Realistic Policy Tool for Poverty Reduction in Sub Saharan Africa written by and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
