Cash, vouchers, and in-kind transfers are tools used to increase access to food, water, health care and other goods and services, to build and support livelihoods. The specific method of transfer varies depending on the local context, their effectiveness in reaching intended objectives and outcomes, and organisational capacity.

Cash and voucher assistance (CVA) interventions are regularly cited by crisis-affected populations as their preferred modality for receiving assistance and increasingly perceived as a more empowering and dignified way of assisting affected populations. In addition, increases in purchasing power through cash injections allow for protection of assets (keeping rather than selling them to cover immediate needs) and investments in livelihoods and productive capacity that stimulate economic recovery.

FAO has been implementing CVA interventions for over two decades in a variety of contexts and scales. FAO identifies a role for CVA in providing immediate relief to farmers, strengthening resilience of their livelihoods to future shocks (such as, drought, poor production, and pests), increasing agricultural production, improving food security and nutrition, and reducing rural poverty. CVA is used to support the transition from humanitarian assistance to development, including through enhanced linkages with social protection systems that can be leveraged to respond to shocks and crises.

FAO’s technical expertise lies in combining cash transfers with agricultural interventions to ultimately benefit communities through economic multiplier effects. In particular, FAO has been increasingly using the Cash+ approach, which complements cash transfers or vouchers with the provision of agricultural productive inputs, assets, activities and/or technical training, as a way to maximize the impact and sustainability. The cash provided to beneficiaries is designed to address their immediate food and other basic needs, while the ‘plus’ component promotes their engagement in productive activities.

The evaluation assesses FAO's CVA portfolio and offers lessons to improve programming. It examines the relevance, partnerships and coordination arrangements, effectiveness and efficiency, gender equality and inclusion, and enabling environment for delivering CVA. The assessment is based on an extensive review of internal documents and external literature, an analysis of 50 FAO CVA projects and 170 FAO evaluations, interviews with 69 key stakeholders, an online survey of FAO’s 85 Country Offices, eight country case studies and three case studies of comparable UN agencies. Its main recommendation was for FAO management to develop a vision and strategy specific to CVA so as to enable their more impactful and more efficient delivery.

Documents

Evaluation of Cash and Vouchers PC video