Evaluación del gasto y análisis de beneficiarios del Programa Nacional de Movimiento para la Alfabetización del Perú[Public expenditure assessment and beneficiary incidence analysis of the Peruvian Literacy Program]

The Peruvian Literacy Program (PRONAMA) was created in 2006 in order to eradicate illiteracy in Peru (through the literacy sub-program) and to correct the regression effect (through the education continuity sub-program). Although the PRONAMA was closed in 2012, Peru still needs this program because there were 1,786,370 people aged 15 years or older who do not know how to read and write in year 2011. Furthermore, only Lima, Callao and Ica were the regions capable to surmount the illiteracy barrier (international standard for that is a ratio below 4%) in 2011. In this context, our paper aims to evaluate the public expenditure and to perform the beneficiary incidence analysis for PRONAMA. We find that the implementation of this program had serious pitfalls such as the delay in teachers’ wages, lag in the provision of materials, incompatible schedules with the beneficiaries’ life styles, weak supervision and monitoring mechanisms, as well as learning difficulties in classes with quechua (a Peruvian indigenous language) speakers due to books written in Spanish and Spanish speaking teachers.