Cash for Care: Making Social Protection Work for Children’s Care and Well-being

Overview

Effective high-quality governmental cash transfer programmes can improve children’s well-being, protection and care by their families.

This is the key finding of research jointly produced by Family’s member organisations Uyisenga Ni Imanzi (Rwanda), Challenging Heights (Ghana) and Children in Distress Network (South Africa). It shows that good social protection can help millions of children in sub-Saharan Africa grow up in a safe and caring environment by:

• preventing family separation and increase reintegration of children;
• reducing stress in the household and improve familial relationships;
• enabling families to care for children who are not their own; and
• improving the material and nonmaterial well-being of children.

Importantly, the research also shows that poorly designed cash transfers schemes can do more harm than good. In order for cash transfers to improve care, they must: promote meaningful links between social and child protection systems; sensitise communities about the importance of good care; avoid over-burdening social workers with excessive administration of grants; provide childcare for public works components; and provide grants of a meaningful size that are paid on time.

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