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FAO. 2018. FAO Technical Guide 2 – Integrating gender into the design of cash transfer and public works programmes. Rome. 88 pp.
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Contents

Acknowledgements

Abbreviations and acronyms

Introduction

PART 1
A guide to undertaking a gender-sensitive poverty and vulnerability analysis (GSPVA)

1.1 Purpose and objectives of the GSPVA

1.2 Key elements of the GSPVA

1.3 Main steps in implementing the GSPVA

PART 2
How to integrate gender considerations into the design of cash transfers

2.1 Overview

2.2 Programme objectives

2.3 Targeting of beneficiaries

2.4 Transfer size and payment predictability

2.5 Programme conditions

PART 3
How to integrate gender considerations into the design of Public Works Programme (PWPs)

3.1 Overview

3.2 Targeting of beneficiaries

3.3 Type of transfer

3.4 Working conditions

3.5 Selection of assets and the type of work

PART 4
Enhancing impacts of social transfers through complementary support

Overview

ANNEX 1
Checklist for undertaking the GSPVA

ANNEX 2
Targeting methods and their gender implications

ANNEX 3
Checklist for ensuring gender-sensitivity of cash transfers

ANNEX 4
Checklist for ensuring gender-sensitivity of PWPs

ANNEX 5
Learning tools

ANNEX 6
Key resources

References

Acknowledgements

This document is the result of a joint effort of the Gender and Social Protection teams of the Social Policies and Rural Institutions Division (ESP) of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) prepared by Maja Gavrilovic, Juan Gonzalo Jaramillo Mejia, Susan Kaaria and Natalia Winder-Rossi, with technical guidance from Ana Paula de la O Campos and Pamela Pozarny.

The authors are grateful to Liz Koechlein of FAO, Rebecca Holmes of the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), Professor Maxine Molyneux of the UCL Institute of the Americas, Amber Peterman of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), and Raquel Tebaldi of the International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth (IPCIG) for having provided very useful feedback on draft versions of this document.

Finally, the authors would like to thank Andrea Wöhr who developed the graphic design, Christine Legault and Chiara Villani of FAO who managed the publishing process and Gordon Ramsey for copyediting the document.

Abbreviations and acronyms

4Ps Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Programme (Philippines)

CCT Conditional Cash Transfer

CTP Cash Transfer Programmes

CEDAW Convention on All Forms of Discrimination against Women

FAO Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

GSPVA Gender-sensitive poverty and vulnerability analysis

IDS Institute of Development Studies

ILO International Labour Organization

IPC-IG International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth

MGNREGS Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (India)

ODI Overseas Development Institute

PSNP Productive Safety Net Programme (Ethiopia)

PWP Public Works Programme

SP Social protection

VUP Vision 2020 Umurenge Programme (Rwanda)

UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund

Introduction

Welcome to FAO Technical Guide 2 – Integrating gender into the design of cash transfer and public works programmes. This is the second of three technical guides in the Toolkit on gender-sensitive social protection programmes to combat rural poverty and hunger (see Figure 1).

The purpose of the Toolkit

This Toolkit on gender-sensitive social protection programmes to combat rural poverty and hunger is designed to support social protection (SP) practitioners in their efforts to systematically apply a gender lens to SP programmes in ways that are in line with FAO commitments[1] to expanding inclusive SP systems for rural populations. The Toolkit is intended to deepen the knowledge and technical skills practitioners require to integrate gender issues effectively into the design, delivery, and monitoring and evaluation of cash transfers and public works programmes (PWPs). The Toolkit has a specific focus on SP’s role in reducing gender inequalities and rural poverty and hunger. For a detailed discussion of the rationale and scope of the Toolkit, see Technical Guide 1. The Toolkit is designed for government staff involved in SP programme development and implementation. It may also be of use to FAO gender and social protection focal points in regional and country offices, development partners and SP practitioners in general.

Overview of Technical Guide 2

Technical Guide 2, which provides practical advice on how to formulate and design a gender-sensitive cash transfer and PWP, has four parts:

Part 1: A guide to undertaking a gender-sensitive poverty and vulnerability analysis (GSPVA).

Part 2: How to integrate gender considerations into the core design features of cash transfers.

Part 3: How to integrate gender considerations into the core design features of PWPs.

Part 4: Enhancing gender impacts of social transfers through complementary support.

Technical Guide 2 combines conceptual and empirical insights, illustrative examples, and practical tools, such as checklists and exercises (see Annexes 1-5). It is intended for beginners and men and women with an intermediate level of experience in working in SP policy and programming.

How should the technical guides be used?

The technical guides in the Toolkit follow a logical programming sequence: from planning and design to implementation and monitoring and evaluation. Each technical guide can be used as a stand-alone resource or in combination with the other technical guides. Figure 1 indicates the key issues and topics covered in the technical guides. Users can work at their own pace and according to their personal interests and learning objectives, without direct guidance or facilitation.

The combination of techniques used throughout the technical guides is designed to build on the participants’ existing knowledge and experience.

The technical guides can be adapted for, and used in face-to-face training workshops with a dedicated facilitator to respond to specific country demands and contexts. The combination of techniques used throughout the technical guides is designed to build on the participants’ existing knowledge and experience.

How were the technical guides prepared?

The technical guides are based on:

a comprehensive review of literature on gender, rural poverty and vulnerability, SP, and gender-sensitive SP programming. The review combined theoretical and conceptual review of literature including impact evaluations and case studies;

expert consultations with key partners within and outside FAO;

policy and operational insights into gender-sensitive SP, gathered during a series of webinar events on gender and SP organized by FAO and the IPC-IG;[2] and

a peer review by external experts, academics and senior FAO staff.

The technical guides are based on: a comprehensive review of literature, expert consultations, policy and operational insights and a peer review by external experts.

1.1 Purpose and objectives of the GSPVA

The GSPVA is a starting point for developing gender-sensitive SP programmes. Before formulating programme objectives and design features, it is critical to establish a comprehensive understanding of gender dynamics in a given context and their links to rural poverty. Conducting the GSPVA allows SP programme designers to understand the ways poverty and vulnerability affect women and men differently throughout their lives, and the different needs women and men have for SP. This information can help to identify gender equality programme objectives, and ensure the programme is designed in a manner that is sensitive to these different needs and priorities of men and women. In this way, the SP programme can better satisfy both the practical needs of women and men (e.g. food, housing, employment) and their strategic interests (e.g. education and training, decision-making, political power).

The GSPVA asks questions in four key areas.

The GSPVA asks questions in four key areas:

i. What are the specific risks and vulnerabilities that rural women and men face? How do gender norms and inequalities affect the vulnerability and poverty of women relative to men?

ii. What are the various potential gender-related factors (e.g. the socio-cultural, economic, financial, political and legal obstacles) that limit the participation of rural women and men in the programme, and hinder their access to and control over benefits?

iii. What are the programme’s likely gendered impacts, both positive and negative, and how are different stakeholders likely to affect, or be affected by, the programme activities and outcomes?

iv. What are the potential challenges and opportunities for the SP programmes to promote gender equality and economic empowerment of rural women?

Box 1 provides an example of a GSPVA in action.

Performing the GSPVA allows programme designers to develop SP programmes that help rural women and men to overcome poverty and food insecurity in a more effective and sustainable way by: (i) taking the specific needs, priorities and perspectives of both women and men into account; (ii) not excluding or harming the well-being of women and men; and (iii) addressing gender-specific livelihood constraints.

The GSPVA can also generate baseline data that can be used to track the impact of the programme on gender-related issues.

The GSPVA is particularly relevant during the formulation stage of the SP programme. It enables staff to integrate gender effectively into key elements of SP programming based on evidence and data. The analysis can also be applied during programme implementation to support managers in assessing progress and redressing any shortcomings in programme design. The GSPVA can also generate baseline data that can be used to track the impact of the programme on gender-related issues (see Technical Guide 3 for information on gender-sensitive monitoring and evaluation of SP).

1.2 Key elements of the GSPVA

The GSPVA consists of the following components:

These five thematic areas build on each other. Depending on the scope of the research, the analysis can collect data across all five thematic areas for a thorough assessment. Alternatively, the research team can focus on selected issues that are in line with the specific needs of the programme and available resources. It is important to note that the GSPVA works best when embedded in the existing overarching poverty and vulnerability assessments employed at the start of the formulation stage of the SP programme. In the following section, we explain the purpose of each thematic area and the key issues they investigate.

i. Gender and livelihoods analysis

Purpose: Gender and livelihoods analysis can be used to map key gender issues and explore gender inequalities in (i) the roles and responsibilities of men and women, including their economic activities and care activities; (ii) the livelihood strategies and opportunities of women and men; (iii) access to and control over productive resources (e.g. land, equipment, tools, work, credit and household income) and time, as well as access to services and information; and (iv) involvement in, and influence over decision-making processes at household and community levels. The GSPVA can also be used to assess the underlying causes of these gender differences (e.g. socio-cultural norms, practices, rules and policies) and the ways these causes can produce unequal gender outcomes in well-being, livelihood security and poverty. Finally, the analysis can identify the potential barriers (e.g. limited access to information, little free time, restricted mobility and opportunity costs) that may affect the participation of rural women and men in the programme and the benefits they derive from it.

Based on this information gathered in the GSPVA, programme designers can start to map the needs of women and men that require attention, and identify programme features and activities for effectively reaching and benefiting both rural women and men.

Guiding questions:

What are the policy and legal frameworks and institutional mechanisms supporting gender equality?

What are the main roles and activities for women and men regarding productive and reproductive and time use roles?

What are the gender differences in access to productive resources, land, assets, labour, services and markets?

What are the main livelihood activities for men and women in the household, including activities related to social transfers?

What are the gender differences in access to employment opportunities (wage labour, PWPs)?

Who makes decisions regarding expenditures, the crops to plant and cash transfers?

To what extent are women participating in community-based organizations?

What are the potential barriers women and men face in participating in the progamme and deriving benefits from it?

CHECKLIST: Table 5 in Annex 1 suggests detailed guiding questions and tools for carrying out this type of analysis.

TIMING: The analysis should be conducted at the start of the research. It forms the basis for exploring gender dimensions of poverty and vulnerability.

ii. Vulnerability analysis

Purpose: The vulnerability analysis assesses the main sources of vulnerabilities faced by rural women and men at the community, household and individual level. These sources of vulnerability include socio-economic, environmental, health and life-cycle risks. The analysis looks at the gender-specific manifestations of this vulnerability and their implications for rural livelihood security and poverty. It also explores the different capacities women and men have to manage risk and withstand crises, and the strategies they adopt to cope with shocks and stresses. This data can be used to identify programming options for strengthening the resilience of women and men to enable them to effectively manage risks. The findings of the vulnerability analysis can also help identify opportunities for beneficiaries to accumulate productive, financial and social assets, and determine the role of SP in this process.

Guiding questions:

What are the main sources of vulnerability in the community/household?

How do these affect the livelihood systems, assets and well-being of women and men?

Do men and women experience different types of shocks or stresses?

What are the gender differences in coping capacities and mechanisms? What are the causes of these differences?

What are the differences in impacts to disasters and/or climate change on men and women? What are the causes of these differences?

What are the life-cycle events specific to women that increase their vulnerability?

What strategies do men and women use to minimize risk and cope with shocks and stresses?

