Public works and employment programmes have long been considered a staple of social assistance. For the most part, though, they have been designed as short-term "safety nets". While, in some cases, the focus has also been on reducing poverty or addressing structural unemployment challenges,...

Despite the recovery of economic growth in Latin America during the 1990s, rising unemployment, high informality rates and sluggish wages lie at the root of high inequality and poverty. This paper looks at changes in hourly earnings from the early 1990s to the early 2000s in three relatively...

This paper analyses Brazilian, Chilean and Colombian experiences with conditional cash transfer programmes and how they have helped tackle gendered economic and social vulnerabilities. It is argued that Bolsa Família, Chile Solidario and Familias en Acción should be analysed within the broader...

In this paper we propose a method to estimate externality effects in cash transfer programmes, even in cases when the benefit is not randomly assigned. Externality is assessed through the decomposition of the average treatment effect on the treated (ATT) into participation (direct) effect and...

This paper discusses the link between Bolsa Família, Brazil's largest direct income-transfer programme, and the citizen's basic income as established in Brazilian legislation. Although these two initiatives were created by law almost simultaneously, the relationship between them does not seem...

This paper investigates the impact of the pilot phase of Paraguay's conditional cash transfer programme, Tekoporã, on the demand for healthcare and education, and how much of this impact was due to the cash transfers and/or due to changes in behaviour/preferences, possibly as an effect of...

A majority of people living in rural areas depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. Investing in smallholder farming can be a sustainable way to revitalise agricultural production based on local and diverse food systems. Inclusive agricultural growth has the potential to reduce rural...

The objective of this paper is to analyse how knowledge-sharing activities between Brazil and several sub-Saharan African countries, in the fields of social protection and food and nutrition security policies and programmes, have directly and/or indirectly influenced African policies and...