IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wodepe/v23y2021ics2452292921000576.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Measuring the impact of unconditional cash transfers on consumption and poverty in Rwanda

Author

Listed:
  • Habimana, Dominique
  • Haughton, Jonathan
  • Nkurunziza, Joseph
  • Haughton, Dominique Marie-Annick

Abstract

This study estimates the causal effect of Rwanda’s unconditional cash transfer program (VUP-Direct Support) on the incidence of poverty, the poverty gap, and household food and non-food expenditure for direct support recipients. Our empirical analysis applies four matching methods to data from the 2013/14 household survey in order to estimate the program impact on the treated. The findings show that participation in the program has positive and statistically significant effects on measured headcount poverty and poverty gap. The program results in a small increase in both total and food consumption, with a reduction in consumption of food from home production, and no change in non-food consumption. The estimated treatment effects are relatively robust to violations of the conditional independence assumption, and to the choice of subsample.

Suggested Citation

  • Habimana, Dominique & Haughton, Jonathan & Nkurunziza, Joseph & Haughton, Dominique Marie-Annick, 2021. "Measuring the impact of unconditional cash transfers on consumption and poverty in Rwanda," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 23(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wodepe:v:23:y:2021:i:c:s2452292921000576
    DOI: 10.1016/j.wdp.2021.100341
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2452292921000576
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.wdp.2021.100341?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shikuku, Kelvin Mashisia & Okello, Julius Juma & Wambugu, Stella & Sindi, Kirimi & Low, Jan W. & McEwan, Margaret, 2019. "Nutrition and food security impacts of quality seeds of biofortified orange-fleshed sweetpotato: Quasi-experimental evidence from Tanzania," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 1-1.
    2. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp485 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Han, Chirok & Kim, Beomsoo, 2011. "A GMM interpretation of the paradox in the inverse probability weighting estimation of the average treatment effect on the treated," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 110(2), pages 163-165, February.
    4. Pedro Rodrigues de OLIVEIRA & Ana Lúcia KASSOUF, 2012. "Impact Evaluation of the Brazilian Non-Contributory Pension Program Benefício de Prestação Continuada (BPC) on Family Welfare," Working Papers PIERI 2012-12, PEP-PIERI.
    5. Guido W. Imbens, 2015. "Matching Methods in Practice: Three Examples," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 50(2), pages 373-419.
    6. Gustavo J. Bobonis & Roberto Castro & Juan S. Morales, 2015. "Conditional Cash Transfers for Women and Spousal Violence: Evidence of the Long-Term Relationship from the Oportunidades Program in Rural Mexico," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 91600, Inter-American Development Bank.
    7. Andrea Ichino & Fabrizia Mealli & Tommaso Nannicini, 2008. "From temporary help jobs to permanent employment: what can we learn from matching estimators and their sensitivity?," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 23(3), pages 305-327.
    8. Jenny Aker, 2013. "Cash or Coupons? Testing the Impacts of Cash versus Vouchers in the Democratic Republic of Congo," Working Papers 320, Center for Global Development.
    9. Ellen Verhofstadt & Miet Maertens, 2015. "Can Agricultural Cooperatives Reduce Poverty? Heterogeneous Impact of Cooperative Membership on Farmers' Welfare in Rwanda," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 37(1), pages 86-106.
    10. Hidrobo, Melissa & Hoddinott, John & Kumar, Neha & Olivier, Meghan, 2018. "Social Protection, Food Security, and Asset Formation," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 88-103.
    11. Bagnoli, Lisa, 2019. "Does health insurance improve health for all? Heterogeneous effects on children in Ghana," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 1-1.
    12. Alberto Abadie & Guido W. Imbens, 2011. "Bias-Corrected Matching Estimators for Average Treatment Effects," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(1), pages 1-11, January.
    13. Richard K. Crump & V. Joseph Hotz & Guido W. Imbens & Oscar A. Mitnik, 2006. "Moving the Goalposts: Addressing Limited Overlap in the Estimation of Average Treatment Effects by Changing the Estimand," NBER Technical Working Papers 0330, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Wooldridge, Jeffrey M., 2007. "Inverse probability weighted estimation for general missing data problems," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 141(2), pages 1281-1301, December.
