Intraclass Correlations Values in International Development: Evidence Across Commonly Studied Domains in sub-Saharan Africa

The sharp increase in the number of experimental studies evaluating development programs raises the need for accurate intraclass correlations (ICC) to conduct power calculations so that researchers can design studies to detect meaningful effects with sufficient statistical power. The intraclass correlation is an important parameter for determining the statistical power of cluster-randomized trials. The parameter is rarely available to researchers planning a study until after the design is set and data are already collected. This paper takes an important step towards helping researchers working in sub-Saharan Africa to accurately estimate appropriate sample sizes for their clustered RCTs. The study draws from rich data sets in Kenya, Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. We present ICCs for a wide range of domains common for development research. Our results suggest that ICCs for commonly studied indicators in sub-Saharan Africa are lower than is often assumed in power calculations. ICC values are especially low for indicators associated with child nutrition and food security, suggesting that cluster-RCTs might be a viable design even when faced with limited budgets because sample size requirements are not much different from an individual random assignment design.

A Cash Plus Program Reduces Youth Exposure to Physical Violence in Zimbabwe

Violence against children and adolescents, a highly prevalent problem, is a clear violation of child rights and has detrimental effects on later life outcomes. Programs that alleviate poverty address a structural determinant of child vulnerability and can thereby reduce child abuse. This paper investigates whether the Government of Zimbabwe's Harmonized Social Cash Transfer (HSCT) Program, which combines cash transfers with complementary services, affects youth exposure to physical violence. The analysis uses data from a non-experimental impact evaluation and a difference-in-differences approach. Results show a 19-percentage point decline in the incidence of physical violence among youth four years into the program. HSCT-induced enhancements in beneficiary households' purchasing capacity and food security, improvements in caregiver subjective well-being, and reductions in youth participation in economic work for pay could be mediating the program's effects on youth abuse. This paper adds to the relatively scarce evidence on the impacts of anti-poverty policies on young people's susceptibility to physical violence in developing countries.

Do Social Protection Programs Foster Short-term and Long-term Migration Adaptation Strategies?

We examine how migration is influenced by temperature and precipitation variability, and the extent to which the receipt of a cash transfer affects the use of migration as an adaptation strategy. Climate data is merged with georeferenced panel data (2010-2014) on individual migration collected from the Zambian Child Grant Program (CGP) sites. We use the person-year dataset to identify the direct and heterogeneous causal effects of the CGP on mobility. Having access to cash transfers doubles the rate of male, short-distance moves during cool periods irrespective of wealth. Receipt of cash transfers (among wealthier households) during extreme heat causes an additional retention of males. Cash transfers positively spur long-distance migration under normal climate conditions in the long term. They also facilitate short-distance responses to climate, but not long-distance responses that might be demanded by future climate change.

Can unconditional cash transfers raise long-term living standards? Evidence from Zambia

In Africa, state-sponsored cash transfer programs now reach nearly 50 million people. Do these programs raise long-term living standards? We examine this question using experimental data from two unconditional cash transfer programs implemented by the Zambian Government. We find far-reaching effects of the programs both on food security and consumption as well as on a range of productive outcomes. After three years, household spending is on average 67 percent larger than the value of the transfer received, implying a sizeable multiplier effect, which works through increased non-farm activity and agricultural production.

Does money buy happiness? Evidence from an unconditional cash transfer in Zambia

The relationship between happiness and income has been at the center of a vibrant debate, with both intrinsic and instrumental importance, as emotional states are an important determinant of health and social behavior. We investigate whether a government-run unconditional cash transfer paid directly to women in poor households had an impact on self-reported happiness. The evaluation was designed as a cluster-randomized controlled trial in rural Zambia across 90 communities. The program led to a 7.5 to 10 percentage point impact on women's happiness after 36- and 48-months, respectively (or 0.19-0.25 standard deviations over the control group mean). In addition, women have higher overall satisfaction regarding their young children's well-being, including indicators of satisfaction with their children's health and positive outlook on their children's future. Complementary analysis suggests that self-assessed relative poverty (as measured by comparison to other households in the community) is a more important mediator of program effects on happiness than absolute poverty (as measured by household consumption expenditures). Although typically not the focus of such evaluations, impacts on psychosocial indicators, including happiness, should not be discounted as important outcomes, as they capture different, non-material, holistic aspects of an individual's overall level of well-being.

