Can Social Protection Work in Africa? The Impact of Ethiopia's Productive Safety Net Programme

被引:97
作者
Berhane, Guush [1 ]
Gilligan, Daniel O. [1 ]
Hoddinott, John [1 ]
Kumar, Neha [1 ]
Taffesse, Alemayehu Seyoum [1 ]
机构
[1] Int Food Policy Res Inst, Washington, DC 20006 USA
关键词
RURAL ETHIOPIA; FOOD AID; CONSUMPTION;
D O I
10.1086/677753
中图分类号
K9 [地理];
学科分类号
0705 ;
摘要
This study considers the impact of the duration of participation in the Public Works component of the PSNP. We note that households who received payments for 1 year typically received only tiny amounts - the median total Public Works payment for such households over a 5-year period is only 186 birr. Our impact estimates match these households to those receiving 2, 3, 4, or 5 years of transfers. Taking the difference between the impact estimate of a change in an outcome for a household receiving, say, 5 years of payments, and the impact estimate of a change in an outcome for a household receiving 1 year of payments yields our double-difference estimate of program impact. Against the formidable background of rising food prices and widespread drought, participation in the Public Works component of the PSNP has modest effects. The PSNP has improved food security by 1.29 months. This impact is statistically significant and is equivalent to reducing the length of the hungry season by one-third. Five years of participation raises livestock holdings by 0.38 TLU relative to receipt of payments in only 1 year. There is no evidence that the PSNP crowds out private transfers, although in this sample these are typically small. The joint impact of access to both the PSNP and the OFSP/HABP is larger than access to only one program. Having both the PSNP and OFSP/HABP increased food security by 1.5 months and livestock holdings by 0.99 TLU. Our evaluation has weaknesses. We apply continuous matching methods to calculate difference-in-difference estimates of impact, within and across beneficiary samples. As is well known, this approach cannot account for time-varying unobservables, and we cannot rule out the possibility that their existence biases our results. We cannot distinguish between the impact of duration of program participation from the level of transfers received. The timing of the surveys was not ideal; it would have been much better had the first survey been fielded prior to the implementation of the PSNP. Finally, the sample design precludes measuring important outcomes relating to the impact of the community assets on both PW participants and nonparticipants. With these caveats in mind, these results point toward several conclusions. First, Ethiopia's experience suggests that it is indeed possible to implement a large-scale social safety net with measurable impacts in an environment characterized by limited infrastructure and administrative resources. Second, impacts were larger when safety net transfers were combined with access to services designed to improve agricultural productivity. Third, at least in these data, there is little evidence of the safety net having disincentive effects, an oft-raised concern. © 2014 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.
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页码:1 / 26
页数:26
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