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Food Transfers, Cash Transfers, Behavior Change Communication and Child Nutrition: Evidence from Bangladesh

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  • Akhter Ahmed
  • John Hoddinott
  • Shalini Roy

Abstract

This paper reports the results of two 2-year randomized control trials in two poor rural areas of Bangladesh. Treatment arms included monthly cash transfers, monthly food rations of equivalent value to the cash transfers, and mixed monthly cash and food transfers, and treatment arms—one with food and one with cash—that combined transfers with nutrition-behavior communication change (BCC). This design enables a comparison of transfer modalities within the same experiment. Intent-to-treat estimators show that cash transfers and nutrition BCC had a large impact on nutritional status, a 0.25 standard deviation increase in height-for-age z-scores and a 7.8 percentage point decrease in stunting prevalence. No other treatment arm affected anthropometric outcomes. Mechanisms underlying these impacts are explored. Improved diets—particularly increased intake of animal source foods in the cash plus BCC arm—are consistent with the improvements observed in this paper.

Suggested Citation

  • Akhter Ahmed & John Hoddinott & Shalini Roy, 2025. "Food Transfers, Cash Transfers, Behavior Change Communication and Child Nutrition: Evidence from Bangladesh," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 39(2), pages 439-472.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:39:y:2025:i:2:p:439-472.
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wber/lhae023
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    Cited by:

    1. Duchoslav, Jan & Kenamu, Edwin & Thunde, Jack, 2023. "Targeting hunger or votes? The political economy of humanitarian transfers in Malawi," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    2. Mohamed Kalid Ali & Renée Flacking & Munshi Sulaiman & Fatumo Osman, 2022. "Effects of Nutrition Counselling and Unconditional Cash Transfer on Child Growth and Family Food Security in Internally Displaced Person Camps in Somalia—A Quasi-Experimental Study," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(20), pages 1-13, October.
    3. Quisumbing, Agnes & Ahmed, Akhter & Hoddinott, John & Pereira, Audrey & Roy, Shalini, 2021. "Designing for empowerment impact in agricultural development projects: Experimental evidence from the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Gender Linkages (ANGeL) project in Bangladesh," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    4. Harris-Fry, Helen & Saville, Naomi M. & Paudel, Puskar & Manandhar, Dharma S. & Cortina-Borja, Mario & Skordis, Jolene, 2022. "Relative power: Explaining the effects of food and cash transfers on allocative behaviour in rural Nepalese households," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    5. Premand, Patrick & Barry, Oumar, 2022. "Behavioral change promotion, cash transfers and early childhood development: Experimental evidence from a government program in a low-income setting," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    6. Barrera,Oscar & Macours,Karen & Premand,Patrick & Vakis,Renos, 2020. "Texting Parents about Early Child Development : Behavioral Changes and Unintended Social Effects," Policy Research Working Paper Series 9492, The World Bank.
    7. Derek Headey & Marie Ruel, 2023. "Food inflation and child undernutrition in low and middle income countries," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-10, December.
    8. Salauddin Tauseef, 2022. "The Importance of Nutrition Education in Achieving Food Security and Adequate Nutrition of the Poor: Experimental Evidence from Bangladesh," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 84(1), pages 241-271, February.
    9. de Groot, Richard & Yablonski, Jennifer & Valli, Elsa, 2022. "The impact of cash and health insurance on child nutrition during the first 1000 days: Evidence from Ghana," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 107(C).

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