What are the most important risks and vulnerabilities faced by the community/ household from the perspective of women and men?

CHECKLIST: Table 6 in Annex 1 suggests detailed guiding questions and tools for carrying out a vulnerability analysis.

TIMING: The vulnerability analysis can be conducted after the information from the gender and livelihood analysis has been gathered.

iii. Poverty analysis

Purpose: A gender approach to poverty analysis focuses on the identification of gender differences in all phases of the poverty cycle, including: (i) the root causes and factors that push rural women and men into poverty (this phase builds on the results of the vulnerability assessment); (ii) the ways in which poverty is experienced by women and men and its outcomes; and (iii) the options men and women have for escaping poverty (see Technical Guide 1, Part 4 for an analytical framework on the links between gender and rural poverty).

An examination of intrahousehold poverty dynamics and outcomes is the critical dimension of the poverty analysis in the GSPVA. A conventional poverty analysis, which is generally based on housheold-level information, typically looks at income and consumption indicators. It often fails to acknowledge significant differences between men and women and between generations within households (Chant, ed., 2010). The intrahousehold poverty analysis in the GSPVA explores how gender roles and access to opportunities and entitlements within the household affect men, women, boys and girls as individuals.

This analysis can help to identify a set of gender-sensitive options and actions to address poverty and food insecurity at the individual and household level.

The poverty analysis in the GSPVA also explores how gender-related poverty outcomes vary according to household composition (e.g. whether it is a male-headed or female-headed nuclear family, an extended family or polygamous family). It also documents the poverty experience of particularly vulnerable groups of rural women who, in addition to gender inequalities, face other forms of discrimination and disadvantage related to a range of factors, such as ethnicity, religion, occupation, caste and location. This analysis can help to identify a set of gender-sensitive options and actions to address poverty and food insecurity at the individual and household level.

Guiding questions:

What have been the government policy and institutional responses to poverty (e.g. policies, institutions, support mechanisms, safety nets)?

How is gender equality addressed in policies, institutions, and support mechanisms?

What are the main characteristics of rural poverty, and how does they differ for men and women?

Are women at a greater risk of income poverty and multidimensional poverty? Why?

What are the main causes of poverty, as perceived by women and men?

What causes these differences (e.g. discriminatory social norms, barriers to economic resources, time use)?

What are the opportunities and mechanisms that women and men view as enabling households and individual household members to escape from poverty and start a process of capital accumulation?

What are the main needs and priorities for support among women and men?

CHECKLIST: Table 7 in Annex 1 suggests the detailed guiding questions and tools for carrying out a poverty analysis.

TIMING: This is a core activity of the GSPVA. It draws on both secondary data and fieldwork research from the other components of the GSPVA.

iv. Stakeholder analysis

Purpose: Community members and institutions often have different priorities, interests and needs related to SP, poverty reduction and gender equality. Conflicts of interest are common, particularly concerning culturally sensitive issues, such as changes in gender roles and power relations, and the promotion of women’s empowerment. The stakeholder analysis can be used to identify (i) different types of stakeholders; (ii) their relative stake in a given SP programme and their influence over programme objectives and outcomes; (iii) their potential level of support for or resistance to the proposed initiative; and (iv) the likely impact of the programme on stakeholders and community relations.

Potential stakeholders include intended beneficiaries; government agencies at the national, regional and local levels; donors; front-line government workers and service providers; and community members. Programme planners can use the data from the stakeholder analysis to identify strategies to promote collaboration between stakeholders in order to reach consensus, build commitments towards gender equality goals and gender-sensitive programming features and manage potential risks.

Guiding questions:

Who are the main stakeholders?

What are their priorities and interests with regard to poverty reduction, gender equality and SP?

How supportive are they to the proposed gender-sensitive programming?

Are there certain groups that stand to gain or lose more than others? Men and women? Rich or poor? Who will be disadvantaged?

Which stakeholders could influence the success of the proposed programme? How can they be engaged effectively?

Are there any stakeholders who are likely to be negatively affected and who have not yet been consulted? How can this be addressed?

Are there any potential allies among the stakeholders who could help to enhance the voice and influence of the weaker stakeholders?

CHECKLIST: Table 8 in Annex 1 suggests the guiding questions and tools for carrying out a stakeholder analysis.

TIMING: The stakeholder analysis can be used at any stage of the programme cycle, including the programme preparation stage and mid-term reviews. It can build upon existing information at each successive phase.

v. Programme review

Purpose: The purpose of the programme review is to assess the level of gender integration within the programme formulation phase and at the same time sharpen the programme’s gender focus and relevance. The programme review examines how gender differences and priorities of rural women and men as identified by the GSPVA, can be (or have been) considered in key aspects of the programme design, implementation and monitoring and evaluation to ensure that women and men benefit equally from the intervention.

Collected data can be used to inform an action plan to strengthen the staff and institutional capacities that are required to achieve gender-related programme objectives and design features.

An important component of the programme review is an institutional assessment of the capacities to mainstream gender within SP programmes (e.g. in the Ministry of Social Protection, and with gender focal points). Evidence can be collected on a government’s policy commitments to gender equality, the capacity of staff for gender mainstreaming, the existence of gender-sensitive programme implementation arrangements, and budgetary commitments towards gender-sensitive programme activities. Collected data can be used to inform an action plan to strengthen the staff and institutional capacities that are required to achieve gender-related programme objectives.

Guiding questions:

Are gender equality and/or women’s empowerment goals included in programme objectives?

How is the programme ensuring that benefits accrue equally to both women and men?

How is the targeting ensuring that women (or men) are preferentially targeted?

Are women and men facing gender-specific barriers to participation in the programme? What are they? How does the programme plan to address these constraints?

Do the proposed activities respond to the needs and priorities of women and men identified in the analyses?

Are there funds earmarked to implement gender-related activities?

Does the programme team have adequate gender expertise?

Does the programme integrate gender into monitoring and evaluation frameworks and activities?

CHECKLIST: Table 9 in Annex 1 suggests the detailed guiding questions and tools for carrying out a programme review.

TIMING: The review can commence ex ante to inform programme development. The analysis can also be adapted and used ex post (e.g. mid-term review) to assess the extent to which the findings of the GSPVA have been reflected in the existing programme, and make recommendations to refine programme design and implementation arrangements.

1.3 Main steps in implementing the GSPVA

This section explains the three main steps for undertaking the GSPVA:

IMPORTANT NOTE: Please note that this section provides a brief guide to how to conduct the GSPVA analysis and data collection. It does not provide a detailed guide to undertaking general research on gender or SP. There are more comprehensive resources that can be consulted for these purposes, and they are referenced in this section.

1.3.1 Setting up the research team

A first step in implementing the GSPVA involves identifying and contracting the research team, and securing the resources required to conduct the analysis. It is critical to ensure that the programme staff has the necessary skills, adequate funding and the appropriate amount of time to undertake the work effectively. The GSPVA requires both general expertise in gender concepts, and familiarity with poverty and vulnerability dynamics across a wide range of sectors. The team conducting the assessment needs adequate facilitation skills, and an awareness of, and sensitivity to, gender-related research. In some circumstances where local capacity is particularly weak, the team may need to be supported or mentored by regional or international gender experts. This learning-by-doing approach can also be a useful way to build local capacities in conducting the GSPVA.

The GSPVA requires both general expertise in gender concepts, and familiarity with poverty and vulnerability dynamics across a wide range of sectors.

1.3.2 Planning and conducting the GSPVA

The research team needs to (i) define the scope of their analysis and (ii) select research methods for collecting the relevant data to answer the key research objectives. This section briefly explores how these two activities can be achieved.

a. Determining the scope of the GSPVA

To ensure the GSPVA can be successfully completed and be relevant, it is critical to establish from the outset the focus of the assessment that will guide the analysis. Conducting assessments within the five thematic areas discussed above makes it possible to generate a comprehensive picture of the issues that must be addressed in programming. However, covering every thematic area may be difficult, and perhaps even impossible given time and financial limitations.

The focus and scope of the GSPVA will also be determined by the type of programme (see Box 2), its size, and the availability of skilled staff and resources to undertake the analysis. The more concise and focused the research objectives are from the outset, the more useful the GSPVA will be. For example, one question that could be considered: should the programme address women’s and girls’ practical needs for food, education and health care, or also aim to empower them? Based on these overarching programme goals and parameters, the next step is to develop specific research objectives, identify the main issues to explore, and then prepare the key questions to guide the assessment.

b. Selecting data collection methods

Once the scope of the analysis and objectives are determined, the next step is to select appropriate data sources and research methods to gather the necessary information and evidence. A desk-based literature review can be undertaken to identify the existing sources of information including sex- and age-disaggregated data (if available) on gender, poverty and vulnerability. Information can be typically found in poverty reduction strategies and social protection strategies, national statistics and surveys (e.g. living standards measurement studies, demographic and health surveys, time-use surveys), national development plans, country gender assessments and strategies, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) reports, FAO Country Gender Assessments, and employment strategies.

While much of the basic information will be available in these secondary sources, it may also be necessary to undertake primary data collection.

While much of the basic information will be available in these secondary sources, it may also be necessary to undertake primary data collection. Different types of quantitative and qualitative methods are available to gather such information, including:

household surveys and statistical analysis (quantitative research); and

key informant interviews, focus group discussions, in-depth interviews and other methods (qualitative research).

FURTHER READING: refer to Technical Guide 3, Part 2 for more discussion about qualitative and quantitative methods in the context of gender and social protection analysis.

Tips to keep in mind when selecting the data collection methods

Tailor the selection of research methods to the specific issues you wish to capture. Certain research methods are more relevant for particular types of GSPVA (see Box 3).

Combine quantitative and qualitative methods to obtain a more accurate and comprehensive view of the situation. The research team should strive to employ data triangulation, which involves the use of different data collection methods and the comparison of data from different sources. For example, quantitative data can provide robust gender-disaggregated statistics on women’s time use, asset ownership and agricultural production, while qualitative methods may be needed to investigate more elusive issues related to women’s empowerment, including women’s bargaining power and agency, and/or their influence over key decisions in the household, which are difficult to capture with statistics or surveys.

Good facilitation skills are needed to make sure that these groups participate meaningfully and their voices are heard.

Use participatory tools to understand gender and poverty dynamics at the household level. When collecting data, the use of participatory tools is recommended for engaging with intended beneficiaries, especially groups who are illiterate, and/or socially marginalized. However, applying participatory tools and methods in a group setting with vulnerable groups may not lead to better participation. Good facilitation skills are needed to make sure that these groups participate meaningfully and their voices are heard. Before selecting participants in a group discussion, the research team should identify the various groups of people in the community to ensure that the sample includes gender-sensitive categories, such as households headed by women or unpaid women farmers.

FURTHER READING: For a further discussion of different types of research methods and examples of their application, there are many excellent guides that can be consulted. See for example the FAO Social Analysis for Agriculture and rural Investment Projects: Field Guide, for a discussion on participatory tools.[3] Other references are provided in Annex 6.

Once the data is collected, the information must be analysed and the findings synthesized in an easy-to-read document. A technical paper or a brief can be written to communicate the main findings and recommendations to various stakeholders. This document can be used to guide programme formulation.

FURTHER READING: For an in-depth example of a GSPVA, refer to the case study at the end of this section.

