New cash transfer program for pregnant mothers in India

One of the states within India will begin a new conditional cash transfer program. Pregnant mothers will receive a smart card with money to buy food during the pregnancy. The mother is then given another deposit at the time of birth and more for each vaccination the child receives.

From the Times of India, we find out more details about the new program.

The Tamil Nadu government will soon pay mothers who get their newborns vaccinated as per the immunization schedule.

Under the Muthulakshmi Reddy Scheme, each pregnant woman will get a smart card with her medical details. The health department will deposit Rs 4,000 to her bank account after she registers with a government healthcare unit. The money is intended to help her have nutritious food and avoid anaemia during pregnancy.

If the woman gives birth to her child at a government hospital, the state will deposit Rs 4,000 more in her bank account. If the mother takes the baby to the healthcare unit for all vaccinations, the health department will transfer another Rs 4,000 to her account after the 14th week.

Moving from cash transfer to social protection

The cash transfer programs in Latin America have been a great success, but they have brought along with it great criticism. In cash transfer programs, the government gives poor people some money to help supplement their small incomes. People on the right of the political spectrum say such a program will begin a cycle of dependence. While those on the left say cash transfer does little to remove the unjust barriers preventing the poor from moving up the economic ladder.

From the Guardian, writer Stephen Devereux from the Institute of Development Studies talks about how cash transfer can participate in social justice. Using the term "social protection" Devereux talks about an open relationship between governments and the citizens receiving the help.

The social protection discourse has been dominated by efforts to demonstrate and measure its poverty-reduction impacts, and to deflect criticisms from the right and left. But social protection is not only about installing safety nets and contributing to the millennium development goals – important though these are – it also has profound implications for governance and social relations in implementing countries. A conference hosted by the Institute of Development Studies in April addressed a perception that insufficient attention has been paid to the politics of social protection, and its relationship to social justice. Several key lessons emerged.

Social protection is much more than a service-delivery sector: the decisions a society makes about how and whether to guarantee basic subsistence for all citizens reveals the vision that society has about itself – is it based on solidarity and interdependence, or individualism and self-reliance? What constitutes a "good society" at a time when neoliberal capitalism prevails and financial austerity offers a convenient excuse to cut back on government spending? These questions resonate in the UK and mainland Europe as much as they do in the poorest countries.

What are the implications of the social protection agenda for the evolving social contract between governments and citizens? If there is no direct line of accountability between the providers and beneficiaries of social protection, the potential for mobilising civil society is limited. This question is particularly pertinent in countries where poverty and aid dependence mean that international donor agencies dominate the design and financing of these interventions.

Social protection must be delivered in ways that do not stigmatise people: social protection programmes need to respect the dignity of claimants and empower them to become active citizens rather than passive beneficiaries. In India, "social audits" are innovative participatory tools that empower marginalised villagers to claim their right to social protection, and to hold local administrations accountable for their delivery.

Social protection should be linked to other dimensions of social policy, such as tackling discrimination and social exclusion, which are often the root causes of poverty: eradicating social injustice can eliminate a need for welfare transfers. For instance, is it better to deny an HIV-positive person work and compel them to depend on social protection, or to outlaw discrimination in the labour market based on HIV status, as South Africa has done?

Video: Emergency Cash Transfers, Nairobi

From Concern Worldwide, a video about how cash transfers can help women in Kenya.

DFID issues a new report on cash transfer programs

Governments around the world are implementing a new strategy to fight poverty called "cash transfer" programs. They are called cash transfer because they give a small amount of money to families below the poverty line. The money is small enough that they will not be able to live on that money alone and will still need to find work. Still, the money is more than welcome to poor families who can then use it to supplement other incomes and have more money for food and medicine.

The most famous of the cash transfer programs is based in Brazil called "Bolsa Familia." The Brazilian government has an added feature to their cash transfer program because families have to meet certain conditions before receiving the money. The conditions range from keeping good attendance in school, or going for medical checkups regularly. Many governments around the world have borrowed from Bolsa Familia to set up their own cash transfer programs.

Cash Transfer programs are beginning to catch the attention of rich donor nations for their development aid contributions. The UK’s Department for International Development has just released a study on the effectiveness of cash transfer programs. OXFAM's Duncan Green relayed the summary of the report in his blog, From Poverty to Power.

“Over the past 15 years, a ‘quiet revolution’ has seen governments in the developing world invest in increasingly large-scale cash transfer programmes. These are now estimated to reach between 0.75 and 1 billion people. While this expansion began in middle-income countries (MICs), governments in low-income countries (LICs) have also started to develop cash transfer programmes.

