This report presents policy background, institutional arrangements and innovations related to linking social protection programmes and productive inclusion instruments, specifically… Read more for Chile, Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, and the Philippines. Social protection measures such as Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programmes have been shown to have significant positive impact on poverty reduction in both Southeast Asia and Latin America. The challenges ahead, however, remain daunting: one in five people in developing countries is still living in extreme poverty. The slowing rate of poverty reduction that can be observed in Indonesia, Mexico, and Peru is also a matter of concern. To achieve the newly adopted Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #1, which aims to end extreme poverty for all people everywhere by 2030, innovation in social policy and social protection systems must take place. One of the operational challenges of CCT programmes is the lack of a predetermined strategy that promotes a sustainable and resilient exit out of poverty for the target population. Policy makers and practitioners working in the field of social protection therefore increasingly recognise that social protection policies and programmes need to evolve from providing income support towards an integrated social protection system with heavy emphasis on human capital development and access to opportunities. This can be achieved by linking social protection measures with other interventions that successfully draw the target population into productive economic activities, through what are aptly referred to as ‘productive inclusion’ measures. Across different policy sectors, the role of social protection schemes needs to be emphasised, by using elements of social protection systems – such as targeting mechanisms and distribution channels at local level – as a platform for the integrated delivery of services for the poor. Read less ...

The Integrating Extremely Poor Producers into Markets Field Guide (Field Guide) is intended to provide the field-level practitioner with tools… Read more and applications to impact extremely poor households. The intended outcome of the Field Guide is to increase market engagement for extremely poor households, especially women, through value chain and market systems development activities. Read less ...

The promise of randomized controlled trials is that evidence gathered through the evaluation of a specific program helps us—possibly after… Read more several rounds of fine-tuning and multiple replications in different contexts—to inform policy. However, critics have pointed out that a potential constraint in this agenda is that results from small “proof-of-concept” studies run by nongovernment organizations may not apply to policies that can be implemented by governments on a large scale. After discussing the potential issues, this paper describes the journey from the original concept to the design and evaluation of scalable policy. We do so by evaluating a series of strategies that aim to integrate the nongovernment organization Pratham’s “Teaching at the Right Level” methodology into elementary schools in India. The methodology consists of re-organizing instruction based on children’s actual learning levels, rather than on a prescribed syllabus, and has previously been shown to be very effective when properly implemented. We present evidence from randomized controlled trials on the designs that failed to produce impacts within the regular schooling system but helped shape subsequent versions of the program. As a result of this process, two versions of the programs were developed that successfully raised children’s learning levels using scalable models in government schools. We use this example to draw general lessons about using randomized control trials to design scalable policies. Read less ...

While there is a growing body of evidence surrounding the impact of financial inclusion and the importance of product design… Read more in achieving desired welfare impact outcomes, there remains much to learn about the ways in which formal financial products and services can contribute to women’s economic empowerment. This review finds that, overall, financial service providers and other stakeholders can leverage appropriate product design features to overcome some of these barriers to women’s financial inclusion. Even so, broader social constraints related to intra-household bargaining power and the social status of women may continue to limit the broader impact of financial inclusion on women’s economic empowerment. There is a need for further evidence on effective product-led strategies to address these barriers and improve economic empowerment outcomes for women. The paper is organized by product and presents the existing evidence on the impact of savings, credit, payments, and insurance products on women’s economic empowerment outcomes, as well as the remaining open research questions in each area. The studies included in this review are limited to those designed as randomized control trials (RCTs), widely considered to be the gold standard in impact evaluation methodology. Read less ...

The broad-ranging benefits of cash transfers are now widely recognized. However, the evidence base highlights that they often fall short… Read more in achieving longer-term and second-order impacts related to nutrition, learning outcomes and morbidity. In recognition of these limitations, several ‘cash plus’ initiatives have been introduced, whereby cash transfers are combined with one or more types of complementary support. This paper aims to identify key factors for successful implementation of these increasingly popular ‘cash plus’ programmes, based on (i) a review of the emerging evidence base of ‘cash plus’ interventions and (ii) an examination of three case studies, namely, Chile Solidario in Chile, IN-SCT in Ethiopia and LEAP in Ghana. The analysis was guided by a conceptual framework proposing a menu of ‘cash plus’ components. The assessment of three case studies indicated that effective implementation of ‘cash plus’ components has indeed contributed to greater impacts of the respective programmes. Such initiatives have thereby addressed some of the non-financial and structural barriers that poor people face and have reinforced the positive effects of cash transfer programmes. In design of such programmes, further attention should be paid to the constraints faced by the most vulnerable and how such constraints can be overcome. We conclude with recommendations regarding the provision of complementary support and cross-sectoral linkages based on lessons learned from the case studies. More research is still needed on the impact of the many variations of ‘cash plus’ programming, including evidence on the comparative roles of individual ‘plus’ components, as well as the knowledge, attitudes and behaviour pathways which influence these impacts. Read less ...