    15. James Heckman & Salvador Navarro-Lozano, 2004. "Using Matching, Instrumental Variables, and Control Functions to Estimate Economic Choice Models," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(1), pages 30-57, February.
    16. Lebihan, Laetitia & Mao Takongmo, Charles-Olivier, 2019. "Unconditional cash transfers and parental obesity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 224(C), pages 116-126.
    17. Marito Garcia & Charity M. T. Moore, 2012. "The Cash Dividend : The Rise of Cash Transfer Programs in Sub-Saharan Africa," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 2246.
    18. Nilsson, Pia & Backman, Mikaela & Bjerke, Lina & Maniriho, Aristide, 2019. "One cow per poor family: Effects on the growth of consumption and crop production," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 1-12.
    19. Hjelm, Lisa & Handa, Sudhanshu & de Hoop, Jacobus & Palermo, Tia, 2017. "Poverty and perceived stress: Evidence from two unconditional cash transfer programs in Zambia," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 110-117.
    20. Keisuke Hirano & Guido W. Imbens & Geert Ridder, 2003. "Efficient Estimation of Average Treatment Effects Using the Estimated Propensity Score," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(4), pages 1161-1189, July.
    21. Kamurase, Alex & Wylde, Emily & Hitimana, Stephen & Kitunzi, Anka, 2012. "Rwanda - Social safety net assessment," Social Protection Discussion Papers and Notes 91577, The World Bank.
    22. Melissa Hidrobo & Amber Peterman & Lori Heise, 2016. "The Effect of Cash, Vouchers, and Food Transfers on Intimate Partner Violence: Evidence from a Randomized Experiment in Northern Ecuador," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 8(3), pages 284-303, July.
    23. Sudhanshu Handa & David Seidenfeld & Benjamin Davis & Gelson Tembo, 2016. "The Social and Productive Impacts of Zambia's Child Grant," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(2), pages 357-387, April.
    24. Stefan Wager & Susan Athey, 2018. "Estimation and Inference of Heterogeneous Treatment Effects using Random Forests," Journal of the American Statistical Association, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 113(523), pages 1228-1242, July.
    25. Zhiqiang Tan, 2010. "Bounded, efficient and doubly robust estimation with inverse weighting," Biometrika, Biometrika Trust, vol. 97(3), pages 661-682.
    26. Jing Qin & Biao Zhang & Denis H.Y. Leung, 2017. "Efficient Augmented Inverse Probability Weighted Estimation in Missing Data Problems," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(1), pages 86-97, January.
    27. Austin Peter C & Laupacis Andreas, 2011. "A Tutorial on Methods to Estimating Clinically and Policy-Meaningful Measures of Treatment Effects in Prospective Observational Studies: A Review," The International Journal of Biostatistics, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 1-32, January.
    28. Becerril, Javier & Abdulai, Awudu, 2010. "The Impact of Improved Maize Varieties on Poverty in Mexico: A Propensity Score-Matching Approach," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(7), pages 1024-1035, July.
    29. Quentin Wodon, 2012. "Improving the Targeting of Social Programs in Ghana," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13082.
    30. Paul J. Gertler & Sebastian W. Martinez & Marta Rubio-Codina, 2012. "Investing Cash Transfers to Raise Long-Term Living Standards," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 164-192, January.
    31. repec:oup:apecpp:v:37:y:2015:i:1:p:86-106 is not listed on IDEAS
    32. Barbara Sianesi, 2004. "An Evaluation of the Swedish System of Active Labor Market Programs in the 1990s," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 86(1), pages 133-155, February.
    33. Sarah Baird & David McKenzie & Berk Özler, 2018. "The effects of cash transfers on adult labor market outcomes," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 8(1), pages 1-20, December.
    34. Angus Deaton & Salman Zaidi, 2002. "Guidelines for Constructing Consumption Aggregates for Welfare Analysis," World Bank Publications, The World Bank, number 14101, April.