This rapid spread has been driven by a range of forces. Firstly, there is growing recognition that while global economic integration brings poor households opportunities, it also brings increased exposure to stresses (e.g. volatile food and fuel prices) and shocks, which can push many into poverty. In this context, transfers are seen to play a role in reducing transitory poverty.

Secondly, there is growing evidence that transfers can help people escape chronic, often inter-generational poverty; in part by leveraging gains in non-income, human development outcomes.

Finally, there is recognition that in situations of chronic food insecurity (e.g. Ethiopia), institutionalised transfer programmes are more efficient and effective than repeated annual emergency food aid.

There is convincing evidence from a number of countries that cash transfers can reduce inequality and the depth or severity of poverty. There is an increasing volume of research into how cash transfers might support ‘graduation’ from poverty for those of working age. Evidence from Bangladesh and Ethiopia suggests that transfers are unlikely to achieve graduation without complementary interventions (e.g. skills training or agricultural extension) to promote livelihoods.

There is robust evidence from numerous countries that cash transfers have leveraged sizeable gains in access to health and education services…. Cash transfers also have a proven role in supporting specific vulnerable groups (people living with HIV and AIDS, orphans and vulnerable children).

Guest Voices: Hard Cash in Hard Times

Continuing our series of posts from Concern Worldwide is a story about giving cash instead of food aid in Zimbabwe. Writer Cormac Staunton says this is a big change from the traditional response to humanitarian aid and may be a big improvement.

Sophia Chitsatse was 65 when I met her in Nyanga, Zimbabwe, a widow looking after four orphaned grandchildren. Although she was a farmer, she struggled to grow enough food for her family to last from one harvest to another. As a result, she had been receiving food aid rations from the World Food Program (WFP) for several years.

This is the traditional response to a humanitarian crisis, to directly provide people with what they need most. It is hard to argue with the logic; if people are starving, they need food. If people’s belongings have been washed away, they need essential items like soap, cooking utensils, and clean water.

But in the last number of years there has been an increasing focus on improving the way in which the world responds to emergencies. In late 2009, Sophia Chitsatse benefited from a new approach: instead of receiving food aid, Sophia was given cash.

We do it all the time in the western world. We have state pensions, unemployment benefits, and child-welfare payments. There are differences and debates as to the extent to which these should be provided, but most people agree that the best way to provide this assistance is through money, rather than goods.

Taking the same approach to a humanitarian crisis has many advantages, backed up by numerous studies. For one thing, giving cash is generally cheaper. There are huge costs involved in trucking and shipping large quantities of commodities across the globe.

Cheaper, of course, does not necessarily mean better. But providing cash has been proven to be very effective, because it allows people to prioritize their own needs. Women like Sophia can now choose the food they want to buy for their families, and how much. They can also choose whether, in addition to food, they need soap or toothpaste, or a blanket. These aren’t always easy choices. But it is better that they are made by a family, rather than by a third party. Allowing them to make decisions gives power to the poorest and most vulnerable. It also results in the better outcomes, as each family purchases precisely what they need.

Of course, in some humanitarian crises, the goods that people need are simply not there. Providing cash in such cases is meaningless and can even be dangerous. The cost of scarce goods would sky-rocket and could make a bad situation worse.

However, often a crisis is not caused by scarcity, but because people cannot access the goods they need. Food might be available in a market, but people do not have money to buy it, or it is prohibitively expensive. This problem is made worse by the global rise in food prices. This points to another advantage to providing cash: the effect it has on the local economy.

Flooding local markets with free goods can undercut local suppliers and put local traders out of business. Cash, on the other hand, can stimulate local markets. When I met Sophia in Zimbabwe I was conducting a study to compare “multiplier” effects of cash versus food aid. The study—the subject of an upcoming Working Paper for Trinity College, Dublin—looked at food aid and cash transfers distributed by the WFP and Concern Worldwide in rural Zimbabwe in 2010. Building on previous work by the economist Simon Davies with Concern in Malawi, the study created a “Social Accounting Matrix” for the region where both cash and food distributions took place.

The model, quantifying how all the economic groups in the region interact, was used to calculate and compare “multipliers” for cash and for food aid. A multiplier measures the effects of injecting something into the economy, including benefits beyond the help given to the initial recipients of aid. The results showed higher multiplier figures for cash than for food aid.

Food did have some multiplier effects, for example, when it was used to barter for other items. But the majority of the food was consumed and where it was bartered, the deals that people got were often not very fair.

