ReliefWeb

1. Introduction

Over the past decade, the World Food Programme (WFP) has increased its use of cash-based transfers (CBTs) to assist persons who are food insecure, with CBTs considered an effective tool to contribute to Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 to “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote sustainable agriculture”. In 2017, WFP provided 1.3 billion USD in cash transfers, up from 880 million USD in the previous year and being 30 percent of the total food assistance provided. 19.2 million people (51% females / 49% males), across 61 countries with 98 operations, were assisted through cash transfers in 2017.

Concurrently, gender equality is central to WFP’s work, being a prerequisite for achieving SDG 2 and so sustained food security and nutrition. Thus SDG 5 – “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls” – is central to WFP fulfilling its mandate.

Given the growing importance of cash-based interventions (CBIs) to humanitarian and development assistance, the centrality of gender equality to sustainable and empowering changes, and finite resources, it is critical that WFP programming and operations be evidence-based and guided by reliable and credible information.

The study on The Potential of Cash-Based Interventions to Promote Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment sought to explore how CBIs can contribute to achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment (GEWE), as ends in themselves and for food security and nutrition outcomes. Where changes in GEWE were experienced, the study sought to understand women’s and men’s perceptions of how and why changes occurred. This is not an impact study or an evaluation. Instead, it is formative research to inform WFP’s policies, processes, programming and future research, such as the WFP CBT and Gender Impact Evaluation Window scheduled to start in 2019.

The study was guided by the following five questions.

(i) What GEWE outcomes have been achieved through or by CBIs?

(ii) How can CBIs contribute to GEWE, as ends in themselves and as needed for sustained food security and nutrition outcomes? Which programme features – programme governance or planning processes, transfer, conditionalities, complementary interventions, technology etc. – are essential for GEWE outcomes?

(iii) What are the apparent causal linkages that may explain how and why CBIs contribute to achieving GEWE outcomes?

(iv) Where CBIs are used, how are/can market-related engagement (e.g. retailer engagement, markets for change, market support) contribute to GEWE?

(v) What are the institutional factors that enable the CBIs to contribute to achieving GEWE outcomes?

This report is the culmination of seven months of research, comprising desk reviews, field work in six countries, a practitioner survey and a learning workshop. The report has seven sections. Section 2 describes the study methodology. Section 3 describes and analyses the types of programme features common to WFP CBIs examined in the study. Section 4 describes and analyses the seven dimensions of food security and nutrition-related changes and eight dimensions of gender equality-related changes reported by women and men. Section 5 discusses four contextual issues observed across the six case studies. Section 6 presents the study’s findings, including a conceptual model linking CBIs with food security-, nutrition- and gender-related outcomes and the programme features and processes that supported the achievement of equitable and empowering impacts observed. Finally, Section 7 proposes recommendations to strengthen WFP’s work that uses cash-based assistance. Summaries of each of the six CBI case studies are provided in Annex 6.