IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/wp-2024-79.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The role of social assistance in African crises: a systematic literature review

Author

Listed:
  • Kalle Hirvonen
  • Patricia Justino
  • Rodrigo Oliveira

Abstract

This systematic review examines the effectiveness of social assistance programmes in protecting households in Africa—a region highly vulnerable to climate change, conflict, and other shocks—during periods of crisis. Despite the significant increase in the number of these programmes over the past two decades, the need for emergency aid remains. Our review focuses on quantitative studies using microdata to assess the impact of these programmes on household income, poverty, assets, and food security outcomes during crises.

Suggested Citation

  • Kalle Hirvonen & Patricia Justino & Rodrigo Oliveira, 2024. "The role of social assistance in African crises: a systematic literature review," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2024-79, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2024-79
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2024-79-role-social-assistance-African-crises.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Premand, Patrick & Stoeffler, Quentin, 2022. "Cash transfers, climatic shocks and resilience in the Sahel," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    2. Gupta, Prankur & Stein, Daniel & Longman, Kyla & Lanthorn, Heather & Bergmann, Rico & Nshakira-Rukundo, Emmanuel & Rutto, Noel & Kahura, Christine & Kananu, Winfred & Posner, Gabrielle & Zhao, K.J. & , 2024. "Cash transfers amid shocks: A large, one-time, unconditional cash transfer to refugees in Uganda has multidimensional benefits after 19 months," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    3. Premand, Patrick & Stoeffler, Quentin, 2022. "Cash transfers, climatic shocks and resilience in the Sahel," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    4. Jenny C. Aker, 2017. "Comparing Cash and Voucher Transfers in a Humanitarian Context: Evidence from the Democratic Republic of Congo," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 31(1), pages 44-70.
    5. Lori Beaman & Dean Karlan & Bram Thuysbaert, 2014. "Saving for a (not so) Rainy Day: A Ramdomized Evaluation of Savings Groups in Mali," Working Papers 1043, Economic Growth Center, Yale University.
    6. Hirvonen, Kalle & Gilligan, Daniel O. & Leight, Jessica & Tambet, Heleene & Villa, Victor, 2023. "Do ultra-poor graduation programs build resilience against droughts? Evidence from rural Ethiopia," IFPRI discussion papers 2206, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    7. Rachel Sabates-Wheeler & Kalle Hirvonen & Jeremy Lind & John Hoddinott, 2022. "Expanding Social Protection Coverage with Humanitarian Aid: Lessons on Targeting and Transfer Values from Ethiopia," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 58(10), pages 1981-2000, October.
    8. Rodrigo Oliveira & Jesse Lastunen & Pia Rattenhuber & Melissa Samarin & Adnan Abdulaziz Shahir, 2023. "The role of social protection and tax policies in cushioning crisis impacts on income and poverty in low- and middle-income countries: A rapid scoping review," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2023-6, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Patrick Premand & Dominic Rohner, 2024. "Cash and Conflict: Large-Scale Experimental Evidence from Niger," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 6(1), pages 137-153, March.
    2. Fiala, Nathan & Rose, Julian & Aryemo, Filder & Peters, Jörg, 2022. "The (very) long-run impacts of cash grants during a crisis," Ruhr Economic Papers 961, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    3. Scognamillo, Antonio & Song, Chun & Ignaciuk, Adriana, 2023. "No man is an Island: A spatially explicit approach to measure development resilience," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).
    4. Trivelli, C. & Clausen, J. & Vargas, S., 2017. "IFAD RESEARCH SERIES 9 - Social protection and inclusive rural transformation," IFAD Research Series 280047, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).
    5. Hızıroğlu Aygün, Aysun & Kırdar, Murat Güray & Koyuncu, Murat & Stoeffler, Quentin, 2024. "Keeping refugee children in school and out of work: Evidence from the world's largest humanitarian cash transfer program," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    6. Basu, Karna & Wong, Maisy, 2015. "Evaluating seasonal food storage and credit programs in east Indonesia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 200-216.
    7. Gupta, Prankur & Stein, Daniel & Longman, Kyla & Lanthorn, Heather & Bergmann, Rico & Nshakira-Rukundo, Emmanuel & Rutto, Noel & Kahura, Christine & Kananu, Winfred & Posner, Gabrielle & Zhao, K.J. & , 2024. "Cash transfers amid shocks: A large, one-time, unconditional cash transfer to refugees in Uganda has multidimensional benefits after 19 months," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 173(C).
    8. Premand, Patrick & Stoeffler, Quentin, 2022. "Cash transfers, climatic shocks and resilience in the Sahel," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    9. Koppenberg, Maximilian & Mishra, Ashok K. & Hirsch, Stefan, 2023. "Food Aid and Violent Conflict: A Review of Literature," IZA Discussion Papers 16574, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Flory, Jeffrey A., 2018. "Formal finance and informal safety nets of the poor: Evidence from a savings field experiment," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 517-533.
    11. Ryan Cardwell & Pascal L. Ghazalian, 2020. "The Effects of Untying International Food Assistance: The Case of Canada," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(4), pages 1056-1078, August.
    12. Claire MacPherson & Olivier Sterck, 2019. "Humanitarian vs. Development Aid for Refugees: Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design," CSAE Working Paper Series 2019-15, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    13. Haddis Solomon & Yoko Kijima, 2022. "Does Land Certification Mitigate the Negative Impact of Weather Shocks? Evidence from Rural Ethiopia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-17, October.
    14. Abhijit Banerjee & Rema Hanna & Benjamin A Olken & Elan Satriawan & Sudarno Sumarto, "undated". "Pangan versus Kupon Makanan: Bukti dari Eksperimen Berskala Besar di Indonesia," Working Papers 3537, Communications Section.
    15. Armande Mahabi Nabami & Anaëlle Petre & Roy Mersland, 2024. "Impact of climate change training intervention in savings groups," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 36(4), pages 2047-2062, May.
    16. Martínez Flores, Fernanda & Milusheva, Sveta & Reichert, Arndt R. & Reitmann, Ann-Kristin, 2024. "Climate anomalies and international migration: A disaggregated analysis for West Africa," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    17. Karlan, Dean & Horn, Samantha & Jamison, Julian C. & Zinman, Jonathan, 2020. "Does lasting behavior change require knowledge change? Evidence from savings interventions for young adults," CEPR Discussion Papers 15392, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    18. Panman, Alexandra & Madison, Ian & Kimacha, Nyambiri Nanai & Falisse, Jean Benoît, 2021. "Saving up for a rainy day? Savings groups and resilience to flooding in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 114610, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    19. Timothée Demont, 2020. "Coping with shocks: the impact of Self-Help Groups on migration and food security," AMSE Working Papers 2016, Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France.
    20. Cassidy, Rachel & Fafchamps, Marcel, 2020. "Banker my neighbour: Matching and financial intermediation in savings groups," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).

    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:unu:wpaper:wp-2024-79. 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: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    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.