1.3.3 Using the GSPVA to inform programme features

The ultimate purpose of the GSPVA is to use the results to influence the SP programming processes and outcomes. Two final steps need to be undertaken to ensure this happens.

a. Disseminating the findings of the GSPVA

To promote the uptake of the GSPVA results, it is important to share the findings with a wide range of stakeholders at the national and community level. This is needed to (i) validate conclusions and recommendations; (ii) build consensus for prioritizing the issues to be taken forward in SP programming; and (iii) agree on a vision that reflects this consensus and supports the promotion of gender equality and women’s empowerment. Community representatives and potential beneficiaries should be involved in this process.

Two final steps need to be undertaken to ensure this happens: Disseminating the findings of the GSPVA and using the findings to inform programming.

b. Using the findings to inform programming

At this point, the task is to package the key findings from the GSPVA so that they clearly identify and articulate how gender can be integrated in each stage of the programme cycle. A planning workshop can be organized with the main actors involved in programme design and implementation to begin developing the structure of the programme. This involves defining the key goals and objectives of the intervention, and deciding how these objectives can be achieved through specific design and implementation features, activities and inputs (see Table 1). These outputs would then inform the development of a logical framework that would guide gender-sensitive programme design and monitoring and evaluation.

Summary questions

What are the objectives of the GSPVA?

What types of analysis can be undertaken?

What are the key activities necessary to plan and implement the GSPVA?

Exercise 1: Developing a road map to conduct the GSPVA
(SEE ANNEX 5)

In-depth case study 1: Samuel Hall gender research in Afghanistan

In 2013, the World Bank engaged Samuel Hall to conduct a pilot study for the Afghanistan Social Protection Programme, which was to be implemented in four poor provinces across the country. The programme, which was intended to target women household members, was based on the premise that women’s spending decisions were better aligned with the World Bank’s poverty reduction goals than decisions made by the men in the household. Samuel Hall was commissioned to assess the potential for such a programme, gather new evidence on the gender implications of the design and delivery of the programme, and make recommendations to maximize its impact.

The objectives of the research were to:

identify the key practical and socio-cultural constraints that limit women’s ability to access social safety net programmes as direct beneficiaries;

explore the status of women in the household and determine the extent of their decision-making power; and

delineate the various implications for the women or men directly receiving cash transfers through a social safety net programme.

The following research questions guided the assessment:

How much decision-making power would women have over spending any cash benefits received?

What are the impediments women might face in receiving information on a social safety net programme and enrolling in it?

What obstacles would women face in receiving payments?

If mothers and other women were to be direct beneficiaries of such a scheme, what impact would this have on household spending patterns?

What are the community attitudes and potential risks in targeting women as beneficiaries of cash benefits?

To collect the data, 45 focus group discussions were undertaken in Bamyan and Kunar provinces. Women’s focus group discussions were used to gain an understanding of women’s activities and responsibilities, and grasp the dynamics of household spending and general decision-making from their perspectives. Men’s focus group discussions were held to ascertain the perceptions of male community members regarding the challenges their households face in sustaining their livelihoods and dealing with poverty, and how these challenges are addressed in household decision-making processes. Focus group discussions were organized with community elders including Maliks (local leaders), Wakils (representatives) and members of the Shura (council or committee) to gauge potential reactions regarding the challenges and benefits of women becoming direct beneficiaries of a cash transfer.

The analysis identified a number of hurdles to the proposed approach of directing payments to mothers/women.

Restrictive socio-cultural norms may pose a challenge for women to engage in household decision-making and travel to registration centres and banks to collect the payment without a male chaperone.

Significant security concerns (especially in Kunar province) risk making traveling to payment distribution points and markets (where women might make spending decisions) prohibitive.

Both women and men reported that any income received by anyone in the household would immediately be pooled, and that disputes over spending decisions may result in domestic violence.

Based on research findings, four recommendations were proposed to programme designers and staff implementing the intervention.

1. Carefully weigh the trade-offs involved in the targeting approach and criteria, and ensure community support when targeting married women, particularly in traditionalist areas.

2. Inform communities and leaders of the exact nature of the programme and its beneficiary selection process.

3. Utilize local, trusted money distribution mechanisms, such as the Hawala system, to distribute cash effectively and securely to beneficiaries. Use simple processes for obtaining ID cards.

4. Establish and closely monitor a grievance mechanism to address potential gender inequities.

Source: Hall, 2015.

2.1 Overview

As shown in Technical Guide 1, cash transfers can be a powerful tool for reducing rural gender inequalities in access to health, food and education. They can also facilitate women’s accumulation of productive assets, which can have positive impacts on their capacity to earn income and improve their social status (Warring and de la O Campos, 2016).[4] Even so, these positive outcomes are neither guaranteed nor automatic. Concerted efforts are needed to address gender systematically in the design of CTPs to maximize their positive outcomes on gender equality and poverty reduction.

This section discusses how gender can be mainstreamed into the four core design features of CTPs:

Each subsection discusses the key operational issues related to these design features and proposes options for enhancing their gender focus.

2.2 Programme objectives

One of the key tasks of gender-sensitive programme design is to define clear and explicit gender objectives and expected outcomes. By helping to clarify the expected outcomes and specific activities needed to achieve those objectives, well defined programme objectives set the direction of the programme. Clearly stated objectives also allow staff to track and measure progress on gender equality and women’s empowerment through monitoring and evaluation activities. This section discusses the extent to which existing CTPs promote gender equality and women’s empowerment in their objectives, and offers suggestions for improving gender sensitivity in this crucial aspect of programme design.

One of the key tasks of gender-sensitive programme design is to define clear and explicit gender objectives and expected outcomes.

KEY POINTS

CTPs can integrate gender in their objectives in different ways and to varying degrees.

CTPs can incorporate gender equality and/or women’s empowerment in some dimension as one of their objectives. They can focus on addressing a specific and often narrow range of gender issues, as part of their overall poverty reduction goals. For example, programmes can promote girls’ rights to education, or women’s access to maternal health care. They can also address the specific vulnerabilities faced by elderly women (e.g. social pensions) or pregnant and nursing mothers (e.g. maternity allowances). While these programmes support women’s practical needs, they do not necessarily seek to transform the discriminatory gender norms and relations that underpin women and girls’ vulnerabilities to deprivation. Consequently, they can fall short of achieving transformative gender outcomes (Molyneux and Thomson, 2012).

Although it may not be the main area of focus, some programmes also aim (often implicitly) to empower rural women by providing transfers directly to them instead of the male heads of households. These programmes can play an important role in increasing women’s access to and control over resources, and improving their financial autonomy and bargaining power within the family. These programmes often assume that by simply providing cash to women, the interventions will contribute to their empowerment.

A small number of programmes systematically and comprehensively promote gender-specific objectives as their main focus. Such programmes are deliberately designed to address both the practical and strategic needs of rural women in a synergistic way through a number of design components. The Chapéu de Palha Mulher Programme in Brazil follows such an approach (see Box 4). These programmes are quite rare, since most SP programmes are typically designed to address household poverty and stop poverty from being perpetuated from one generation to the next.

Programmes can have ‘gender-neutral’ objectives. Most CTPs are not designed with the explicit goal of addressing gender inequality or empowering rural women. This lack of attention to gender is not surprising, given that cash transfers generally address household poverty, food insecurity and/or welfare of particularly vulnerable groups, such as children, people with disabilities and the elderly.

Table 2 provides examples of programmes with different types of gender objectives.

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

The specific ways to integrate gender into CTP objectives are determined by various factors, such as the nature of gender issues that affect women’s and men’s poverty outcomes, the level of gender awareness among staff, and the context in which the programme is implemented.

As a general rule, gender equality principles should be built into the programme objectives from the outset to ensure that the priorities and needs of men and women are properly addressed and that benefits are equally distributed. This applies to CTPs that do necessarily aim to to reduce gender inequalities or empower rural women, and to CTPs that specifically adopt these goals.

There are a number of actions and considerations programme designers need to keep in mind.

Ensure that programme objectives are linked to equitable outcomes for all members of the household. For example, if the overarching aim of the programme is to reduce household food insecurity and hunger, the cash transfer scheme should develop objectives and define expected outcomes to ensure that women and men, and girls and boys, have equal access to income to purchase and consume quality food.

Programmes combining multiple objectives (e.g. child development, nutrition, maternal health, women’s economic empowerment) must carefully navigate any trade-offs related to the different objectives to prevent suboptimal results arising from poor implementation.

Ensure the objectives address the challenges faced by rural women and men, and the gender barriers to their participation in the programmes, as identified in the GSPVA. For example, if a primary goal is to increase women’s access to antenatal health care and family planning services, the programme needs to identify the barriers rural women face in attending and using these services, and articulate specific objectives and strategies to address these barriers. For example, if a lack of permission from male partners is identified as a barrier to women’s participation in programmes, an objective that could be stated would be to increase men’s involvement and support for women’s utilisation of health services and making these services friendly to men.

If the goal of the programme is to empower rural women, define explicitly the areas of empowerment to focus on, and the specific pathways and mechanisms best suited to achieve these objectives. For example, if the programme aims to increase women’s bargaining power in household resource allocation, it should clearly articulate a theory of change and include specific sub-objectives and activities to promote women’s participation and their stake in joint decision-making over the use of the transfer.

Explore the feasibility of explicitly supporting rural women’s productive roles and economic empowerment as a broader strategy for achieving poverty reduction and food security outcomes for the entire household. See Part 4 for a discussion on the programme complementarities that may be required for achieving these objectives.

Promote gender equality and more equitable relationships through messaging and awareness-raising activities. This could be done through information-sharing sessions with family members, community leaders and elders that focus on the importance of ensuring that both men and women have equitable access to, and can benefit from, the programme (see Part 4).

Summary questions

To what extent are gender equality principles integrated into CTPs?

Provide examples as to how programme objectives can be more gender-sensitive.

Provide examples of the challenges involved in integrating gender into programme objectives, and how these can be overcome.

2.3 Targeting of beneficiaries

Direct targeting can ensure that poor and particularly disadvantaged women and men have access to CTPs. However, targeting by itself will not automatically yield positive gender outcomes (UN Women, 2015; Bonilla et al., 2017).

In this section, we explore the ways in which gender is considered (or not) within targeting criteria of CTPs, and whether or not women are being preferentially targeted (section 2.3.1). We then discuss the gender implications of the different targeting methods and procedures used to select beneficiaries for the programmes, and suggest practical actions for enhancing gender equality outcomes in the targeting process (section 2.3.2).

2.3.1 Targeting choices

KEY POINTS

Women are targeted in CTPs in a variety of ways and for different purposes, which have important implications for women’s empowerment. Let’s look briefly at three main approaches.

Women can be explicitly targeted as direct beneficiaries of cash transfers to address gender-specific risks. For example, programmes can target women preferentially on the basis of their perceived greater economic deprivation (e.g. extremely poor female-headed households, unpaid female farm workers), social vulnerability (e.g. widows) and gender-specific life-cycle vulnerabilities (e.g. pregnant and lactating mothers).

