Unicef cash payments improve lives of the poor
Programme seeks to stabilise incomes of Malagasy households
MOTHER of five Mary Fahesoa is a happy loner these days. For three years she had spent mornings and afternoons with her four older children working and looking for food when she wanted them in school. All that changed last March when she was among the first beneficiaries of the UN Children’s Fund (Unicef ) cash payments in the village of Sampona, southern Madagascar.
Now, her 10-, eight- and five-year-olds are back in school. The eldest, aged 12, says he would rather work and help around the home because he is afraid his peers will laugh at him, Mary said in an interview.
“It was good to get them out of the house, but also sad,” the 29-year-old said at a community meeting attended by donors, government officials and village elders last November.
Unicef has spearheaded cash transfer programmes as part of its response to emergencies around the continent. It says its studies have shown the transfers can greatly improve the lives of poor and vulnerable people build resilience, access social services and improve food availability in a country where 91% of the population lives on less than $2 a day.
Madagascar ranks high among countries most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, with about 9.4 million people affected by droughts, cyclones, and other disasters in the past decade.
Last December, Unicef and the World Bank launched a $35 million drought mitigation programme called Fiavota in the Androy and Anosy regions of southern Madagascar, targeting 45 000 households in the first year and 65 000 in the second. Each household receives an unconditional 60 000 ariary (R224) per month in the first year, plus a once-off 180 000 ariary to support income generation activities and replenishment of assets.
At its core the programme seeks to stabilise incomes of households affected by the drought, support the rebuilding of household assets, strengthen access to nutrition services, and support the retention of children in primary schools.
The programme also empowers women through additional training to serve in their communities. For Mary Fahesoa, by the time the cash payments came, she had already had to sell all her goats and chickens to feed the family.
Pregnant with her last son, she had been forced to trek to the mountain 5km away to fetch wood, which she sold to neighbours for 500 ariary, just about enough to buy rice for her children. Her husband is unemployed.
With her children back in school, except for the 22-month-old and 12-year-old, Mary now wants to restock, starting with goats and then chickens. It is the same sentiment being expressed throughout southern Madagascar, said Rindra Rakotoarisoa director of the Intervention Fund for Development (FID), the government implementing agency.
“A lot of the money has been invested in goats, which is one of the main animals here, because it has a short farming cycle,” said Rakotoarisoa, who has worked in the region for the past 17 years.
“The women we have worked with have been very responsible.” Cash transfers throughout the world have been very effective interventions although they have also attracted controversy, including accusations that the money is wasted on alcohol and tobacco; that they are handouts that do not contribute to development; that they cause dependency and that they disrupt local economies by boosting inflation.
But Unicef and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) studies’ show that at most 1% to 2% of cash transfer money is spent on alcohol – while in Lesotho, alcohol expenditure actually decreased.
Away from the big and complicated debates surrounding cash transfers, grandmother Macy Solo, who is the only breadwinner in her eight-member family, was celebrating the arrival of her first sheep in years and was eager to show officials what she had done with her payment.
“I just want you to see it,” she said, insisting that we follow her to her homestead, a few kilometres away. She, along with dozens of locals, had gathered at the community nutrition site to receive their monthly payment, which officials combine with workshops on everything from hygiene to rebuilding livelihoods.
● Unicef covered travel expenses for journalists on this trip.