The World Bank has said the ₦5,000 cash transfer scheme implemented by the Nigerian Government had little impact on household consumption and women’s financial inclusion in the country.
This global apex bank said this in a report titled, ‘Beta Don Come: Effects of Cash Transfers on Women and Households in Nigeria’.
In the report, the World Bank added that the scheme implemented in 2016, called the National Social Safety Nets Project (NASSP) also had a limited impact on employment, especially for women.
Former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration provided households with a cash transfer of N5,000, disbursed as a lump sum every two months.
Payments were given to each household’s primary caregiver — predominantly women — the report stated.
The report, however, suggested that there is a need for a complementary livelihood to support the intervention to generate sustainable improvements in households’ self-sufficiency.
The bank said it found “no significant effects on overall household consumption, women’s employment, or financial inclusion”.
The report reads: “Program participation improved several dimensions of households’ and women’s welfare over time.
“Households in communities that entered the program earlier experience larger increases in household savings and food security, along with increased access to farmland and livestock ownership, compared to similar households in communities that entered the program later.
“We also find improvements in caregivers’ self-reported happiness, decision-making autonomy over how to spend their own income, and freedom of movement.
“Positive impacts appear to primarily result from the saving mobilisation component of the program.
“Households are substantially more likely to save the longer they have been receiving cash transfers and to switch away from exclusively using cash for household consumption.
“However, in contrast to these strong positive impacts, we do not find any statistically significant effects on overall household consumption or on caregivers’ employment and financial inclusion.”
The World Bank also said despite the efficacy of the programme, there is no evidence of “the impacts of participating in the program at all”.
“We find positive effects on households’ saving, food security, and economic activity along with increased caregivers’ decision-making autonomy and physical mobility associated with participating in the project for longer periods of time.”