On the other hand, people like Sophia were now able to buy food from local producers and traders. Even though many people were suffering from a food shortage, some producers had enough to sell and local traders were able to respond to the demand for goods that the cash injection created. Prices did not increase significantly.

There’s more. Sophia was also able to use the money to pay school fees and keep her grandchildren in school. The money she and others spent on these fees also allowed teachers’ pay to be “topped up”. Others told us that they paid fees at local clinics that covered maintenance, carried out by local workers. The teachers and the laborers would spend these earnings, buying food from a local trader, who in turn bought suppliers from a local producer.

This is the multiplier in action. At each stage, the added value of the cash is increasing and the cycle continues until the money leaves the local market. The study showed that in Zimbabwe, as far as the local economy was concerned, cash had a much more positive effect than food aid. The benefits were felt by more people– many of whom were only marginally better off than the poorest that the programme was reaching– than just the initial recipients.

While the advantages of giving cash are becoming clearer, there is still much to work on. Agencies are increasingly looking at new, better and safer ways to distribute cash, including the use of mobile phones and smart card technology, which has been pioneered by Concern in various countries, most recently in Niger. There is a need to look at what happens when projects are scaled up to see if many of the positive impacts still hold. Caution is also needed to ensure that cash is only used in appropriate settings, and that agencies are fully able to assess the impact of cash.

But for women like Sophia–who now spends less time working on other people’s land and more time on her own, who’s grandchildren are staying in school and who is getting a fairer deal for the things she needs–it is clear that cash is a more appropriate, effective and empowering way to help people in times of crisis.

Cash payments to thousands of vulnerable Syrian families

From IRIN, a story about a new cash payment program in Syria.

Syria's decision to make cash payments to thousands of vulnerable families and reduce some taxes could help stem food insecurity and rising poverty, but many still do not have enough to eat, say experts.

Payments have begun to be made from a new fund designed to help 420,000 vulnerable families. The National Social Aid Fund has been in the pipeline for several years, was set up in January and made its first payments on 13 February.

Two days later, the government reduced duties on a range of basic foodstuffs including rice, tea, powdered milk, coffee and bananas. It also lowered taxes on vegetable oil, margarine, unroasted coffee and sugar.

Shortly after the ouster of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali on 14 January, the government also announced a 72 percent rise in heating fuel subsidies for public sector employees.

"Traditionally the Middle East and North Africa has been relatively food secure,” said Arne Oshaug, a nutrition and food security expert at Akershus University College in Norway. “But many countries now produce less and rely on imports which are subject to price fluctuations.”

This is beginning to affect more affluent people too. An index of food vulnerability by Nomura, a Japanese investment house, found that on average 47.9 percent of household income is spent on food in Syria.

"When people spend so much of their income on food, a slight variation in the price can upset their ability to eat enough to avoid hunger,” said Oshaug.

Syria is faced with decreasing oil reserves and a growing population, limiting its options. Food prices have been rising and at the same time some subsidies, such as on fuel, have decreased.

"It's very hard to survive,” said one herder on the outskirts of Damascus. “We can barely afford the basics of tea, bread and sugar.”

Poverty, drought

In 2005, a UN report found that 30 percent of Syrians lived below the poverty line, and of these, 11.4 percent below the subsistence level.

The situation has since deteriorated, in part due to several years of drought. In a 27 January report, UN Rapporteur on the Right to Food Oliver de Schutter estimated the number of people who may be food insecure at 3.7 million.

"Since 2006, the country has endured four consecutive droughts," Schutter noted. "The drought of 2007-08 was particularly devastating, placing additional burdens on the country.

Although rainfall in 2009 and 2010 has been greater than in the three previous years, it was poorly distributed. While the impact on pasture land was positive, crops failed in the rain-fed areas of the most vulnerable agro-climatic zones."

In the northeastern region, he added, drought had resulted in significant losses particularly in the governorates of Al Hasakah, Dayr Az Zawr and Al Raqqah.

In January, the World Food Programme (WFP) and government emergency drought response was extended until May after the UN found food insecurity was an enduring problem.

"There is a situation of food insecurity in the drought-affected areas,” said Selly Muzammil, World Food Programme (WFP) spokesman in Syria. “Our latest assessment shows 25 percent of the rural population in the five surveyed governorates are experiencing food insecurity.”

The situation has been further aggravated by the yellow rust crop disease and adverse weather, which have reduced agricultural output, causing Syria to turn to imports. According to Agriculture Ministry figures, wheat, barley and cotton yields fell last year by 17, 20 and 28 percent respectively.

Safety nets

Experts said the situation could lead to chronic food insecurity and also hit the economy. "Malnutrition and learning impairment are just two possible consequences,” said Oshaug, adding: “Research has shown that food insecurity is directly linked to a reduction in a country's GDP.”

