Art Appraisal Blog

This report summarizes a 2021 workshop hosted by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, the African Union, and the World Bank on the experience of African countries in using digitized social protection in response to COVID-19. It includes discussions of using existing social protection information to expand coverage and the development of interoperable data systems. The report concludes by emphasizing the need for systems to be designed...

The Better Than Cash Alliance offers technical assistance to government members to make the shift from cash to digital – by helping to conduct diagnostic studies and advising on national strategies to help to benchmark and map the priorities. This two-part blog, discusses the factors that support the implementation of a comprehensive digitization agenda and how to build sustainable systems and structures to implement priorities while adapting to rapid growth....

This note published by the World Bank presents four priorities to build stronger safety nets that help address gender inequality. 1) Maintain and extend coverage among vulnerable groups, prioritizing women and taking the specific needs of women into account. 2) Invest in adaptive delivery systems that recognize women and girls’ specific vulnerabilities. 3) Leverage digital technologies to reach and empower women in safety net programs. 4) Invest in cash plus...

This paper attempts to analyze the efficiency and effectiveness of the various social protection delivery mechanisms with reference to climate resilience, and also examines the sufficiency of social protection finance in meeting climate resilience and sustainable development outcomes. In doing so, the paper discusses India’s JAM trinity in the context of a potential universal basic income.

Adaptive social protection (ASP) is a focus area within the larger social protection sector, which has emerged in response to the need to build resilience of the poor and vulnerable to covariate shocks, such as natural disasters, economic crises, pandemics, conflicts, and forced displacement. This paper details a stress test tool for assessing the adaptiveness social protection systems, incorporating digital payment and data systems as factors.

This working paper seeks to provide an overview of dominant perspectives, policies and operational and regulatory approaches that are shaping existing initiatives to digitise social protection programmes across the Global South. It focuses on Government–to–person (G2P) transfers and reviews both grey and academic literature and addresses two specific questions: To what extent do the transformations brought about by the digitisation of G2P programmes contribute to facilitating poor and vulnerable people’s...

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the digital transformation across the world. This post by CSIS explores the advantages and risks in the shift to digital payments, outlines principles for inclusive digital payments systems, and briefly summarizes the experiences of Kenya and Mexico.

M-PESA allows users to send and receive money through SMS messages. This IPA summary outlines one of the first studies examining the long-term effect access to M-PESA has on individuals, finding that in areas where M-PESA became more accessible, women were more likely to switch from farming to business occupations and to save more. It estimates that 185,000 women changed occupations, and 194,000 households, primarily female-headed households, were lifted above...

Social Protection in Bangladesh began in the 1970’s and has been evolving ever since. This in-depth World Bank report examines the current state of social protection in Bangladesh, including efforts to digitize payments, and recommendations for future improvements through digitization.

The Philippines’ Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) is a conditional cash transfer program that aims to provide short-term poverty alleviation for poor households. As the program grew quickly and in volume and geography, so did the challenges faced in getting payments quickly and efficiently to recipients. This case study examines the design and implementation of the 4Ps program, explains the experiences of stakeholders and presents lessons learned.