Social Safety Nets Primer

2003-01, Weigand, Christine

Food-based safety net programs provide food, either directly, or through instruments (such as food stamps or coupons) that may be used to purchase food. More generally, these programs serve a variety of purposes and are designed to ensure livelihoods, to increase purchasing power, or to relieve deprivation and improve nutritional status, perhaps through the direct provision of food.

2003-01, Blomquist, John

Governments and donor organizations increasingly recognize that rigorous evaluations of public interventions should be part of the social policy decision-making process. Yet there is frequently a gap between the desire for information on the effectiveness of programs and an understanding of the potential and the limitations of evaluation tools. This note reviews the basic elements of good impact evaluations, identifies some of the political economy aspects that influence whether they are conducted, and explores ways to encourage use of evaluation.

2003-01, Mackintosh, Fiona, del Ninno, Carlo

Many governments use price and tax subsidization to meet social protection objectives. They endeavor to reduce the cost of living for their population-or for a subset of the population-by subsidizing the price of goods or services in lieu of, or in addition to, direct income transfers. While these subsidies may distort production incentives, subsidize the non-poor more than the poor, and limit consumer choice, there are reasons why a government may choose to use some forms of pricing policy rather than make income transfers to help the poor.