The Economic Impact of Productive Safety Net Program on Poverty: Evidence from Household Survey Data, Tigrai National Regional State, Ethiopia

Abstract

This paper aims at evaluating the impact of productive safety net program on poverty using primary data from randomly selected 600 households in central zone of Tigrai National Regional State, Ethiopia. Propensity Score Matching and Foster-Greer-Thorbecke were used to evaluate impact of the program and poverty, respectively. The paper revealed that the program has positive and significant effect on consumption, livestock holdings, and productive assets. Moreover, impact of the program on total consumption expenditure per adult equivalent was found to be positive and significant. Using total poverty line, poverty rate was lowest among program participants (30.33%) than non-participants (31.1%). Highest poverty rate was found among households headed by women (38.42%) while households headed by men (23.1%). The study also revealed that the program has positive and significant effect on poverty reduction and protecting productive assets. Finally, it was recommended that female headed program participants based programs should be provided to help boost their agricultural output and reduce endemic poverty.
Classification-JEL: C
Keywords: asset; consumption per adult equivalent; productive safety net program; propensity score matching; poverty; Tigrai