Our Humanitarian Specialist, Jacob de Hoop, presents findings on the effects of cash transfers on education outcomes. Presented to the German Development Institute in November 2018.

1. unite for
children
Effects of Social Cash Transfers on
Education Outcomes
Jacobus de Hoop
UNICEF Office of Research – Innocenti & Transfer Project
November 7, 2018: DIE

2. 2
Transfer Project: Partners & motivation
▪ Created 2009 as an Institutional
Partnership between UNICEF,
FAO, UNC
▪ Objectives:
1. Provide rigorous evidence on the
effectiveness of large-scale national
cash transfer programs
2. Use evidence to inform the
development & design of
programs/policies via dialogue &
learning
Learn more on our website:
https://transfer.cpc.unc.edu/

3. 3
“From Evidence to Action”
Open access book:
http://www.fao.org/3/a-i5157e.pdf

4. 4
School enrollment impacts (secondary age children):
8
3
7
8
16
8
4
7 7
1
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
Ghana
(LEAP)
Ethiopia
(PSNP)
Lesotho
(CGP)
Kenya
(CT-OVC)
Malawi
(SCTP)
South
Africa
(CSG)
Tanzania
(PSSN)
Zambia
(CGP)
Zambia
(MCTG)
Zim
(HSCT)
Percentagepointimpact
Primary enrollment already high, impacts at secondary level. Ethiopia is all children age 6-16.
Bars represent percentage point impacts - Solid bars represent significant impact, shaded not significant.

5. 5
Significant increase in material needs for school-age
children’s clothing, shoes, blanket
11
26
30
5
23
32
26
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
Percentagepointimpact
Lesotho includes shoes and school uniforms only, Ghana is schooling expenditures for ages 13-17. Other
countries are shoes, change of clothes, blanket ages 5-17.
Bars represent percentage point impacts - Solid bars represent significant impact, shaded not significant.
“I do not lack food that much
nowadays because the money
from Mtukula Pakhomo is there to
use to support us. Life has
changed. It has helped in school, I
have food, have bought a change
of clothes. In the past I had only
one set of clothes that when I
come from school I could wash it
at night and wear it the next day.
(Now) the uniform is in good
condition and not torn up.”
~ Male youth in beneficiary household (on
recently transitioning to secondary school)

6. 6
Schooling conditions
Baird et al. (2014):
▪ Rationale for conditions: (i) market failure, (ii) externalities, and (iii)
political economy.
▪ Conditions are a “fuzzy” concept. They differ in terms of “intensity of
monitoring and enforcement of conditions”.
▪ There are few studies that directly evaluate the effect of introducing
schooling conditions.
▪ “…programs that are explicitly conditional, monitor compliance and
penalize non-compliance have substantively larger effects”.
Baird et al. (2011): There is a trade-off:
▪ “CCT had a significant edge in terms of schooling outcomes”
▪ This success is achieved “at the cost of denying transfers to non-
compliers”

7. 7
Cash for work
Dammert et al. (2018):
▪ Rationale: (i) self-targeting, (ii) stimulate local economy, (iii) integrate
marginalized groups in the labor market.
▪ Evidence on impacts is limited, but suggests that these programs
may increase child labor.
Example, Shah and Steinberg (2015):
▪ Focus on the effects of India’s National Rural Employment
Guarantee Scheme (NREGS)
▪ “…each year of exposure to NREGS decreases school enrollment by
2 percentage points and math scores by 2% of a standard deviation
amongst children aged 13-16”
▪ “…adolescent boys are primarily substituting into market work when
they leave school while adolescent girls are substituting into unpaid
domestic work”

8. 8
Two evidence frontiers
• Impacts on learning outcomes:
• Baird et al. (2014): “conclude that the effects of [unconditional and
conditional cash transfers] on student achievement are small at best”
• We are only beginning to understand the role of cash transfers in learning
and longer-run outcomes.
• Impacts in humanitarian settings:
•ODI & CGDev (2015) Doing Cash Diferently: Give more unconditional
cash transfers in humanitarian settings
•Grand Bargain (2016): “Increase the use and coordination of cash-based
programming”
•Limited rigorous evidence (Doocy and Tappis, 2016)

9. 9
Need for evidence in humanitarian
contexts
No Lost Generation / Min Ila
(© UNICEF Lebanon)
• Effects may differ from
those in stable settings
(de Hoop, forthcoming):
• Supply-side constraints
• Information constraints
• Special needs
• Volatile funding
• UNICEF Office of
Research – Innocenti
aims to help and fill this
evidence gap https://www.unicef-irc.org/article/1829-evidence-on-social-
protection-in-contexts-of-fragility-and-forced-displacement.html

10. 10
Meda ase
Asante
Zikomo
Shukran
Thank you
Grazie
Danke!
Ghana LEAP 1000
(© Michelle Mills)

11. 11
• Transfer Project website: www.cpc.unc.edu/projects/transfer
• UNICEF Office of Research—Innocenti: https://www.unicef-irc.org/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TransferProject
• Twitter: @TransferProjct @jjdehoop
For more information
©FAO/Ivan Grifi

12. 12
Works cited
▪ Baird, S., Ferreira, F., Özler B; Woolcock M. 2014. “Conditional, Unconditional and Everything in Between : A
Systematic Review of the Effects of Cash Transfer Programs on Schooling Outcomes” Journal of Development
Effectiveness 6(1)
• Baird, S., McIntosh, C., Özler, B. 2011. “Cash or Condition? Evidence from a Cash Transfer Experiment.” Quarterly
Journal of Economics 126 (4)
• Dammert, AC, de Hoop, J., Mvukiyehe, E., Rosati, FC. “Effects of Public Policy on Child Labor: Current Knowledge,
Gaps, and Implications for Program Design” World Development (2018), 110: 104-123
• De Hoop, J. Forthcoming. “Using Cash Transfers to Support Displaced Children” UNDP International Policy Centre for
Inclusive Growth - Policy in Focus.
▪ Doocy, S., & Tappis, H. 2016. Cash-based approaches in humanitarian emergencies: a systematic review, 3ie
Systematic Review Report 28. London: International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie).
• ODI and Center for Global Development. 2015. “Doing Cash Differently: How Cash Transfers Can Transform
Humanitarian Aid”, ODI, <www.odi.org/sites/odi.org.uk/files/odi-assets/publications-opinion-files/9828.pdf> (accessed
24 August 2018).
• Shah, M., Steinberg, BM. “Workfare and Human Capital Investment: Evidence from India.” NBER Working Paper No.
21543.