    35. Rachel Sabates‐Wheeler & Samantha Yates & Emily Wylde & Justine Gatsinzi, 2015. "Challenges of Measuring Graduation in Rwanda," IDS Bulletin, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(2), pages 103-114, March.
    36. A. Smith, Jeffrey & E. Todd, Petra, 2005. "Does matching overcome LaLonde's critique of nonexperimental estimators?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 125(1-2), pages 305-353.
    37. Quentin Wodon, 2012. "Improving the Targeting of Social Programs in Ghana," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 13081.
    38. Vo, Thang T. & Van, Pham Hoang, 2019. "Can health insurance reduce household vulnerability? Evidence from Viet Nam," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 1-1.
    39. Aguila, Emma & Kapteyn, Arie & Tassot, Caroline, 2017. "Designing cash transfer programs for an older population: The Mexican case," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 9(C), pages 111-121.
    40. Johannes Haushofer & Jeremy Shapiro, 2016. "The Short-term Impact of Unconditional Cash Transfers to the Poor: ExperimentalEvidence from Kenya," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(4), pages 1973-2042.
    41. Katia Covarrubias & Benjamin Davis & Paul Winters, 2012. "From protection to production: productive impacts of the Malawi Social Cash Transfer scheme," Journal of Development Effectiveness, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(1), pages 50-77, March.
    42. Marco Caliendo & Sabine Kopeinig, 2008. "Some Practical Guidance For The Implementation Of Propensity Score Matching," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 31-72, February.
    43. Vincent Gahamanyi & Andrew Kettlewell, 2015. "Evaluating Graduation: Insights from the Vision 2020 Umurenge Programme in Rwanda," IDS Bulletin, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(2), pages 48-63, March.
    44. Handa, Sudhanshu & Natali, Luisa & Seidenfeld, David & Tembo, Gelson & Davis, Benjamin, 2018. "Can unconditional cash transfers raise long-term living standards? Evidence from Zambia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 42-65.
    45. Aliou Diagne & Matty Demont, 2007. "Taking a new look at empirical models of adoption: average treatment effect estimation of adoption rates and their determinants," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 37(2‐3), pages 201-210, September.
    46. Giang, Long Thanh & Nguyen, Cuong Viet, 2017. "How would cash transfers improve child welfare in Viet Nam?," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 87-98.
    47. Silvio Daidone & Luca Pellerano & Sudhanshu Handa & Benjamin Davis, 2015. "Is Graduation from Social Safety Nets Possible? Evidence from Sub‐Saharan Africa," IDS Bulletin, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 46(2), pages 93-102, March.
    48. Margitic, Juan & Ravallion, Martin, 2019. "Lifting the floor? Economic development, social protection and the developing World's poorest," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 97-108.
    49. Jonathan Haughton & Shahidur R. Khandker, 2009. "Handbook on Poverty and Inequality," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 11985.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Song, Yang & Cheng, Zerui, 2024. "The impact of welfare design on consumption patterns of the poor: Evidence from the recent Dibao reform in rural China11This research is supported by National Social Science Foundation of China (22AZD," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    2. Meemken, Eva-Marie & Aremu, Olayinka & Fabry, Anna & Heepen, Celestina & Illien, Patrick & Kammer, Marie & Laitha, Andrew, 2024. "Policy for decent work in agriculture," IAAE 2024 Conference, August 2-7, 2024, New Delhi, India 344353, International Association of Agricultural Economists (IAAE).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kassie, Menale & Shiferaw, Bekele & Muricho, Geoffrey, 2011. "Agricultural Technology, Crop Income, and Poverty Alleviation in Uganda," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(10), pages 1784-1795.
    2. Handa, Sudhanshu & Natali, Luisa & Seidenfeld, David & Tembo, Gelson & Davis, Benjamin, 2018. "Can unconditional cash transfers raise long-term living standards? Evidence from Zambia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 42-65.
    3. Alexandra Peralta & Scott M. Swinton & Songqing Jin, 2018. "The Secret to Getting Ahead Is Getting Started: Early Impacts of a Rural Development Project," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(8), pages 1-20, July.