Last week the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned that countries in the Middle East need to focus on inclusive growth and targeted help for the poor.

In an interview with IMF Survey magazine, Masood Ahmed, director of the IMF's Middle East and Central Asia department, said the authorities in the region had announced expenditure increases of up to 3 percent of GDP since the recent unrest began in Tunisia.

But he warned that efforts must be sustainable."To address the fiscal constraint without necessarily reducing other important expenditures, it is important to improve and modernize existing safety nets,” he said.

More funding, better targeting

Humanitarian agencies said more money was needed to tackle food security in Syria. WFP’s emergency funding appeal for the country fell short of its target.

A lack of funds last year meant it could only distribute food to 215,000 of the 300,000 beneficiaries targeted. Some 2,000 children were being given food supplements to prevent stunting.

Experts said it may also be necessary to target interventions in a better way. "We need to rethink development support in general,” said Oshaug. “There needs to be a greater focus on people's needs rather than what politicians are willing to do.”

Another area Syria needs to tackle is unemployment. Officially at 11-12 percent, independent economic analysts say it is running at 20 percent. The number of new job openings is believed not to be keeping pace with rising demand.

Child cash benefit programs in Argentina

Argentina produces plenty of enough food to feed all of its people. They produce so much that everyone could be fed 10 times over. Still, over 750,000 Argentinian children are malnourished.

A cash transfer program has just started in Argentina and social experts are debating its effects. Some question if it has helped to reduce child malnutrition, or if the program needs to be extended to help more.

From the Inter Press Service, writer Marcela Valente takes a look at the cash transfer program in Argentina.

A little more than a year after the creation of a cash transfer programme to poor families with children under 18, experts are debating the reach, positive impacts and limitations of the subsidy.

The universal child benefit, which went into effect in December 2009, provides a monthly payment of 220 pesos (55 dollars) per child to parents who are unemployed, work in the informal economy or are domestic workers -- in other words, all parents who do not have access to the government's family allowance scheme that already covered workers in the formal economy.

The benefit, which reaches 3.5 million children, is conditional on school attendance and regular medical check-ups and vaccinations.

A family can receive the subsidy for up to five children -- an amount that is close to the official minimum monthly wage.

However, the plan is not actually universal: 2.8 million children and teenagers are not covered by it, for different reasons.

Sociologist Gabriela Agosto, director of the Asociación Civil Observatorio Social, told IPS that the universal child benefit "is an incentive for education and health care, but does not substantially modify access to food.

"The benefit generates a transfer of income, but in and of itself it does not correct a key deficit, child malnutrition, because chronic poverty cannot be turned around with this alone: targeted policies are needed," she said.

Agosto referred to the cases of severe malnutrition and even deaths among indigenous children that are periodically reported in provinces in northern Argentina like Salta, Formosa, Chaco and Misiones, the country's poorest provinces.

The history of Mexico's Opportunidades

Earlier this week, an op-ed piece in the New York Times spelled out the reasons why "conditional cash transfers" are so successful in Mexico and Brazil. This type of program gives money to the poor on the condition that they meet requirements such as keeping their children in school, or getting regular medical checkups. As a follow-up to the article, writer Tina Rosenberg addressed some of the comments she received by giving us this background on how Mexico's Opportunidades program was set up.

Mexico was able to change this because of the Tequila Crisis — the 1994 crash of the peso, when the economy contracted by six percent. A third of all Mexicans were living in extreme poverty, which meant their incomes did not cover even food alone. The government of Ernesto Zedillo knew that the food subsidy programs would do little to help. So it decided to find something better. Santiago Levy, then an undersecretary in the finance ministry, reasoned that subsidies were just an inefficient way to give the poor money — so why not give them money? At the time, this was considered a crazy idea. No other country did it.

Levy reasoned that the program would be much more effective if the money could be used as leverage. He set up a pilot project in a faraway state in secret — so as not to attract the attention of special interest groups. It worked. The pilot showed that it was logistically feasible to carry out the program; that families preferred cash over subsidies; that families did go to the doctor, and that, despite what skeptical Mexican cabinet members had warned, men did not beat up their wives, take the money and get drunk. Giving out cash proved to be hugely more efficient than the old food subsidies. Mexico found it could help many times more people with the same money it was spending on the old programs. One reason is that Opportunidades is careful to enroll only the people who need it most.