Women are often designated within households as direct recipients of cash transfers. For example, some conditional cash transfer (CCT) programmes primarily target poor families with young children and deliver cash benefits directly to women. This approach is particularly prevalent in Latin America, where extremely poor households with ‘younger’ parents of small children are a prevalent demographic group (Davis et al., 2016). This targeting approach primarily serves an instrumental purpose and is driven by the assumption that money in the hands of a responsible female household member will more likely be spent in a ‘family- and child-friendly’ way (Bonilla et al., 2017). This approach is also often used as a strategy to improve women’s access to income and influence over household spending decisions. However, this approach typically neglects to consider the effects on women’s work burden, as discussed below and in section 2.4. Box 5 lists some assumptions underlying this popular approach.

Cash transfers may target poor households as a unit, rather than as individuals. In such instances, cash is provided to the heads of households. They can be women or men, although in most cases it is a man. This approach assumes that cash will ‘automatically’ be shared equally or allocated according to overall household needs. Some programmes in sub-Saharan Africa that focus on orphans and vulnerable children affected by HIV/AIDS deliver transfers to caretakers/heads of the family who are predominantly women. Table 3 provides examples for each of the three types.

Each targeting approach has strengths and weaknesses.

Each targeting approach has strengths and weaknesses. The choice of targeting rural women, either as beneficiaries or recipients, provides an important opportunity to meet their practical needs or empower them. However, simply targeting women does not automatically make a given programme gender-sensitive or transformative. Direct payments to women may not be sufficient to ensure their access to, and control over this income, particularly if men feel threatened by an increase in women’s status in the household (Bonilla et al., 2017; de la O Campos, 2015). Social norms, the extent of women’s autonomy, and the nature of family decision-making processes can influence and reduce the impacts of these payments. For example, as noted in the case study at the end of Part 1, in rural areas of Afghanistan, cultural norms recognize the husband as the family head and sole provider. Any income received would immediately be collectivized, and disputes over spending decisions might result in domestic violence.

Similarly, the targeting of conditional transfers to mothers as recipients has been criticized for exacerbating women’s workloads, and reinforcing traditional gender stereotypes that assign care responsibilities to women and marginalize the father’s role in this domain (Molyneux and Thomson, 2012; Cookson, 2017). Finally, household-level targeting, may overlook important intrahousehold gender inequalities and their influence over individuals’ access to and control over benefits.

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

As a general rule, the fact that rural women generally experience greater disadvantages than rural men justifies affirmative action through targeting that ensures that poor and particularly disadvantaged women have access to and can benefit from the programmes.

Where programmes aim to deliberately target rural women as beneficiaries, programme staff can undertake a number of actions.

Carefully assess the implications and conditions under which rural women and girls should be preferentially targeted by cash transfers. The selection of female beneficiaries should be based on evidence and data generated through the GSPVA, rather than basing the selection on common and implicit assumptions that women are always poorer and more disadvantaged than men. This approach should also be validated through community consultations to ensure community support when targeting poor rural women.

Ensure that a targeting approach does not ignore women in ‘dual adult households’ and/or vulnerable single-parent households headed by men. Targeting criteria should also pay attention to other vulnerable groups of women, such as unpaid family farm workers, women dependent on fisheries or forestry for their livelihoods, widows, and elderly women caring for orphans.

Complement targeting with other measures to ensure that the programme responds to women’s needs and concerns, and leads to more gender-equitable results and greater empowerment for women. Part 4 explores this issue further.

Where programmes target rural women as transfer recipients within poor households, the programme staff can carry out a number of actions.

Use the GSPVA to assess the feasibility of directing payments to women (or men) to achieve intended programme objectives and avoid potential monetary and social costs, such as intrahousheold conflict.

Establish a solid understanding of the pathways and mechanisms through which the targeting of transfers can meaningfully contribute to the empowerment of women and men.

Incorporate measures that empower women economically and socially beyond increasing direct access to ‘income’. For example, measures that help to improve women’s financial inclusion, social status, and financial autonomy include opening individual bank accounts that can enable women to receive cash; providing financial and literacy classes; and promoting women’s engagement in social networks (e.g. village savings and loans schemes, farmer cooperatives). Achieving these outcomes requires that women are explicitly targeted in their productive roles, rather than simply for their caring responsibilities.

Ensure that regular monitoring processes are tracking the gender impacts of targeting rural women as transfer recipients. This would include an assessment of women’s time poverty and labour supply, the direct and indirect costs imposed by the transfer, and the potential backlash from men and non-beneficiaries.

Where programmes target households as a ‘unit’, the programme staff could engage in a range of actions.

Explore the feasibility of providing individual benefit entitlements, which can help redress gender inequalities in household resource allocation and spending patterns. Individual entitlements enable women and men to be recognized as rights holders, and claim these entitlements as citizens and individuals rather than solely as caregivers or dependents.

If individual targeting is not a feasible option, use programme messaging to assist in diffusing potential intrahousehold tensions arising from the allocation of benefits to only one household member. Such messaging could emphasize that the entire family is meant to benefit from the grant, regardless of who the recipient is.

2.3.2 Targeting methods and implementation

KEY POINTS

The targeting methods and procedural measures used to identify, select and enrol potential beneficiaries also have important implications for gender equality and women’s empowerment.

a. Targeting methods

CTPs can adopt a range of targeting methods to select programme beneficiaries: (i) means testing and proxy means testing; (ii) community-based targeting; and (iii) categorical targeting.[5] Each targeting method has its advantages and disadvantages in terms of reaching and benefiting rural women.

Means testing uses rigorous and objective selection processes, such as per capita income and consumption levels in relation to the poverty line. These tests can enhance targeting transparency and efficiency. However, means testing also increases the likelihood of excluding potentially eligible rural women from the assessment process. For example, means tests that link women’s eligibility to a spouse’s income can exclude women who live in households above the income threshold but may have no access to personal income. This is often the case for unpaid female farm workers. Poor rural women who rely heavily on informal sources of income, can face difficulties in verifying their income levels to satisfy eligibility requirements.

CTPs can adopt a range of targeting methods to select programme beneficiaries: Means testing and proxy means testing, community-based targeting, and categorical targeting.

Community-based targeting uses local community members to select beneficiaries based on their understanding about who is poor in the community. In this way, the challenges associated with income verification can be avoided, and this can reduce the barriers for women to be selected. However, community-based targeting can be problematic, particularly in communities with entrenched gender inequalities, significant ethnic tension, power struggles, and/or caste issues, which may perpetuate the marginalization of stigmatized groups. If a community does not allow equal participation by rural men and women in community meetings, this may cause some eligible beneficiaries to be excluded.

Categorical targeting selects individuals or households belonging to a given social or age group (e.g. women, elderly, orphans). Since these methods usually entail more easily observable criteria and means of verification, they can be more advantageous to poor and vulnerable rural women, (e.g. women who are the heads of households). However, categorical targeting may expose very poor and socially excluded women to stigma and marginalization within the community and potentially hinder their enrolment in the programme and limit their ability to claim benefits.

For example, evidence from the Bono de Desarrollo Humano Programme in Ecuador shows that cash transfers have advanced the negative stereotypes that the female beneficiaries are lazy or have more children in order to receive benefits. As a result, eligible women have been self-excluding from the programme because they fear facing discriminatory attitudes, harassment and abuse. These potential risks affect both women and men. However, women are likely to suffer stigma and stereotyping more profoundly due to their lower status in the community. See Table 10 in Annex 2 for a summary of different targeting methods and their pros and cons in terms of gender.

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

Several actions can be adopted to ensure targeting methods are gender-sensitive.

Assess the targeting methods for potential gender biases, and if needed adjust the selection of methodologies and operational procedures for identifying and selecting beneficiaries.

Explore the potential for using a combination of targeting methods to identify target groups in a transparent, robust and inclusive manner. For example, combining community-based targeting methods with means testing may improve gender-sensitive targeting outcomes (Subbarao et al., 2010).

Remove or adjust any requirements that may prevent women from applying for benefits (e.g. income verification or men’s co-signatures).

Organize community-based sensitization activities to ensure that village leaders specifically target poor people and contribute to avoiding any conflict, stigma or social exclusion that may arise from direct targeting.

b. Procedural arrangements

When the procedural arrangements used to identify and enrol potential programme beneficiaries are not gender-sensitive, women, even if they are entitled to benefits, can face barriers to enrolment. For example, the process used to register and assess the eligibility of prospective beneficiaries can impose costs on rural women in terms of the time and money required to travel to the registration centres.

Very poor and socially excluded rural women may experience obstacles in obtaining information on the targeting and enrolment processes. These obstacles may include illiteracy; the lack of necessary identification documents; inadequate funds to obtain the formal documentation required to register; mobility constraints, including poor and inadequate access to rural transportation; work responsibilities; and time poverty (UN Women, 2015).

Programme implementation also needs to take into account informal mechanisms of exclusion, such as self-exclusion and discrimination along social, ethnic or religious lines.

Finally, cultural norms that restrict women’s mobility and engagement with programme administrators in the public domain may make women less confident to take advantage of SP programmes, or make them unaware of their eligibility (Holmes and Jones, 2013). Programme implementation also needs to take into account informal mechanisms of exclusion, such as self-exclusion and discrimination along social, ethnic or religious lines. For example in Kenya, during public discussions on targeting, divorced women were heavily criticized by community members because of the negative connotations associated with divorce. This criticism forced some of these women to drop out from programme selection (Gelders, 2018).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

Several actions can be adopted to ensure procedural arrangements are gender-sensitive:

Conduct information and awareness-raising campaigns to provide adequate and clear information to potential beneficiaries about programme admission criteria and the application process. This is critical for women who face barriers in accessing information. Special beneficiary outreach efforts, for example through door-to-door campaigns, radio and other media, may be required to reach those who are most in need of assistance but least able to access information through traditional channels (e.g. female farm workers, young married women and indigenous women).

Ensure that the language in all publications about the programme’s targeting methods is gender-sensitive, non-discriminatory and sensitive to the cultural norms of indigenous and minority groups.

Simplify and streamline application procedures and translate the application forms and project documents into the local language. Provide free technical support to assist rural women and men in completing the application forms and registering in programmes. This includes providing support in obtaining identification documents if they are required by the programme.

Staff must be trained to carry out targeting processes in a gender-sensitive way. In settings where it is difficult for women to interact with male staff, female staff must be recruited to carry out the registration and enrolment procedures.

Grievance mechanisms must be accessible to all, including groups that may be difficult to reach, such as the very poor, and elderly, illiterate women with limited mobility. Programme implementers must provide dedicated guidance to these women, and clearly explain the nature, purpose and process of the complaint mechanisms.

Summary questions

What are the main approaches for considering gender within targeting eligibility criteria?

What are the pros and cons of targeting rural women as transfer recipients?

What are the advantages and disadvantages of different targeting methods with regard to gender equality and rural women’s empowerment?

2.4 Transfer size and payment predictability

Setting benefits at the right levels and ensuring the cash transfers are delivered regularly and predictably are critical for achieving CTP objectives. This section explores how these two core design features can also influence the scale and types of gender outcomes.