BRAC is one of the world’s largest development organizations, and in 2002 pioneered its Ultra-Poor programme in Bangladesh to improve… Read more the resilience of the ultra-poor and to address extreme poverty. In this webinar, hosted by socialprotection.org, Sadna Samaranayake (Senior Advisor, BRAC Ultra-Poor Advocacy and Advisory Services) and Michael Samson (Director of Research, Economic Policy Research Institute) presented analysis of BRAC’s success, and its intersection with social protection. The session was moderated by Sally-Anne Vincent (Deputy High Commissioner, Australian High Commission, Dhaka). This webinar was organized by the Social Protection Employment Community (SPEC), and supported by the Australian Government, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Read less ...

Graduation out of chronic poverty has recently been receiving considerable attention globally for its potential synergies with social protection, microfinance… Read more and livelihoods development approaches to poverty reduction. This paper examines the evidence regarding the effectiveness of graduation strategies in reducing extreme poverty, with a particular focus on rural households. Data have been collected from archives, interviews and published research. However, this inquiry goes beyond a literature review. We attempt to deepen our understanding of alternative theories of change underpinning the CGAP-Ford Foundation graduation model and investigate the enabling and disabling contextual factors that affect the efficiency and effectiveness of graduation programmes. We use two research strategies: (1) a quantitative analysis of country-level graduation pilot programmes, and (2) a qualitative inquiry into the mechanisms of capability building, with a particular focus on the interaction between household and contextual factors. Based on available evidence, we propose a new analytical framework to support future programmatic work on graduation. We conceptualize graduation as a learning and adaptation process of alignment between motivation, knowledge and practice whose outcomes are highly dependent on contextual factors in general and initial endowments in particular. We conclude that graduation could become a new dimension in IFAD operational strategies under clearly identified conditions. Read less ...

“Graduation in an Urban Refugee Context: A Technical Guide” has been prepared to offer guidance to organizations planning to implement… Read more the Graduation Approach in an urban context for refugees and their host communities. The document can be used to support the design and implementation of Graduation programs as part of a comprehensive economic inclusion strategy for refugees and their host communities in urban and peri-urban areas. This Technical Guide is to be used by multi-functional teams who are responsible for determining if the Graduation Approach can form an appropriate part of an inclusive livelihoods strategy to achieve protection and solutions goals for refugees in urban contexts. Specifically, the Technical Guide aims to provide guidance on considerations that implementing agencies will need to take into account when determining if the Graduation Approach is suitable for their context. The Technical Guide is intended as a resource to inform the adoption of the Graduation Approach for refugees in an urban context by a variety of stakeholders, including governments, development actors, NGOs, microfinance institutions, social protection programs, and other multilateral and bilateral agencies. Read less ...

In order to alleviate poverty and food insecurity in Malawi – one of the poorest countries in the world –… Read more in 2016 the Government of Malawi, the Mwanza District Council, and COMSIP Cooperative Union, with the support of the GIZ Social Protection Programme, designed and implemented the Economic Empowerment Pilot Project in the district of Mwanza. The programme targets ultra-poor and labour-constrained households in six randomly selected areas of the district. In view of the forthcoming impact evaluation, this report provides the first evidence of the immediate effects of this programme. The objective was to verify how beneficiaries spend the lump-sum transfers, in which kind of micro-business activities they engage, and what is the potential role of training (with and without lump-sum) in coming up with new business ideas and generating stable savings groups. It builds on three rounds of qualitative interviews conducted between June and October 2016. Focus group discussions with members of the VSL groups, expert interviews and interviews with purposely selected households provided further useful information. Read less ...

Can training and mentorship expand the economic impact of cash transfer programs, or would such extensions waste resources that recipients… Read more could allocate more impactfully by themselves? Over the course of two years, a Ugandan nonprofit organization implemented alternative poverty alleviation approaches in a randomized manner. These included an integrated graduation-style program involving cash transfers as well as extensive training and mentorship; a slightly simplified variant excluding training on savings group formation; and a radically simplified approach that monetized all intangibles and delivered cash only. Light-touch behavioral extensions involving goal-setting and plan-making were also implemented with some cash transfer recipients. We find that simplifying the integrated program tended to erode its impact. Read less ...