The program uses census data to find the poorest rural areas and urban blocks, and within those areas, gives out questionnaires about people’s income and possessions. What do you make? Do you have a dirt or cement floor? Do you own a hot-water heater? The homes of those who qualify are visited to verify their answers. Families must be recertified every three years, and according to Salvador Escobedo, the current director, about 10 percent leave each year — either because they have failed to complete their responsibilities, or they graduate and are no longer extremely poor. Mexico checks on whether families are keeping up with their responsibilities by having schools and clinics keep computerized track of attendance.

What about corruption in a country like Mexico? People will be corrupt when they have the chance. Amy from Los Angeles reports that in the Mexico City slum where she lived, people had to march with and vote for the locally-governing political party in order to get Oportunidades money. But the program aims to minimize the possibilities for patronage and corruption.

When I went back to Mexico, where I used to live, to report on Oportunidades in 2008, I was at first puzzled by the ubiquity of signs announcing “Oportunidades is a program of the federal government.” But there was a good reason for these signs — they were telling people that they shouldn’t give in to pressure from local leaders in order to get their payments. All program criteria are national – no decisions get made on the local level. If Amy is right, some local governments trick their people into thinking that they have influence. But it’s not many.

Oportunidades has no shops. No goods move, only money — and much of that electronically. The money is handled by banks; staff do not touch it. There is very little infrastructure — 95 percent of the program’s budget goes directly to beneficiaries. They get their cash, then patronize local businesses that sell food, clothing or school supplies. (The program is hugely popular with small businesses in poor towns. This is one way Oportunidades is helping even people who are not its beneficiaries, and one response to the complaint that simply redistributing money can’t possibly do anything.)

Pay the poor, with one condition

40 different countries are now using conditional cash transfer programs as a tool for reducing poverty. The poor are given a small amount of cash if they meet certain conditions. Those conditions could range from keeping the kids in school, to seeking health care when pregnant.

The expansion of the programs throughout the world has caused the press to take notice. In a op-ed piece in the New York Times, writer Tina Rosenberg tells us why conditional cash transfers could be the next great idea.

In Mexico, Oportunidades today covers 5.8 million families, about 30 percent of the population. An Oportunidades family with a child in primary school and a child in middle school that meets all its responsibilities can get a total of about $123 a month in grants. Students can also get money for school supplies, and children who finish high school in a timely fashion get a one-time payment of $330.

Bolsa Familia, which has similar requirements, is even bigger. Brazil’s conditional cash transfer programs were begun before the government of President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, but he consolidated various programs and expanded it. It now covers about 50 million Brazilians, about a quarter of the country. It pays a monthly stipend of about $13 to poor families for each child 15 or younger who is attending school, up to three children. Families can get additional payments of $19 a month for each child of 16 or 17 still in school, up to two children. Families that live in extreme poverty get a basic benefit of about $40, with no conditions.

Do these sums seem heartbreakingly small? They are. But a family living in extreme poverty in Brazil doubles its income when it gets the basic benefit. It has long been clear that Bolsa Familia has reduced poverty in Brazil. But research has only recently revealed its role in enabling Brazil to reduce economic inequality.

The World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank are working with individual governments to spread these programs around the globe, providing technical help and loans. Conditional cash transfer programs are now found in 14 countries in Latin America and some 26 other countries, according to the World Bank. (One of the programs was in New York City — a small, privately-financed pilot program called Opportunity NYC. A preliminary evaluation showed mixed success, but it is too soon to draw conclusions.) Each program is tailored to local conditions. Some in Latin America, for example, emphasize nutrition. One in Tanzania is experimenting with conditioning payments on an entire community’s behavior.

The program fights poverty in two ways. One is straightforward: it gives money to the poor. This works. And no, the money tends not to be stolen or diverted to the better-off. Brazil and Mexico have been very successful at including only the poor. In both countries it has reduced poverty, especially extreme poverty, and has begun to close the inequality gap.

Conditional Cash transfers help with more than cash

Cash transfer programs are having a lot of success to help those in poverty. Most of the programs give a bit of cash to the poor in exchange for taking steps to improve health and education. The programs started in Latin America but are spreading through the rest of the world, so much so that the World Bank is beginning to invest in them.

From Newsweek, writer Christopher Werth gives us some examples of how cash transfer programs help in areas other than the pocketbook.