KEY POINTS

To date, there has been limited research on the correlation between the size of cash transfers and gender-related programme outcomes. However there is some indication that the size of transfers can affect the well-being of rural women and gender dynamics in a number of ways (Samson, van Niekerk and Mac Quene, 2010):

‘Adequate’ transfer size is necessary to ensure that poor rural women can meet their practical daily needs for food and other essential expenditures. An adequate size of transfer may also serve to alleviate household tensions and anxiety generated by financial insecurity, and improve happiness and satisfaction among women and men (Handa and Davis, 2014; Buller et al., 2018). Generous transfers also help families to better manage risks and avoid adopting negative coping strategies to safeguard family consumption and welfare. Negative coping strategies often disproportionately affect rural women and girls (Barca et al., 2015). FAO research in Malawi found that providing a more generous benefit in the Social Cash Transfer Programme eased pressure for rural women to engage in the distress sale of labour to stabilize household income (Barca et al., 2015).

If women already have some control over resources, a larger transfer size may have a positive impact on women’s influence in household decision-making. At the same time, a relatively large transfer carries with it the risk that men (e.g. husbands and older sons) will appropriate the cash, which can exacerbate household conflict (Bastagli et al., 2016). This is an issue that warrants further research.

An increase in productive capacity benefits the entire household as it improves access to food and generates higher incomes.

The size of the transfer can contribute to economic advancement of women and contribute to alleviating household poverty. Larger transfers can increase rural women’s financial independence and allow them to direct more of their finances to productive activities, such as investments, savings and asset accumulation (de la O Campos, 2015; Beazley and Farhat, 2016). An increase in productive capacity benefits the entire household as it improves access to food and generates higher incomes. This increase in productive capacity is particularly significant for rural women who face entrenched gender gaps in access and control over productive resources and assets.

Finally, payment predictability and regularity are critical for smoothing household consumption and making it possible to make plans for income-generating activities (Davis et al., 2016). These are especially important concerns for highly vulnerable female-headed households, who often live in precarious circumstances. Delays in payments and irregular transfers have been found to discourage female beneficiaries from taking part in programmes (Pavanello et al., 2016).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

Decisions about transfer size depend on the intervention’s goals, the government and donor’s fiscal capacity, and the potential policy trade-offs between increasing the level of the transfer and expanding the number of programme beneficiaries (Davis, 2014). Programme designers may consider the following gender-sensitive actions to determine the optimal size of the benefit.

Conduct a GSPVA of spending patterns at the household level, and determine how these patterns vary by gender, the poverty and vulnerability status of household members, and household composition (e.g. labour availability, the sex of the head of the household, the number of dependents).

If relevant, adjust the transfer size to address specific gender vulnerabilities. For example, to address the potential risk of girls being unable to access secondary school, programmes may target higher cash transfers to school-aged girls or boys to encourage enrolment and regular attendance. This has been done in the Prospera Programme in Mexico and the Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education in Jamaica.

Adjust the transfer size to support both risk management and productive development. If a cash transfer is intended to facilitate productivity among women, it must be large and predictable enough to enable meaningful agricultural investments, without compromising basic consumption needs (Beazley and Farhat, 2016). A FAO review of cash transfer programmes in sub-Saharan Africa suggests that transfers amounting to over 20 percent of per capita income produced significant results in both household food consumption and productive expenditure (Davis, 2014). Similar research does not yet exist for other regions.

Where the fiscal situation allows, explore the possibility of complementing regular cash transfers with a larger lump sum payment or asset grant; skills development activities; and measures to improve access to credit and micro-insurance and foster financial literacy. This would help rural women to invest, save and accumulate assets, and improve their livelihoods sustainably over time.

Monitor the size of transfers and the impact they have on gendered spending patterns, access and control over benefits, and gender relations. Based on the findings of the monitoring activities, adjust the transfer size if needed.

Summary questions

In what ways can transfer size affect (both positively and negatively) gender equality outcomes and women’s empowerment?

How can transfer size be adjusted to ensure it maximizes positive outcomes on gender equality, poverty reduction and women’s empowerment?

2.5 Programme conditions

Cash benefits can be conditional on fulfilling requirements related to school enrolment, health check-ups, or training classes in nutrition. Conditions can be light and ‘mildly’ imposed, or heavier and enforced through regular monitoring of compliance (Pellerano and Barca, 2016). Women, either as mothers or primary carers, are usually responsible for fulfilling the programme conditions.

This section discusses the effects of programme conditions on various dimensions of gender equality and women’s empowerment. It considers the impact the conditions may have on the programme beneficiaries from a gender perspective and the implications these conditions may have for women who are responsible for meeting them. The section also proposes how the conditions can be designed to be more gender-sensitive.

KEY POINTS

There is mixed evidence regarding the extent to which conditions affect rural women and girls, and it is the subject of lively debate (Newton, 2016; Kidd, 2016).

In settings where programme conditions are properly designed and enforced, and where beneficiaries have adequate access to quality services, the conditions can play an important role in reducing rural gender gaps in access to health, nutrition and schooling (Arnold, Conway and Greenslade, 2011). For example, conditions related to girls’ school attendance can improve girls’ participation and retention in school, and contribute to reduced rates of early marriage and adolescent pregnancy, as was documented in Malawi’s Zomba CTP (Baird, McIntosh, and Ozler, 2010).

There is mixed evidence regarding the extent to which conditions affect rural women and girls, and it is the subject of lively debate.

For adult women, ‘light’ conditions related to attendance in rights awareness sessions can increase their knowledge, broaden their contacts and social networks, and enhance their confidence and self-esteem. Requirements, such as obtaining identification cards, can improve their access to social services and SP (Newton, 2016).

At the same time, conditions can disempower rural women by violating their rights and harming their welfare. Evidence suggests that particularly heavy conditions can exacerbate the burden of women’s unpaid care work and time poverty, which already disproportionately affect very poor rural women (relative to poor urban women) due to their time-consuming responsibilities in agriculture, food and fuel production, and child care (Holmes and Jones, 2010; Molyneux and Thomson, 2012; Newton, 2016). In some instances, poor rural women can be vulnerable to so-called ‘extra-official’ conditions when they are required to perform a number of tasks that do not actually feature in the design of the programme (see Box 7).

The imposition of conditions may also overlook the inability of many rural women to comply with them due to the distance of social services, high transport costs, mobility constraints and potential exposure to gender-based and sexual violence. Evidence from Mexico and the Plurinational State of Bolivia, for example, suggests that the long distances to health facilities, long waiting times and mistreatment by staff led women to forgo maternal health services, even where conditions encouraged their use (Molyneux and Thomson, 2012). Finally, conditions may perpetuate traditional norms about women’s primary role as caregivers and marginalize men from care responsibilities (Molyneux, 2017).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

Programme staff can consider the actions listed below to mitigate the negative impacts of conditionalities on gender equality.

Consider the necessity of using conditions:

Carefully assess the trade-offs embedded in the imposed conditions in terms of the welfare of rural women and girls, and assess the potential constraints faced by rural women in complying with requirements. If there is evidence that conditional transfers may not yield better results than unconditional transfers, or may exacerbate existing rural gender inequalities, then their use should be reconsidered.

Explore whether the programme can achieve its intended objectives without imposing strict conditions, and instead use positive messaging and soft conditions to influence a desired behavioural change. Early results from ‘labelled cash transfers’ show that simply informing the transfer recipients that funds are intended for specified purposes, without penalties, results in high levels of compliance with programme goals without imposing added burdens on women transfer recipients (Newton, 2016).

Make conditions more gender-sensitive:

Explore the feasibility of designing conditions that explicitly aim to promote positive behavioural change related to more equitable gender roles, norms and responsibilities (see examples in Box 8).

Ensure easier access to services and better outreach to reduce the burden of conditions on rural women. For example, mobile health clinics can reduce the distance rural women must travel for health care.

Promote changes in gender roles by ensuring co-responsibility for conditions by both parents, and making men responsible for fulfilling conditions. Beneficiary households, programme managers and service providers need to be made aware of the importance of involving fathers in the care of their children (see the example from El Salvador in Box 9).

Ensure that women’s social and political rights to transfers are respected and that women are treated with dignity. Women must have access to grievance mechanisms that permit them to lodge complaints in the event of mistreatment by programme managers, including the imposition of ‘extra-official’ conditions.

Monitor the effects of conditions on the direct beneficiaries and the people responsible for programme compliance. This may include assessing gender-related changes in women’s and men’s workloads and time poverty, mistreatment by programme authorities and changes in intrahousehold dynamics.

Summary questions

What are the potential positive and negative impacts of conditions on rural women and girls’ well-being?

How can conditions be designed in a more gender-sensitive way?

CHECKLIST: See Table 11 in Annex 3 for a checklist of key strategies for ensuring gender-sensitivity of core design features of cash transfers discussed in this section.

Exercise 2: How to formulate gender-sensitive CTP?
(SEE ANNEX 5)

In-depth case study 2: CCT programme with a transformative edge – the Ain El-Sira Programme in Egypt

In addition to improving child development, the key objectives of the Ain El-Sira Programme in Egypt include enhancing women’s rights and empowering women. The Ain-El-Sira pilot has sought to strengthen women’s productive and economic roles and agency, without undermining their roles as mothers. Various measures were adopted to achieve this.

1. Women were active in programme planning and design. A network of feminist researchers and gender advocates assisted women to engage effectively in the consultation process and freely voice their opinions and suggestions about programme objectives and activities.

2. Women were targeted as transfer recipients in an innovative way. The programme officially stated that its cash transfers would compensate women for their time spent attending programme meetings and social worker visits, as well as provide partial income support. In this way, the cash became an entitlement for reproductive work done by women, which is traditionally unpaid.

3. Women’s participation in paid employment was explicitly encouraged instead of making transfers contingent on proof of unemployment. This measure enabled women to engage in work on better terms, as it provided them with money to fall back on and a degree of agency in their actions.

4. Payments were transferred directly into women’s bank accounts to protect the money from possible family demands or theft, and promote the women’s financial inclusion.

5. The pilot developed monitoring tools that facilitated accountability between social workers and beneficiaries. Examples of these tools included a written contract with the rights and obligations of each party clearly spelled out; a calendar enabling women to monitor their compliance with conditions; a monthly monitoring checklist for use by the social worker; and a monthly group session for beneficiaries. Self-monitoring tools were used to avert potential abuse over programme compliance and provide evidence in the event of any mistreatment.

6. Monthly group sessions were organized to raise women’s awareness on independent voting, microcredit and indebtedness, housing rights, employment and reproductive health. This support helped women to finance their own enterprises and look for employment. The group sessions also fostered collective action with other women, which had positive effects on their psychosocial welfare, strengthened their influence in public forums, and increased their participation in social networks.

The pilot’s transformative CCT design demonstrated that cash transfers can be used not only as a tool to protect vulnerable people, but as a means to establish a relationship of mutual obligation between women and the state. The pilot also improved women’s social status and their experience of citizenship. Based on such positive outcomes, the Programme was expanded from urban to rural areas in 2012.

Source: Un Women, 2015.

3.1 Overview

PWPs are a popular means for offering temporary access to employment and income to large groups of poor or shock-affected rural populations, including vulnerable women who may otherwise face systematic disadvantages in rural labour markets (Tanzarn and Gutierrez, 2015). The participation of poor rural women in PWPs may be hindered by various cultural and practical constraints. PWPs need to be designed in a gender-sensitive way to ensure that rural women can engage in decent work and derive benefits from their labour.

In this section we explore how gender considerations can be mainstreamed into four different core design features of PWPs:

In each subsection, we first discuss the key operational issues related to these design features and then propose options for enhancing their gender sensitivity.

