Impacts of the Child Grants Programme on the Local Economy in Lesotho

This programme aims to improve the living standards of Orphans and Vulnerable Children to reduce malnutrition and improve health

Abstract

The objective of Lesotho’s Child Grants Programme (CGP) is to improve the living standards of Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) so as to reduce malnutrition, improve health status, and increase school enrolment among OVC. The CGP seeks to accomplish this via an unconditional cash transfer targeted at poor and vulnerable households. The programme’s immediate impact will be to raise the purchasing power of the beneficiary households. The LSL 1 440 transfer represents an average of 22 percent of the income of the treated households, every quarter the programme transfers LSL 3.3 million to 2 299 households.

The local economy-wide impact evaluation (LEWIE) methodology is designed to understand the full impact of cash transfers on local economies, including on the production activities of both beneficiary and nonbeneficiary groups, how these effects change when programmes are scaled up to larger regions and why these effects occur. All of these aspects are important for designing projects and explaining their likely impacts to government officials and other sponsoring agencies.

Citation

FAO. Impacts of the Child Grants Programme on the Local Economy in Lesotho. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome, Italy (2013) 2 pp.

Impacts of the Child Grants Programme on the Local Economy in Lesotho (PDF, 507KB)

Published 1 January 2013