One of the biggest impacts of these programs: education. Since its launch more than a decade ago, South Africa’s Child Support Grant has cut the number of children out of school in half. South Africans are free to use their payment any way they wish, but some countries require school enrollment to keep the money coming in. “It changes the dynamics of the way people conceptualize welfare,” says John Hoddinott, a senior research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute. “Both parties have rights and responsibilities.” In many cases, however, simply having cash in hand allows parents to keep their children in the classroom. “Poor households … need the labor of their children; that’s why they don’t send them to school,” says Santiago Levy, the architect of Mexico’s cash-transfer program, now called Oportunidades. But what works in one country doesn’t always work in another. In Malawi, one of the least-developed countries in the world, the World Bank compared two different groups of school-age girls: one was given cash only if they went to school; the other was simply given the money. The results showed little difference in attendance. In fact, those without conditions fared better when it came to reducing teen pregnancy and teen marriage, factors that often pull Malawian girls out of the classroom.

Putting cash in the pockets of the poor also directly improves their health and well-being. Brazil’s Bolsa Familia, which is now the world’s largest cash-transfer program, has cut child malnutrition by 45 percent. Mexico’s Oportunidades is credited with adding more meat, fruit, and vegetables to the largely grain-based diet of the country’s poor. In South Africa, a study by MIT’s Esther Duflo found that cash transfers can reduce the kind of stunted growth in young children that results from inadequate nutrition. Girls benefited most, making up nearly half the gap in height when compared with American girls of the same age. And Duflo found that the program was most effective when the money went to women, who are more inclined than men to invest in the welfare of their kids.

Two new studies could help AIDS prevention efforts

Since there are currently only enough drugs to treat a third of all people with HIV and money to provide the drugs is unlikely to increase, more AIDS prevention efforts must take place. Two more studies that were released to coincide with the International AIDS Conference might make prevention easier for governments and NGOs.

First, a study has found that using a vaginal gel that has the same active ingredients as anti-retroviral drugs helps prevent women from getting HIV. Another study shows that cash transfer programs help young women say no to sex.

From this New York Times piece that we found at Blue Ridge Now, health writer Celia Dugger explains the new studies.

Women who used a vaginal microbicidal gel containing an antiretroviral medication widely used to treat AIDS, tenofovir, were 39 percent less likely over all to contract H.I.V. than those who used a placebo. Those who used the gel most regularly reduced their chances of infection 54 percent, according to a two-and-a-half year study of 889 women by Caprisa, a Durban-based AIDS research center.

Broader trials are needed to confirm the results, and it will most likely be years before the product is publicly available, but if produced on a large scale the gel would cost less than 25 cents per application, the lead investigators estimated.

Because the trial was relatively small and the gel was nowhere close to 100 percent effective, AIDS scientists and public health officials wanted to see another trial get similar results before they undertook the large fund-raising and public education efforts that would be needed to make billions of doses of the gel, as well as the applicators, which are more expensive, and then to persuade women to use them and governments of poor countries to adopt them.

Dr. Bruce Walker, a Harvard Medical School professor who was not involved in the study, said a cheer erupted when researchers unveiled their findings to a small group of scientists last month in Durban.

“This is the first time that there’s been a tool that women can use to protect themselves from becoming infected,” he said. “It’s a game changer.”
...

In another piece of progress against AIDS, a separate, large study in Malawi sponsored by the World Bank, and made public on Sunday, found that if poor schoolgirls and their families received small monthly cash payments, the girls had sex later, less often and with fewer partners.

A year and a half after the program started, the girls were less than half as likely to be infected with the AIDS or herpes viruses than were girls whose families got no payments. The likelihood that the girls would agree to sex in return for gifts and cash declined as the size of the payments from the program rose, suggesting the central role of extreme poverty in sexual choices.

“Maybe we can combine these behavioral and biomedical interventions,” said Dr. Tim Farley, a scientist with the World Health Organization involved in H.I.V. prevention research. “We need to pursue both avenues.”

The idea of giving money straight to the poor is spreading

For many years, any aid dollars were put into improving what was around those in poverty, or their living conditions. The aid money would go to infrastructure improvements; better roads, schools and the like. Now an idea is gathering momentum that gives the aid dollars directly to the people, called "cash transfers." Not only is this taking place in the under-developed world but New York City has also tried it out.

From the Guardian, writer Aditya Chakrabortty explains why cash transfers may be the wave of the future in poverty-fighting

What Melamed saw in Mozambique was one of the first major exercises in what is now among the most talked-about new ideas in aid, called cash transfers – or, as a new book title puts it, "Just give money to the poor", as those donors did to the former soldiers. The authors, Joseph Hanlon, Armando Barrientos and David Hulme, count 45 countries that hand cash to more than 110m families. In Brazil, poor families can collect money from lottery shops. Pick-up trucks drive across Namibia, bearing safes with cash machines welded on the front, used by old ladies to take out their monthly pensions.