List randomization for soliciting experience of intimate partner violence: Application to the evaluation of Zambia's unconditional child grant program

Social scientists have increasingly invested in understanding how to improve data quality and measurement of sensitive topics in household surveys. We utilize the technique of list randomization to collect measures of physical intimate partner violence in an experimental impact evaluation of the Government of Zambia's Child Grant Program. The Child Grant Program is an unconditional cash transfer, which targeted female caregivers of children under the age of 5 in rural areas to receive the equivalent of US $24 as a bimonthly stipend. The implementation results show that the list randomization methodology functioned as planned, with approximately 15% of the sample identifying 12-month prevalence of physical intimate partner violence. According to this measure, after 4 years, the program had no measurable effect on partner violence. List randomization is a promising approach to incorporate sensitive measures into multitopic evaluations; however, more research is needed to improve upon methodology for application to measurement of violence.

The Effect of Cash Transfers and Household Vulnerability on Food Security in Zimbabwe

We study the impact of the Zimbabwe Harmonized Social Cash Transfer (HSCT) on household food security after 12 months of implementation. We investigate determinants of food security as measured by a well-known food security scale - the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) - and as measured by value of household food consumption composed of own-production, market purchases and gifts received. We find that several dimensions of household vulnerability correlate more strongly with the food security measure than with food consumption. Labor constraints, which is a key vulnerability criterion used by the HSCT to target households, is an important predictor of the food security score but not food consumption, and its effect on food security is even larger during the lean season. Impact analysis shows that the program has had statistically significant impacts on Food Security and Diet Diversity scores but null to low impacts on food consumption. However aggregate food consumption hides dynamic activity taking place within the household where the cash is used to obtain more food from the market and rely less on food received as gifts. The cash in turn gives beneficiaries greater choice in their food basket, which improves diet diversity.

CASH TRANSFERS ENABLE HOUSEHOLDS TO COPE WITH AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION AND PRICE SHOCKS: EVIDENCE FROM ZAMBIA

Climate change is projected to dramatically disrupt rainfall patterns and agricultural yields in Sub-Saharan Africa. These shocks to food production can mire farming households in poverty traps. This study investigates whether unconditional cash transfers can help households cope with agricultural production and price shocks. We find that cash empowers poor, rural households facing these negative shocks to employ coping strategies typically used by the non-poor and enables them to substantially increase their food consumption and overall food security. Extending relatively small cash payments unconditionally to the rural poor is a powerful policy option for fostering climate-resilient development.

Cash for Women's Empowerment? A Mixed-Methods Evaluation of the Government of Zambia's Child Grant Program

The empowerment of women, broadly defined, is an often-cited objective and benefit of social cash transfer programs in developing countries. Despite the promise and potential of cash transfers to empower women, the evidence supporting this outcome is mixed. In addition, there is little evidence from programs at scale in sub-Saharan Africa. We conducted a mixed-methods evaluation of the Government of Zambia's Child Grant Program, a poverty-targeted, unconditional transfer given to mothers or primary caregivers of young children aged zero to five. The quantitative component was a four-year longitudinal clustered-randomized control trial in three rural districts, and the qualitative component was a one-time data collection involving in-depth interviews with women and their partners stratified on marital status and program participation. Our study found that women in beneficiary households were making more sole or joint decisions (across five out of nine domains); however, impacts translated into relatively modest increases in the number of decision domains a woman is involved in, on average by 0.34 (or a 6% increase over a baseline mean of 5.3). Qualitatively, we found that changes in intrahousehold relationships were limited by entrenched gender norms, which indicate men as heads of household and primary decision makers. However, women's narratives showed the transfer increased financial empowerment as they were able to retain control over transfers for household investment and savings for emergencies. We highlight methodological challenges in using intrahousehold decision making as the primary indicator to measure empowerment. Results show potential for unconditional cash transfer programs to improve the financial and intrahousehold status of female beneficiaries, however it is likely additional design components are need for transformational change.

Unconditional Government Social Cash Transfer in Africa Does not Increase Fertility

Among policymakers, a common perception surrounding the effects of cash transfer programmes, particularly unconditional programmes targeted to households with children, is that they induce increased fertility. We evaluate the Zambian Child Grant Programme, a government unconditional cash transfer targeted to households with a child under the age of five and examine impacts on fertility and household composition. The evaluation was a cluster randomized control trial, with data collected over four years from 2010 to 2014. Our results indicate there are no programme impacts on overall fertility. Our results contribute to a small evidence base demonstrating that there are no unintended incentives related to fertility due to cash transfers.