3.2 Targeting of beneficiaries

This section discusses how women are targeted in the PWPs and the extent to which different targeting approaches reach and/or benefit rural women. We then propose practical suggestions for increasing the gender sensitivity of targeting approaches.

IMPORTANT NOTE: It is recommended that readers review section 2.3.2. on targeting methods and procedural measures related to CTPs, as these issues also relate to public works measures, and are not repeated here.

KEY POINTS

A majority of PWPs recognize the importance of active participation of rural women in temporary employment programmes, and this is reflected in their targeting criteria to some degree (see Box 10). The targeting of PWPs addresses gender issues in various ways.

First, programmes may deliberately target rural women through job quotas. Many PWPs specifically include vulnerable women in their targeting criteria, especially female heads of households, due to the higher levels of unemployment and the constraints they face in entering the labour force (IEG, 2014; Tanzarn and Gutierrez, 2015; UN Women, 2015).

Using affirmative action to target women is important for maximizing women’s opportunities to engage in work.

Using affirmative action to target women is important for maximizing women’s opportunities to engage in work. However, job quotas alone are not able to address the limitations rural women face in obtaining employment. A number of factors, including socio-cultural norms around women’s right to work outside the home, mobility constraints, and care responsibilities, also affect their access to employment. For example, in Rwanda, some eligible female heads of households, particularly those with dependents requiring care, were excluding themselves from the PWP of the Vision 2020 Umurenge Programme (VUP) because they could not balance work with their care responsibilities (Pavanello et al., 2016).

Second, programmes can adopt ‘full family’ targeting. In this case, the head of poor household is targeted, but all the adult members of the household are listed as public works clients. Household members are given the choice of deciding who actually works on sites and can rotate their participation (e.g. among spouses). This approach is potentially ‘female-friendly’, as it provides women with legitimate access to employment, even though they are not directly targeted through affirmative action (Holmes and Jones, 2010). However, even where rural women are the primary labourers in public works sites, they may not be able to control their own wages if payments are deposited into their husbands’ bank accounts.

Finally, programmes can adopt ‘partial family’ targeting in which only a household head is registered as a beneficiary. In male-headed households it is typically a man (i.e. a husband) who gets awarded access to a job. Partial family targeting may overlook intrahousehold gender inequalities, which can prevent women from taking up employment. Likewise, second wives living in polygamous households may also be restricted from exercising the right to obtain employment and independently access entitlements.

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

We identify two potential scenarios for integrating gender effectively in the targeting of PWPs.

Where programmes use female-friendly job quotas, the programme staff could:

Ensure that in addition to reserving spots for women, programmes also include complementary measures (e.g. flexible work conditions and child care services) to facilitate the registration and participation of rural women (see section 3.3).

Sensitize men in the households and community about the importance of job quotas, and ensure their support for women’s employment.

Strengthen the awareness and skills of staff to ensure they can execute job quotas effectively.

Closely monitor quota implementation to ensure that any barriers to women accessing jobs are addressed and removed.

Where programmes target poor households through ‘full’ or ‘partial family’ targeting, the programme staff could:

Develop targeting criteria that reflect the diversity of households. For example, targeting modalities should ensure that women in male-headed households, including women living in polygamous households, are also entitled to and have access to employment.

Consider recognizing single persons as a ‘household’, which would make it possible for single women, including widows, to access work.

Consider ‘full family’ targeting in which all adult members (both men and women) of eligible households are listed as clients. In this case, efforts must be made to ensure household members understand the rationale for this targeting, and increase their awareness of eligibility.

Create awareness and encourage each worker to open individual bank accounts to increase control over benefits (see Box 11).

Engage with groups that can be easily accepted by women and other vulnerable groups to disseminate information about different aspects of the programme (e.g. registration and enrolment criteria). In contexts where gender segregation is prevalent, programmes may consider engaging female extension workers to select and register potential beneficiaries and provide support throughout the targeting process. For example, in Mozambique, special teams, composed of female recruiters, were established to promote gender awareness in communities about women’s participation in projects. Sometimes innovative sensitization and outreach campaigns are needed to encourage female participants to attend targeting meetings and register for selection (see Box 12). This is also relevant for quota-based targeting measures.

Summary questions

What are the main approaches to considering gender within targeting eligibility criteria?

What are the pros and cons of including quotas to attract female participants in PWPs?

Provide examples of different options for ensuring the targeting is gender-sensitive.

3.3 Type of transfer

PWPs can deliver wages to participants in cash and in-kind transfers, including food and farm inputs. The choice of transfer in terms of how wages are paid is usually selected in accordance with the programme objectives. The type of the transfer can have important gender implications.

IMPORTANT NOTE: readers are encouraged to review section 2.4 for a discussion of the linkages between the size of the transfer and gender, as this design feature is also relevant for PWPs.

KEY POINTS

While robust research on this topic is still limited, the available evidence shows that the types of payment can be used strategically to promote gender equality and rural women’s empowerment.

Paying wages in cash, for example, enables household members to allocate their resources in accordance to their needs. Cash is seen as more empowering and effective than in-kind transfers (Samson, van Niekerk and Mac Quene, 2010). If women have access to benefits and equal influence over their allocation, cash can address various practical and strategic needs of women, including improved access to food and basic services, and increased intrahousehold bargaining power (see Technical Guide 1, section 6.4).

Providing farm inputs to female farmers in exchange for their services can promote women’s productive capacity and livelihood diversification, and directly reduce gender gaps in access to productive resources (UN Women, 2015).

In some contexts, payments of wages in food can be more gender-sensitive than cash as women may have greater control over the distribution of food than cash in the household.

In some contexts, payments of wages in food can be more gender-sensitive than cash as women may have greater control over the distribution of food than cash in the household. Cash is more likely to be controlled by men (Gentilini, 2016; Subbarao et al., 2010). In times of heightened food costs, rural women may prefer food assistance rather than cash, as it directly eases their responsibility to provide household food security and nutrition (Gentilini, 2016). In Ethiopia, for example, in times of acute food insecurity due to soaring food prices, rural women involved in the Productive Safety Net Programme (PSNP) largely preferred to receive payments in food (e.g. pulses and oil) rather than cash payments, as the drop in real value of cash payments was dramatic, and food was not readily available in the local market (Devereux, 2009).

Predictable payment of wages and guarantees of job availability are also critically important for ultra-poor rural women. Irregular employment and late payment of benefits disproportionately affects poor female-headed households, as they rely more heavily on immediate income to ensure family survival. For example, single mothers in the MGNREGS programme in India were negatively affected by delayed payments. In some case, they were forced to leave the programme and take up less-preferred types of employment to cover the income gap (Holmes and Jones, 2010).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

The selection of the type of transfer may be informed by an analysis of local preferences at the household and community level, local market dynamics, the financial context, and the government’s administrative and fiscal capacity to deliver the preferred transfer. Programme designers may consider the following actions to determine which type of the benefit will promote better gender outcomes.

Undertake an analysis of differences in preference among men and women with regards to benefit types. It is very important to directly consult men and women about their preferences. This can be done through the GSPVA.

Raise the awareness of the staff and build their capacity to understand and monitor the impacts the local context (e.g. local trade markets, humanitarian versus developmental setting) has on women and men’s preferences for different types of benefits. In light of the understanding that has been gained, adjust the choice of transfer accordingly.

To ensure income predictability, provide consistent employment and regular payment of wages, and make sure that workers are adequately informed about their rights and wage entitlements. For example, the MGNREGS entitles poor rural households to 100 days of employment, and a legal guarantee states that requested work must be provided within 15 days. If not, the state must provide an unemployment allowance of one-quarter of the wage for each day without employment.

Summary questions

What are the pros and cons of different types of wages in terms of gender preferences and gender relations?

Can you provide examples of rural women and men having different preferences for the type of wages? What caused these differences and how were these addressed in the programme?

3.4 Working conditions

As mentioned already, rural women face various gender-related constraints that hinder their engagement in public works employment schemes. Programmes that do not explicitly acknowledge these constraints may inadvertently exclude women from employment. In this section, we discuss what types of work conditions can attract rural women’s participation in the programmes and contribute to their empowerment.

In this section, we discuss what types of work conditions can attract rural women’s participation in the programmes and contribute to their empowerment.

KEY POINTS

Women need to have access to fair, equal and flexible work conditions that meet their specific needs and priorities.

Women need a female-friendly work environment that can allow them to balance their productive and reproductive responsibilities, and where they can feel respected and secure. Providing a flexible work schedule, in terms of workdays and hours, and ensuring the work sites are an appropriate distance from their home and offer child care facilities can enable rural women to better manage their competing work responsibilities. In Botswana’s Ipelegeng PWP, female participation was particularly high because women were allowed time off to breastfeed without any loss of pay (Holmes and Jones, 2013).

Programmes also need to recognize and understand how traditional gender norms regarding work may restrict rural women’s participation in public employment. For example, in the Second Public Employment for Sustainable Agriculture and Water Management Project in Tajikistan, the reluctance of some Tajik men to allow women to engage in public works, and the reluctance of some Tajik women to work near men, led to a revision in the programme design. Separate working groups for women were created, and family members were allowed to work in particular areas (IEG, 2014).

The commitment to pay women and men equal wages for similar tasks is critical to ensuring women have access to decent jobs.

The commitment to pay women and men equal wages for similar tasks is critical to ensuring women have access to decent jobs. Wage equality can also facilitate strategic shifts in women’s positions. In India, for example, the MGNREGS states that equal wages must be paid to men and women workers under the Equal Remuneration Act of 1976 (Chopra, 2014).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

A combination of measures can be adopted to ensure a female-friendly work environment.

Provide mandatory on-site or community-based child care support and maternity leave, and ensure that this support is monitored and properly enforced. For example, the MGNREGS legislates that a day nursery should be established at a work site where there are more than five children under the age of six.

Establish decent work conditions that include flexible working hours; work locations close to the beneficiaries’ homes; the provision of drinking water and shade; separate toilet facilities; and zero tolerance for sexual harassment and violence at work. See Box 13 on how this has been addressed in the PSNP in Ethiopia).

Consider life-cycle vulnerabilities and labour constraints in families, and adjust the work conditions accordingly. For example, provide direct support (or light jobs) to pregnant and lactating women and to elderly women who cannot engage in productive work activities. In the Cash-for-Work Programme in Somalia, lactating and pregnant women were allowed to nominate family members to work on their behalf, but they continued to be the principal cash recipients.

Put awareness-raising strategies in place, and train staff to address the gender stereotypes regarding women’s engagement in labour and the cultural constraints that may restrict women’s mobility and their ability to work in the public domain. In the PSNP in Ethiopia, employees working on public works schemes are allowed to work on the private land-holdings of female-headed households, to help them in cases where the women heading the households are restricted from ploughing due to socio-cultural norms.

Make formal commitments to pay equal wages to men and women who perform similar tasks, and sensitize staff and beneficiaries as to the importance of this design feature and monitor implementation accordingly.

Establish local community spaces to enhance women’s participation in social networks and public life. These include public work sites where female beneficiaries can come together to discuss employment-related problems, familiarize themselves with their rights, and establish social and economic networks (e.g. women’s groups and producer cooperatives) that are needed for employment development.

Summary questions

What are some of the gender-related barriers to female participation in PWPs?

Provide examples of gender-sensitive working conditions.