It sounds forehead-smackingly obvious: isn't giving cash to the poor what we do every time we shovel change into an envelope, or pledge a donation to Comic Relief? But when that money – whether from individuals or governments or big international institutions like the World Bank – gets to Africa or Asia, it's typically turned into new roads, schools, even community radio stations. The idea is to give poor people the infrastructure and training they need to lift themselves out of destitution.

Or perhaps I should say that was the idea. Looking back over the last few years, we see in retrospect a brief golden period for aid. It was marked in Britain by turning Clare Short into the new secretary of state for international development, and defined internationally by the 2005 pledge at Gleneagles of the G8 richest countries to give more money to Africa. And it appears to be drawing to a close.

Academics and writers such as Bill Easterly and Dambisa Moyo now gain plaudits for books with titles such as Dead Aid. Recession-hit politicians at events such as last weekend's G20 summit in Toronto avoid even mentioning the Gleneagles promises. And when official money is handed over, it often ends up on the most useless projects. In 2008, Berlin spent half a million dollars on what it called a "basic nutrition project" but which turned out to be a scheme to reduce unpleasant smells from food-processing factories in China and (naturally enough) Germany. That would be called a joke, if it was only remotely funny.

Against all that, the idea of just handing over a hefty chunk of the world's $100bn aid money directly to the 1.4bn people living on less than $1.25 a day is pretty attractive. Less funny business from donors, and far less waste. And what makes this most remarkable of all is that while the rich countries squabble over how much money to give and in what form, this initiative has sprung largely from the poor nations – usually under pressure from some of their poorest people.

This is the world of aid turned upside down. A couple of years ago, Oxfam tried the idea out in a few villages in Vietnam. Charity workers gave the equivalent of three years' wages in one go to more than 400 families. When they returned they found that poverty had dropped through the floor, with most of the money spent sensibly on food or fertilisers, seeds and cows. But older people had put some cash towards coffins, explaining that funerals were a major expense. And one group had built a communal house, to practise yoga.

Another look at Brazil's Bolsa Familia

Bolsa Familia is a highly regarded conditional cash transfer program in Brazil. Conditional because it places certain conditions on families that they have to fulfill in order to receive the money. The conditions include keeping the children in school or getting them to doctor or dentist checkups regularly. Despite the successes of Bolsa Familia, there is some debate within Brazil if the program prevents the parents from going out to look for a job.

From the Global Post, writer Seth Kugel profiles one Bolsa Familia family and looks into it's effect on work.

On a typical night, Janaina Alves da Silva and Jose Cicero dos Santos serve their six school-age children a dinner of cuscuz, a traditional corn porridge from the Brazilian northeast, along with fried eggs and coffee to wash it down. All told, the meal costs about three reais, the equivalent of $1.70.

Not bad for a family of eight, but for a household whose only stable income is Brazil’s “Bolsa Familia,” or “Family Stipend” program, the $50 a month they spend on dinner eats up most of the $70 they get from the government to survive.

Bolsa Familia, which reaches more than 12.5 million families across Brazil, has been the signature anti-poverty effort of the Lula administration, which expanded it greatly. Payments, which are tied (at least theoretically) to school attendance, have arguably done more to reduce severe poverty in Brazil than any previous program. The effort has garnered worldwide praise.

Though most Brazilians accept the general concept of the program — no candidate in the current presidential race would dare threaten it — there are bitter debates about its execution and scope, and criticisms of government mismanagement and misuse by families.

Another common criticism is that families decide to live on the payments alone, withdrawing from the labor market. But after spending a day with Dos Santos and Alves da Silva, who spoke openly about their expenditures and budgeting, that seems unlikely. Just to survive, they scramble for part-time work and use their own ingenuity.

They are just one family, of course, but a recent study from the International Policy Center for Inclusive Growth concluded that Bolsa Familia does slightly reduce work incentives, but not so much as to create dependency. (The center is jointly run by the United Nations Development Program and the Brazilian government.)

Some examples of Bolsa Familia helping people in Brazil

A Brazilian program that is getting a lot of attention worldwide is "Bolsa Familia," or the Family Grant, as it's known in English. Bolsa Familia is a conditional cash transfer program, meaning that poor residents of Brazil will receive some money from the government as long as their children stay in school and are kept in good health.

From the BBC, writer Gary Duffy gives us a couple of examples of people benefiting from Bolsa Familia.

"I think it is good and it helps a lot," says Francineide.

"When the money comes it is always better because there are many families in Brazil that depend on it, and even though it is a small amount, it makes a big difference."
Continue reading the main story Ruti Cunha

The new baby is Francineide's second child, and the monthly assistance she receives from Bolsa Familia will now rise to $66.