Impact of Cash Transfer programs on Food Security and Nutrition in sub-Saharan Africa: A Cross-Country Analysis

This paper explores the extent to which government-run cash transfer programs in four sub-Saharan countries affect food security and nutritional outcomes. These programs include Ghana's Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty, Kenya's Cash Transfer for Orphans and Vulnerable Children, Lesotho's Child Grants Program and Zambia's Child Grant model of the Social Cash Transfer program. Our cross-country analysis highlights the importance of robust program design and implementation to achieve the intended results. We find that a relatively generous and regular and predictable transfer increases the quantity and quality of food and reduces the prevalence of food insecurity. On the other hand, a smaller, lumpy and irregular transfer does not lead to impacts on food expenditures. We complement binary treatment analysis with continuous treatment analysis to understand not only the impact of being in the program but also the variability in impacts by the extent of treatment.

An intervention to increase the condom supply in rural zambia

More than US$800 million per year is spent on programs in low- and middle-income countries to increase demand for condoms, yet in rural areas of Africa condoms are often distributed for free only by regional health clinics that may be located far from home. Anecdotal evidence suggests that limited supply, resulting primarily from long travel times to acquire condoms, is a major barrier to use. This study investigates the potential unmet demand for condoms in rural sub-Saharan Africa. I provide empirical evidence of the importance of supply effects, based on an evaluation of a distribution program in which nine agents were enlisted to sell condoms across 92 rural villages in Zambia. I find that the number of individuals acquiring condoms tripled and the number of condoms distributed rose by more than 250 percent. The study demonstrates that individuals in poor rural areas are willing to pay for condoms and provides a model whereby public health goods can be acquired through market forces without the government incurring large costs and without detracting from public health services.

Income Transfers and Maternal Health: Evidence from a National Randomized Social Cash Transfer Program in Zambia

There is promising recent evidence that poverty-targeted social cash transfers have potential to improve maternal health outcomes; however, questions remain surrounding design features responsible for impacts. In addition, virtually no evidence exists from the African region. This study explores the impact of Zambia's Child Grant Program on a range of maternal health utilization outcomes using a randomized design and difference-in-differences multivariate regression from data collected over 24 months from 2010 to 2012. Results indicate that while there are no measurable program impacts among the main sample, there are heterogeneous impacts on skilled attendance at birth among a sample of women residing in households having better access to maternal health services. The latter result is particularly interesting because of the overall low level of health care availability in program areas suggesting that dedicated program design or matching supply-side interventions may be necessary to leverage unconditional cash transfers in similar settings to impact maternal health.

The impact of Zambia's unconditional child grant on schooling and work: results from a large-scale social experiment

This paper reports the impact on child schooling and work of the Government of Zambia's Child Grant Program (CGP), an unconditional cash transfer program targeted to households with children under age 3 years in three districts of the country. Although the CGP's focus is on very young children, we look to see if the program has impacts on older children who are not the explicit target group. We use data from a large-scale social experiment involving 2,519 households, half of whom were randomized out to a delayed-entry control group, that was implemented to assess the impact of the program. We find that the CGP has no discernable impact on school enrollment of children age 7-14. However when we break the sample by older (11-14) and younger (7-10) children - based on the grade structure of the Zambian schooling system - we find a significant impact among children age 11-14 which coincided with the exact age range where sharp drop-out begins to occur in Zambia with point estimates in the range of 7-8 percentage points. Finally, we provide evidence on the potential pathways through which the unconditional cash transfer impacts on enrollment. Households in the CGP spend more on education, and in particular on uniforms and shoes, two items cited as key barriers to school enrollment in study areas.

The Social and Productive Impacts of Zambia's Child Grant

Accumulated evidence from dozens of cash transfer programs across the world suggest that there are few interventions that can match the range of impacts and cost-effectiveness of a small, predictable monetary transfer to poor families in developing countries. However, individual published impact assessments typically focus on only one program and one outcome. This article presents two-year impacts of the Zambian Government's Child Grant, an unconditional cash transfer to families with children under age five, across a wide range of domains including consumption, productive activity and women and children's outcomes, making this one of the first studies to assess both protective and productive impacts of a national unconditional cash transfer program. We show strong impacts on consumption, food security, savings and productive activity. However, impacts in areas such as child nutritional status and schooling depend on initial conditions of the household, suggesting that cash alone is not enough to solve all constraints faced by these poor, rural households. Nevertheless, the apparent transformative effects of this program suggest that unconditional transfers in very poor settings can contribute to both protection and development outcomes.