    4. Guido Imbens & Yiqing Xu, 2024. "LaLonde (1986) after Nearly Four Decades: Lessons Learned," Papers 2406.00827, arXiv.org, revised Jun 2024.
    5. Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2009. "Recent Developments in the Econometrics of Program Evaluation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 5-86, March.
    6. Difang Huang & Jiti Gao & Tatsushi Oka, 2022. "Semiparametric Single-Index Estimation for Average Treatment Effects," Papers 2206.08503, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2025.
    7. Ana Maria Buller & Amber Peterman & Meghna Ranganathan & Alexandra Bleile & Melissa Hidrobo & Lori Heise, 2018. "A Mixed-Method Review of Cash Transfers and Intimate Partner Violence in Low- and Middle-Income Countries," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 33(2), pages 218-258.
    8. Maoyong Fan & Yanhong Jin, 2015. "The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Childhood Obesity in the United States: Evidence from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997," American Journal of Health Economics, MIT Press, vol. 1(4), pages 432-460, Fall.
    9. Nguyen Ngoc Duy & Ola Flaaten, 2016. "Profitability Effects and Fishery Subsidies: Average Treatment Effects Based on Propensity Scores," Marine Resource Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 31(4), pages 373-402.
    10. Solomon Asfaw & Silvio Daidone & Benjamin Davis & Josh Dewbre & Alessandro Romeo & Paul Winters & Katia Covarrubias & Habiba Djebbari, 2012. "Analytical Framework for Evaluating the Productive Impact of Cash Transfer Programmes on Household Behaviour – Methodological Guidelines for the From Protection to Production Project," Working Papers 101, International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth.
    11. Silvio Daidone & Benjamin Davis & Sudhanshu Handa & Paul Winters, 2019. "The Household and Individual-Level Productive Impacts of Cash Transfer Programs in Sub-Saharan Africa," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1401-1431.
    12. Siddique Abu Bakkar, 2020. "Identity-based Earning Discrimination among Chinese People," IZA Journal of Development and Migration, Sciendo & Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 11(1), pages 1-42, January.
    13. Saeed, Muhammad Kashif & Hayat, Muhammad Azmat, 2020. "The Impact of Social Cash Transfers on Poverty in Pakistan-A Case Study of Benazir Income Support Programme," MPRA Paper 99805, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Sudhanshu Handa & John A. Maluccio, 2010. "Matching the Gold Standard: Comparing Experimental and Nonexperimental Evaluation Techniques for a Geographically Targeted Program," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58(3), pages 415-447, April.
    15. Maren Radeny & Elizaphan J. O. Rao & Maurice Juma Ogada & John W. Recha & Dawit Solomon, 2022. "Impacts of climate-smart crop varieties and livestock breeds on the food security of smallholder farmers in Kenya," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 14(6), pages 1511-1535, December.
    16. Caliendo, Marco & Mahlstedt, Robert & Mitnik, Oscar A., 2017. "Unobservable, but unimportant? The relevance of usually unobserved variables for the evaluation of labor market policies," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 14-25.
    17. Jianxin Guo & Songqing Jin & Lei Chen & Jichun Zhao, 2018. "Impacts of Distance Education on Agricultural Performance and Household Income: Micro-Evidence from Peri-Urban Districts in Beijing," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(11), pages 1-19, October.
    18. Simone Bertoli & Francesca Marchetta, 2014. "Migration, Remittances and Poverty in Ecuador," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 50(8), pages 1067-1089, August.
    19. Lee, Ji Yong & Nayga Jr, Rodolfo M. & Jo, Young & Restrepo, Brandon J., 2022. "Time use and eating patterns of SNAP participants over the benefit month," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    20. Menale Kassie & Gunnar Köhlin & Randy Bluffstone & Stein Holden, 2011. "Are soil conservation technologies “win‐win?” A case study of Anjeni in the north‐western Ethiopian highlands," Natural Resources Forum, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 35(2), pages 89-99, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wodepe:v:23:y:2021:i:c:s2452292921000576. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/world-development-perspectives .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.