3.5 Selection of assets and the type of work

The selection of assets to be built and the type of work to be carried out are the final two design features of PWPs that we consider from a gender-sensitive angle.

KEY POINTS

a. Selection of community assets

Decisions regarding the type of community assets to create within the PWP can be made in a gender-sensitive way. For example, PWPs can develop community assets, such as schools and health care facilities, that provide access to social services for women and girls, or assets, such as community water points and fuel sources, that reduce their work burdens. The conceptualization of community assets can also be expanded to meet rural women’s economic and productive needs. The PSNP in Ethiopia used public labour to build farmer training centres in each project location, which reduced the distance rural women needed to travel. This has enhanced women’s access to agricultural extension services and non-farm adult education (Jones, Tafere and Woldehanna, 2010).

The conceptualization of community assets can also be expanded to meet rural women’s economic and productive needs.

b. Type of work

The type of work usually selected in PWPs is usually connected to infrastructure and rural development, and generally involves labour that is physically demanding and requires few skills (Holmes and Jones, 2010). This tends to exclude some adult women (particularly before and after childbirth), elderly women, and households headed by single adults. To attract more women as beneficiaries, some PWPs have started to broaden the scope of their work categories to include care work and social work (Tebaldi, 2016).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

The following strategies can be used to ensure the type of work and selection of assets are gender-sensitive.

Selection of community assets:

Consult with women and men to understand the specific type of assets they prefer to be developed in the PWP. The GSPVA is a good starting point for this.

Ensure women participate in programme planning, including the selection of job activities and/or assets to be developed. In many PWPs, the assets are often integral to official, decentralized community development planning processes. Where this is the case, programme designers must ensure that rural women have a voice and influence in these processes and outcomes.

PWPs can prioritize the development of assets (e.g. water conservation projects, land terracing, land management and climate-smart farm infrastructure) that reduce women’s burdens and increase their agricultural productivity, and/or build their resilience in the face of risks related to the environment, climate change and food insecurity.

Type of work:

PWPs can adopt a broad definition of what constitutes a public work assignment, and provide appropriate types of jobs that are in line with men’s and women’s skill sets and work experience. For example, jobs for rural women may need to be less physically demanding. However, it is important not to reinforce gender stereotypes about women as a weaker sex.

PWPs can also be used to compensate for household labour shortages. Public works labour can be utilized to support agricultural work on farms cultivated by female-headed households, and/or provide a range of services, such as child care or support for the elderly (see Box 14 for an example of South Africa).

PWPs can provide on-the-job skills development and training to increase the future employability of rural women workers in ‘higher-value’ agriculture production and non-traditional, non-farm work in sectors where women already have some skills.

PWPs can train women participants for management and supervisory roles within public works, which can build women’s functional and professional skills and improve their confidence, leadership capacity and social status.

Summary questions

What types of assets address the needs and priorities of rural women and men?

What types of public works jobs are well aligned with the skill sets, capabilities and life-cycle stages of rural women and men?

CHECKLIST: See Table 12 in Annex 4 for a checklist of key strategies for ensuring gender-sensitivity of the core design features of PWPs discussed in this section.

Exercise 3: How to formulate gender-sensitive public PWP?
(SEE ANNEX 5)

In-depth case study 3: Improving gender-sensitivity of Rwanda’s Vision 2020 Umurenge Programme (VUP)

The VUP, which is Rwanda’s flagship SP programme, has four components: public works, cash transfers (direct support), financial services and sensitization. Through the public works component, the government offers temporary employment to safeguard income security for extremely poor households that have at least one adult member able to work.

In 2014, the Government of Rwanda received support from UnICEF to improve the VUP’s gender- and child-sensitivity, and respond more effectively to the needs of labour-constrained households. The proposal for redesign was partly informed by a FAO assessment of VUP’s impact on rural women’s socio-economic empowerment (Pavanello et al., 2016). The redesign included the following innovative features.

1. Less intensive work schedules: Flexible days and working hours were adopted to enable rural women to better manage the competing demands of their paid work and their domestic and care responsibilities.

2. Support for child care: To enable women with children to participate in the scheme, UnICEF began piloting the implementation of mobile crèches at public work sites for children aged 0–24 months. The children receive meals, and women can rotate between road terracing and contribution activities and working in the crèches as care providers.

3. Expansion of public works job categories: A new range of public works that provided benefits for women were selected for development. These new types of work improved the quality of basic local services (e.g. early childhood development, home-based care, and water and sanitation services).

4. Improved regularity of employment: Provisions were made to ensure participants were offered year-round employment with regular payments that were high enough to alleviate extreme poverty. Participants work approximately 100 days per year. Fixed monthly payments worth approximately USD 12 in Rwandan francs were deposited directly into the bank account of each participant.

5. Engagement of caseworkers to: (i) ensure all household members know about and are able to access their entitlements, and are aware of the appeals processes for expanded PWPs and other programmes; (ii) assess and monitor the particular social and livelihood constraints and opportunities faced by each household; (iii) inform the design of the graduation package and monitor its the implementation. Caseworkers can also provide guidance regarding the complementary services and programmes (e.g. business development advisers, farmer field schools, rural advisory services, and community health workers) that participants need to facilitate their exit out of poverty. The cadre of caseworkers should be balanced by gender to provide effective support for both men and women.

Source: Ayliffe, 2015; Pavanello et al., 2016.

Overview

Neither cash transfers nor PWPs on their own are able to tackle all the multidimensional aspects of poverty and vulnerability in rural settings. Basic income support must be matched with complementary programmes and services to address the various needs of rural women, improve their prospects for empowerment and achieve a sustainable exit from poverty (FAO, 2016). This process is not automatic, however, as CTPs and PWPs are often delivered as single interventions. The deliberate promotion of linkages between the two is required. In this final section, we explore how this can be done effectively.

KEY POINTS

There are two key issues that programme designers need to bear in mind when designing gender-sensitive ‘Social Protection Plus’[6] interventions.

a. Selecting the options for complementary support

The first task is to decide on the types of complementary support that should be provided to beneficiaries in addition to cash transfers or PWPs. Complementary benefits can take many forms. We propose three broad options that can address different needs of rural women. These options are not mutually exclusive and can be combined in various ways depending on the programme’s scope and objectives.

Measures to boost rural women’s employment and income: Transfers can be linked with skills training, job placements and child care support to improve women’s employability and diversify their income. Incentives can be provided to enrol women in social security schemes, including health insurance, to reduce the life-cycle vulnerabilities that may threaten their income security. Access to credit schemes and economic literacy training can assist women with running small enterprises and managing household budgets.

Measures to improve rural women’s agricultural productivity and food security and nutrition: Social transfers can be linked to services that promote women’s agricultural production, the accumulation of assets and the generation of income. These may include access to improved farm inputs (e.g. quality seeds and organic fertilizer); access to rural advisory services and credit and savings; and support in engaging with local and regional markets (e.g. the formation of producer groups and cooperatives). Access to climate-smart technologies and crop insurance that meet rural women’s needs may also help mitigate the risks associated with climate change. Women benefiting from social transfers can also have access to complementary seeds and nutrition training, to help them establish home gardens and improve dietary diversity. Access to labour-saving technologies for productive activities (e.g. water conservation, mulching) and domestic tasks (e.g. water and fuel supply, food processing) can alleviate rural women’s heavy workloads and time poverty, and at the same time improve food security and nutrition outcomes.

Measures to empower rural women: Women can be informed of their rights and entitlements, and supported in obtaining legal and political literacy, and leadership skills. Linking core transfers with broader equity and social inclusion measures (e.g. anti-discrimination legislation regarding inheritance and property ownership, and protection from harmful traditional gender customs and practices, including gender-based violence) can reduce women’s social vulnerabilities and promote gender equality more broadly.

Table 4 provides examples of different types of complementarities promoted by cash transfer and PWPs.

b. Deciding on modalities for linking social transfers and complementary measures

Linkages between social transfers and complementary components can be made through two different programme modalities.

i. Integral programme components

Complementary measures can be provided as integral elements of the cash transfer or public works intervention. This may include providing additional benefits and in-kind transfers (e.g. lump-sum payments, asset transfers, training on feeding, seeds).

Complementary measures can be provided as integral elements of the cash transfer or public works intervention.

Many programmes have started adding sensitization and behaviour change communication components and psychosocial support to CTPs and PWPs (Molyneux, Jones and Samuel, 2016). Relatively simple and cost-effective activities can be used to raise awareness of the ways in which gender norms associated with a number of labour and economic roles (e.g. ownership of assets and domestic work) contribute to and perpetuate rural poverty among women and rural households. These activities can also promote support for the programme’s goals related to gender equality and women’s empowerment (see Box 15).

Programme implementers can capitalize on regular community interactions to tailor awareness-raising initiatives to community needs and the specific socio-cultural context. Information can be delivered at ‘pay’ points, or through community-level training sessions and home visits by programme staff, community volunteers or social workers. Case managers and their strong interpersonal relationships with participants are crucial for the ensuring the uptake of messages and bringing about positive behavioural change (see Box 16) (Newton, 2016; Roelen et. al, 2017).

ii. Linkages to external support

Programmes can offer linkages to complementary benefits and services that are external to the intervention. This can be done by granting the beneficiaries preferential or automatic access to livelihood programmes, insurance or microcredit schemes, or waiving tuition fees for health care and education (Roelen et. al, 2017). For example, the Operations Manual for the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) Programme in Ghana, published in 2012 by the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare, notes that the participants of the programme, in which female-headed households and pregnant women constitute a large beneficiary group, are offered direct access to the free National Health Insurance Scheme and livelihood support as a way of helping them ‘leap out’ of extreme poverty (cited in Roelen et. al, 2017).

Programmes can offer linkages to complementary benefits and services that are external to the intervention.

For individuals to successfully graduate from the SP programme, some interventions combine various measures into a comprehensive support package to address the multidimensional aspects poverty. Case management has also been used to help identify the needs of programme participants and facilitate linkages to corresponding services, as illustrated by the Chile Solidario Programme (see case study 4).

KEY ACTIONS TO STRENGTHEN THE GENDER FOCUS

The process for selecting the types of complementary programmes and the operational modalities for establishing links to them is determined by the programme objectives, the availability of resources and the capacity to deliver different components, and the availability and quality of complementary services and programmes. Programme designers can consider the following actions when considering the ways core transfers can be linked, and the type of complementary support they can be linked to.

Use the GSPVA to assess different pathways to sustainable livelihoods and women’s empowerment, and inform the selection of complementary interventions and modalities through which linkages to these pathways can be promoted.

Map the availability and quality of complementary programmes and services, and the degree of their gender-sensitivity; and explore the scope for embedding components of these complementary programmes and services into the core programmes.

Ensure that a functional unified/single registry is in place to link beneficiaries to external programmes and services. To support the gender-sensitive coordination of linked programmes, ensure that sexdisaggregated data is collected and used in the planning.

Monitor the access of the beneficiaries to the complementary programmes, the coordination across the linked programmes, and the impacts they have on livelihood capacities of rural women and men. Ensure that participation in multiple programmes does not overburden women in terms of their time and/or finances, or create resistance from male household members or non-beneficiaries due to a perceived exclusion from benefits.

Provide access to appropriate child care arrangements to free women’s time for training and other self-improvement activities.