It helps to supplement the meagre income she gets from selling vegetables.

Further up the road, her father Joao works on a small plot of land and also receives a helping hand from the state in the form of low interest loans.

Critics say the family grant his daughter receives offers financial help, but no clear route to escape from poverty.

Now Bolsa Familia is being tied in to existing projects which target small investors in both the countryside and the city.

Joao is using the money, which he gets from a scheme known as AgroAmigo administered by the state-run Bank of the North-East, to buy the materials he needs.

"It helps me to get water, to buy seeds," he says.

"In the past we used to collect them but you can't do that any more. And this money helps to make things better."

An experiment that probably has not changed lives

A few years ago, New York City began a conditional cash transfer program for residents at or below the poverty line. "Conditional" because it only gave money to reward good behavior like seeing the doctor or getting good grades in school. The program was modeled after very successful programs in Brazil and Mexico. However, a new study conducted by the same group that designed New York's program says that it hasn't been life changing.

From this Associated Press story that we found at Google News, writer Sara Kugler tells us more about the study.

The first analysis of New York's effort was released Tuesday by a nonprofit social policy research group called MDRC that also helped design the program. Researchers are also tracking a control group of another 2,400 families that do not receive payments.

New York City's program began in 2007 and has bestowed total of $14 million on 2,400 participating families. The average award per family was $3,000.

The payments, also known as conditional cash transfers, were modeled after successful similar programs in other countries, including Mexico and Brazil. The theory is that the cash rewards reduce immediate hardship for poor people while reinforcing small but significant actions they can take to improve their long-term stability.

Before the city took up the idea, it had never been attempted in the United States.

Participants were offered 22 different incentives to earn money, ranging in value from $20 to $600. Ninety-eight percent of all families earned at least one reward, but just 65 percent achieved payments in every period they were available.

When compared with the control group, 10 percent more families in the reward group had two dental visits per year, 1 percent more had health insurance, 20 percent more had bank accounts and 3 percent fewer used costly services like check cashing.

But fewer people in the reward group held jobs in the first year, and cash rewards had no effect on school performance or attendance for young children.

The rewards also had no effect on test scores or attendance for low-performing high school students, and made only modest differences for higher-achieving students.

Video: Mexico's Oportunidades

A highly regarded poverty fighting program is the conditional cash transfers from Mexico and the Inter-American Development Bank. Instead of just giving money to people because they are poor, Mexico puts some conditions on the money. The poor families can only collect if they keep their children and school and take them to the doctor for checkups.

From PBS Newshour, Ray Suarez gives this long story that explains the program.

The conditional cash transfers of Latin America

Conditional cash transfers have been applauded by many as a great way to help people in poverty. Instead of just giving people money because they are poor, the governments set conditions on receiving the money. For Mexico and Brazil, parents have to keep their children in school to receive the money. The idea has recently been tried in New York City.

From McClatchy Newspapers, writer Tyler Bridges introduces us to one of the program recipients in Brazil, Denise de Oliveira.

Unlike traditional government handouts, however, this popular anti-poverty program, which has spread throughout Latin America and even to New York City, requires that de Oliveira's children stay in school. The children also must have twice-a-year health exams and be vaccinated against diseases.

The program goes by different names — Bolsa Familia (Family Fund) in Brazil and Oportunidades (Opportunities) in Mexico, the most populous countries it's in — and has slightly different rules depending on the country. Analysts say it's become the most successful anti-poverty program in years because it requires the poor to do something meaningful and measurable in exchange for government charity.

"I have worked in this field for 30 years in every region of the world," said Helena Uribe, a senior anti-poverty specialist at the World Bank in Washington. "This is the one (program) that works. It has showed that you can reach poor people today and position them to improve opportunities over a lifetime."

"The programs are popular because they have quick impacts that are measurable," said Amanda Glassman, a specialist in the program at the Inter-American Development Bank. "Well-child visits go up. Vaccination rates go up. School attendance goes up. Kids are taller for their age, even if they've been in the program for only a year."

Fears that the program would encourage families to have more children, stay at home rather than work to collect benefits or become playthings of patronage-happy politicians have proved to be unfounded, Glassman added.
...

(Sergei) Soares, who calls the program a huge success, said it had done little to reduce poverty in Brazil because its greatest impact had been keeping the poorest of the poor alive and making their lives somewhat more bearable. In other words, they've moved up from the bottom rung, but remain poor.

The program also has yet to lift classroom test scores in Mexico, the one country where data are available. It's barely raised school enrollment in urban areas throughout the region because most children already were in school.