Designing and Implementing Child-Centred Cash Transfer Programmes

Overview

In November 2009, UNICEF Nepal commissioned the Economic Policy Research Institute (EPRI) to design and deliver the one-week training course Designing and Implementing of Child Centered Cash Transfer Programs. UNICEF Nepal organised the course and EPRI delivered the course sessions, supported by the Government of Nepal and UNICEF Nepal.  EPRI delivered the course from November 9 to 13 in Nepalgunj.  Twenty-five government officials from the districts of Dolpa, Humla, Jumla, Kalikot, and Mugu participated, along with an additional eight participants from UNICEF and non-governmental organisations. All participants successfully completed the course and were awarded certificates by the Economic Policy Research Institute.  In addition, UNICEF and EPRI presented a one-day workshop for Women Development Officers in Kathmandu on 16 November 2009.

The course aimed to provide participants with an in-depth understanding of the theoretical and practical issues involved in developing child centered cash transfer programs. It was designed for government policy-makers and officials as well as representatives from UNICEF and both international and national non-governmental organisations. The course included presentations by Ms. Beth Verhey (UNICEF), Dr. Michael Samson (EPRI), Ms. Ingrid van Niekerk (EPRI), Mr. Som Lal Subedi (MLD), and Mr. Bishnu Prasad Gauli (MLD), as well as others.

Course content

EPRI designed the course content in close consultation with UNICEF Nepal, with the aim of the participants to more effectively design and implement child-centered cash transfer programs.  The course content included pedagogical sessions (combining lectures and discussions, mostly in the morning time slots) as well as interactive exercises and team-building activities (primarily in the afternoon).  The main topics for the pedagogical sessions included:

•             Child-centered social protection

•             Social protection frameworks

•             Cash transfers design and implementation

•             Program identification

•             Program design

•             Program implementation

•             Protecting program success

In addition, to facilitate active learning the course employed a number of interactive exercises, including both a unifying exercise that ran through the entire week as well as other shorter activities, including district team discussions.  Exercises included an interactive experiment on the political economy of targeting and a test of the scalability of programmes.