Comparing Cash and Voucher Transfers in a Humanitarian Context : Evidence from the Democratic Republic of Congo
Despite recent calls in support of cash transfers, there is little rigorous evidence of the relative impacts of cash versus in-kind transfers, especially in humanitarian contexts, where a majority of such programs take place. This paper uses data f...
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2015
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2015/10/25230975/comparing-cash-voucher-transfers-humanitarian-context-evidence-democratic-republic-congo http://hdl.handle.net/10986/22889 |
| Summary: | Despite recent calls in support of cash
transfers, there is little rigorous evidence of the relative
impacts of cash versus in-kind transfers, especially in
humanitarian contexts, where a majority of such programs
take place. This paper uses data from a randomized
experiment in the Democratic Republic of Congo to assess the
relative impacts and costs of equivalently valued cash and
voucher transfers. The voucher program distorted households’
purchases along both the extensive and intensive margin as
compared with unconstrained cash households. Yet there were
no differences in food consumption or other measures of
well-being, in part due to the fact that voucher households
were able to resell part of what they purchased. As there
were no significant benefits to vouchers, cash transfers
were the more cost effective modality for both the
implementing agency and program recipients in this context. |
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