WFP Cash, Food, and Voucher Study in Ecuador

NCT02526147 | Completed

• 1 other identifier: 6119-001
• Study Type: interventional
• Target: 2,580
• Locations: 0 countries
• Sites: N/A

Brief Summary

This evaluation is part of a five country project to evaluate the benefits and costs of the use of two alternatives to food transfers: vouchers and cash (hereafter referred to as "alternative modalities"). The project will generate information on how outcomes such as household food expenditure and dietary diversity, relevant to both beneficiaries and WFP, change following the introduction of these alternative modalities; how benefits and costs of these are, relative to food transfers, distributed across and within households; and what are the critical operational issues that need to be addressed for these alternatives to be successfully implemented. More specifically, the project will answer seven questions:

1. 1.Do households benefit from receipt of the alternative modalities?
2. 2.Are these benefits greater, or less, when transfers are made using alternative modalities compared to food transfers. How does this vary across outcomes (such as nutrition, livelihoods, gender dynamics and intra-household resource allocation) that are of especial interest to WFP?
3. 3.How does the distribution of benefits differ across households when transfers are made using alternative modalities compared to food transfers?
4. 4.How does the distribution of benefits differ within households when transfers are made using alternative modalities compared to food transfers? Do certain household members (women, young children) benefit more from one type of modality? How do these modalities affect decision-making processes within the household?
5. 5.Why are these differences observed? How do the reasons for these differences affect the study's ability to generalize from these evaluations?
6. 6.Does the delivery of alternative modalities cost less than food transfers? What accounts for these cost differences? Are some costs (such as transport) really lower or are they transferred to beneficiaries? Within the household, who bears these additional costs?
7. 7.What is the benefit: cost ratios associated with these different modalities from the perspective of WFP? Is there a conflict between the modality "preferred" by WFP and the modality "preferred" by beneficiaries?

Conditions

Food Security

Outcome Measures

Primary Outcomes (2)

• Food security as measured by the value of food consumption through a household questionnaire

  Value of food consumption is a monetary value greater than zero of food consumed in the household in the last week.

  6 months

• Dietary diversity as measured by dietary diversity index and food consumption score through a household questionnaire

  Dietary diversity index is the number of food items consumed in the household in the last week. Household questionnaire asks about 41 food items, and thus the index ranges from 0-41. Food consumption score uses same information from food items consumed in the last week, groups them into 8 food groups (staples, pulses, vegetables, fruit, meat/fish, milk/dairies, sugar/honey, oils/fats), sums the number of days these eight different food groups were consumed, and then weights the different groups according to their nutritional value. The score ranges from 0-112.

  6 months

Secondary Outcomes (2)

• Mean hemoglobin level as measured by a portable hemoglobinometer (Hemocue AB, Sweden)

  6 months

• Prevalence of intimate partner violence as measured by WHO Violence Against Woman Instrument

  6 months

Study Arms (4)

Control

NO INTERVENTION

Receives no intervention

Cash

EXPERIMENTAL

Household receives cash transfer monthly for 6 months

Other: Cash

Voucher

EXPERIMENTAL

Household receives food voucher to use at local supermarket monthly for 6 months

Other: Voucher

Food

EXPERIMENTAL

Household receives food transfer composed of rice, lentils, canned sardines, and vegetable oil, monthly for 6 months

Other: Food

Interventions

Cash OTHER

Cash

Voucher OTHER

Voucher

Food OTHER

Food

Eligibility Criteria

• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: No
• Age Groups: Child (0-17), Adult (18-64), Older Adult (65+)

You may qualify if:

• Households in pre-selected neighborhoods in Carchi and Sucumbios with high poverty status according to the proxy means test.
• For hemoglobin measurements, children residing in these households that are 6 months-5 years old, and adolescent girls 10-16 years old

You may not qualify if:

• Households that receive the Bono de Desarrollo Humano
• Children ages 6 months - 5 years who are severely sick

Sponsors & Collaborators

• International Food Policy Research Institute: lead
• World Food Program: collaborator

Related Publications (1)

• Buller AM, Hidrobo M, Peterman A, Heise L. The way to a man's heart is through his stomach?: a mixed methods study on causal mechanisms through which cash and in-kind food transfers decreased intimate partner violence. BMC Public Health. 2016 Jun 8;16:488. doi: 10.1186/s12889-016-3129-3.

  PMID: 27278935 DERIVED

MeSH Terms

Interventions

CASP8 and FADD-Like Apoptosis Regulating Protein; Food

Intervention Hierarchy (Ancestors)

Death Domain Receptor Signaling Adaptor Proteins; Adaptor Proteins, Signal Transducing; Intracellular Signaling Peptides and Proteins; Peptides; Amino Acids, Peptides, and Proteins; Tumor Necrosis Factor Receptor-Associated Peptides and Proteins; Apoptosis Regulatory Proteins; Carrier Proteins; Proteins; Diet, Food, and Nutrition; Physiological Phenomena; Food and Beverages

Study Officials

• Melissa L Hidrobo, PhD

  IFPRI

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Study Design

• Study Type: interventional
• Phase: not applicable
• Allocation: RANDOMIZED
• Masking: NONE
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Sponsor Type: OTHER
• Responsible Party: SPONSOR

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: August 12, 2015
• First Posted: August 18, 2015
• Study Start: April 1, 2011
• Primary Completion: November 1, 2011
• Study Completion: November 1, 2011
• Last Updated: August 25, 2015

Record last verified: 2015-08