Work with the community and service providers to address barriers to equal access to complementary services among rural women and men. In many settings, there is a widespread assumption that farmers are primarily male and women play an ancillary role at best. Consequently, agricultural support measures may be designed with only male needs and priorities taken into account. It is important therefore to ensure that complementary measures (e.g. agricultural rural advisory services, productive inputs, credit) are designed in a culturally and gender-sensitive way.

Summary questions

What are the objectives of linking core transfers with complementary interventions?

What type of linkages can be established, and for what purpose?

How can gender-sensitive complementarities be promoted in your daily work?

Exercise 4: Developing a road map to link social transfers to complementary support for better gender equality results (SEE ANNEX 5)

In-depth case study 4: Integrated programming in the Chile Solidario Programme, Chile

The Chile Solidario Programme, which was implemented from 2002 to 2012 as an integrated anti-poverty intervention, adopted a gender and life-cycle approach to addressing social and economic exclusion. The Programme focused on three overarching interventions: psychosocial family support, monetary transfers and priority access to social services.

The Programme consisted of two years of psychosocial support for beneficiary families, during which a social worker engaged regularly with the adult women in particular, to draft a work plan to achieve a set of 53 minimum conditions for quality of life. These conditions were grouped into seven categories: health, education, housing conditions, employment, income, family dynamics and identification. Social workers help to link households and individuals to a range of services from different public programmes, based on the specific needs of the beneficiaries (e.g. birth registration, conflict counselling and productive inclusion).[7]

The subsidies/cash transfers that Chile Solidario provided include the Bono de Protección Social (a cash transfer provided during the two first years of the programme) and the Bono de Egreso (a cash transfer for those leaving the programme who completed two years of the psychosocial counselling). Families also qualify for other types of subsidies, such as the Subsidio Único Familiar (a family allowance targeted at poor families with children under 18 years and pregnant women) and a water subsidy.

Beneficiaries also gain access to complementary social programmes in a number of areas.

Employment and income: preferential access to training and skills building, job placement programmes, income generation programmes, and rural development. There are also special income-generation programmes for women in rural areas.

Family dynamics: preferential access to social development programmes to curb domestic violence and strengthen bonds between parents and children in situations of risk.

Identification: partial exemption from the cost of applying for ID cards and birth registrations.

The evidence highlights that the Programme was able to facilitate access to health and education services and social programmes. The programme’s impact evaluations also emphasized three potential ‘women’s empowerment’ outcomes that might be attributed to the family support that was provided through the interactions with social workers who are primarily women: (i) an increase in confidence that allowed women to see themselves as individuals in addition to wives and/or mothers; (ii) the possibility of women entering into the public sphere and the labour market as a result of skills training and microfinance interventions; and (iii) an altered sense of self, linked to women’s realization that they can be proactive and change their life circumstances. Recently, the Programme has also broadened its scope to work with men as a way of fostering sustainable changes in household gender relations.

Source: Roelen et. al, 2017.

ANNEX 1:
Checklist for undertaking the GSPVA

In this section we provide examples of guiding questions for each thematic area of inquiry in section 1.2. These are intended to assist the research team in formulating a more detailed, context- and programme-specific set of questions for the analysis.

ANNEX 2
Targeting methods and their gender implications

ANNEX 3
Checklist for ensuring gender-sensitivity of cash transfers

ANNEX 4
Checklist for ensuring gender-sensitivity of PWPs

ANNEX 5
Learning tools

Exercise 1:
Developing a road map to conduct the gender-sensitive poverty and vulnerability analysis (breakout groups and plenary)

LEARNING OBJECTIVE: To provide an opportunity for learners to apply the knowledge and guidance they have acquired, and develop their own assessment tool.

Timing indication

60 minutes (group breakout discussions and development of posters)

20 minutes (presentation of findings)

20 minutes (plenary discussions)

Notes to the facilitator

Divide trainees into small teams to work on the following tasks and develop posters to present the main findings of consultations:

– Task 1: Drawing on the conceptual entry points and guiding questions presented in section 1.2, discuss which of these analytical elements would be relevant to include in your analysis. What other broad dimensions/ issues are missing?

– Task 2: Once the broad scope of the inquiry is agreed upon, develop a more detailed/disaggregated list of questions to use in the analysis.

– Task 3: What research approach and methods would be suitable to use in collecting data/information and responding to questions in the analysis? Determine the most relevant actors to lead/engage in the analysis process. Provide a broad outline of roles and responsibilities.

– Task 4: What opportunities and challenges might you encounter in this process? How can you overcome these challenges? How can you prepare the budget for the assessment?

Ask participants to use Tables 5-9 in Annex 1 to guide their discussion.

Exercise 2:
Formulating gender-sensitive CTPs (breakout groups and plenary)

LEARNING OBJECTIVE: To encourage learners to reflect on the relevance and gender implications of core design features of cash transfers discussed in Part 2, and formulate recommendations on how to integrate gender into each dimension of the programme design.

Timing indication

60 minutes (group breakout discussions)

20 minutes (presentation of findings)

20 minutes (plenary discussions)

Notes to the facilitator

Divide trainees into small teams and provide them with a summary of the programme design document of the real-life CTP. Structure the activities and guide reflection and discussion around programme design features, such as programme objectives and targeting, transfer size and programme conditionalities. For each feature, participants will discuss the following questions:

– Is gender of relevance to this design feature? Why/why not?

– How can gender considerations be integrated most effectively into this feature of the programme?

– What are the potential challenges to making this feature gender-sensitive? How can these challenges be overcome?

At the end of the discussion, groups are invited to share insights and results from their conversations in plenary discussion.

Exercise 3:
Formulating gender-sensitive PWPs (breakout groups and plenary)

LEARNING OBJECTIVE: To encourage learners to reflect on the relevance and gender implications of core design features of PWPs discussed in Part 3, and formulate recommendations on how to integrate gender into each dimension of the programme design.

Timing indication

60 minutes (group breakout discussions)

20 minutes (presentation of findings)

20 minutes (plenary discussions)

Notes to the facilitator

Divide trainees into small teams and provide them with a summary of the programme design document of the real-life public works programme. Structure the activities and guide reflection and discussion around programme design features, such as programme targeting, transfer type, working conditions and type of assets/projects. For each feature, participants will discuss the following questions:

– Is gender of relevance to this design feature? Why/why not?

– How can gender considerations be integrated most effectively into this feature of the programme?

– What are the potential challenges to making this feature gender-sensitive? How can these challenges be overcome?

At the end of the discussion, groups are invited to share insights and results from their conversations in plenary discussion.

Exercise 4:
Developing a road map to link social transfers to complementary measures for better gender equality results

LEARNING OBJECTIVE: To provide an opportunity for learners to apply the knowledge and guidance they acquired in Part 4, and develop a plan to promote linkages between core transfers and complementary interventions.

Timing indication

40 minutes (group breakout discussions)

20 minutes (presentation of findings)

20 minutes (plenary discussions)

Notes to the facilitator

Divide trainees into small teams to identify potential pathways to promoting links between cash transfers and public works with complementary measures. The participants may add to or modify types of objectives listed in the table to suit their circumstances.

ANNEX 6
Key resources

Resources on gender and poverty analysis

FAO. 2011. Social Analysis for Agriculture and Rural Investment Projects: Manager’s Guide, Practitioners’ Guide and Field Guide. Rome http://www.fao.org/docrep/014/i2816e/i2816e00.htm

Holmes, R. & Jones, N. 2010. How to design and implement gender-sensitive social protection programmes. ODI Toolkit. London, ODI. www.odi.org/sites/odi.org.uk/files/odi-assets/publications-opinion-files/6262.pdf

FAO resources on social protection and gender

From Protection to Production (PtoP) project research publications on social protection: www.fao.org/economic/ptop/publications/reports/en/

FAO Gender publications

www.fao.org/gender/resources/publications/en/

See in particular:

de la O Campos, A.P. 2015. Empowering rural women through social protection. Rural transformations. Technical Papers Series No. 2. Rome, FAO. www.fao.org/3/a-i4696e.pdf)

FAO. 2013. Gender Focal Points: Introductory Training Module, Rome.

FAO. 2017. Social Protection Framework: Promoting Rural Development for All. Rome. www.fao.org/publications/card/en/c/87c92abf-466d-4b01-b8ec-57ca7317ed57/)

The Transfer Project publications on cash transfer impact evaluations

https://transfer.cpc.unc.edu/?page_id=310

See in particular:

Davis, B., Handa, S., Hypher, N., Winder-Rossi, N., Winters, P. & Yablonski, J., eds. 2016. From Evidence to Action: The Story of Cash Transfers and Impact Evaluation in sub-Saharan Africa. Oxford, UK, FAO, UNICEF and Oxford University Press. www.fao.org/publications/card/en/c/0b24b92e-5254-4d06-a317-84ccd6babe23/).

Bonilla, J., Castro Zarzur, R., Handa, S., Howlin, C., Peterman, A., Ring, H. & Seidenfeld, D. 2017. Cash for women’s empowerment? A mixed-methods evaluation of the Government of Zambia’s Child Grant Program. World Development, 95: 55-72. (also available at www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X15311682)

International Labour Organization (ILO) resources on social protection

www.ilo.org/global/topics/social-security/lang--en/index.htm

See in particular:

ILO. 2015. World Social Protection Report 2014/15. Building economic recovery, inclusive development and social justice. Geneva, Switzerland.

www.ilo.org/global/research/global-reports/world-social-security-report/2014/lang--en/index.htm)

World bank resources on social protection and gender

https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/discover?query=social%20protection

See in particular:

IEG (Independent Evaluation Group). 2014. Social safety nets and gender. Learning from impact evaluations and World Bank projects. Washington, DC, World Bank. https://ieg.worldbankgroup.org/evaluations/social-safety-nets-and-gender-learning-impact-evaluations-and-world-bank-projects)

World Bank. 2012. World Development Report 2012: Gender Equality and Development. Washington, DC. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/4391)

World Bank. 2015. The state of social safety nets 2015. Washington, DC. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/22101)

Institute of Development Studies (IDS) resources on social protection and gender

www.ids.ac.uk/idsresearch/centre-for-social-protection

ODI resources on social protection and gender

https://www.odi.org/search/site?f[0]=im_field_programme%3A38&f[1]=bundle%3Aresource&solrsort=ds_sort_date%20desc

Social Protection and Human rights platform

http://socialprotection-humanrights.org

References

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1 Consult the FAO Social Protection Framework (FAO, 2017) for the Organization’s corporate approach and programmatic work in SP.

2 Information on the webinar series is available at http://socialprotection.org/connect/communities/gender-sensitive-social-protection.

3 The Social Analysis for Agriculture and Rural Investment Projects: Field Guide is available at: www.fao.org/docrep/014/i2816e/i2816e02.pdf.

4 See Technical Guide 1 for a detailed discussion of the importance of cash transfers for gender equality.

5 Programmes can also use geographical targeting. However, this approach is not explored here given its limited importance for gender. Self-targeting is a method frequently applied in PWPs, and is considered in Table 10.

6 Another frequently used term in the literature to describe integration between cash transfer and complementary interventions is ‘Cash Plus’ programming.

7 Productive inclusion comprises programmes that aim to boost the productivity and incomes of the poor (e.g. training, productive grants, self-employment schemes).