Social grants, remittances, and food security: does the source of income matter?

Abstract

Large numbers of South Africans receive social grants (public transfers) or remittances (private transfers), and yet one in four South Africans is food insecure. The purpose of this paper is to address two questions: do social grants and remittances improve food security and nutritional outcomes? If so, do these impacts differ between public and private transfers? Drawing on the National Income Dynamic Survey (NIDS), South Africa's first nationally representative survey that follows more than 28,000 individuals over time, we found significant and positive impacts of the Older Person's Grant and of remittances on the dietary diversity index, but not of the Child Support Grant. Moreover, we found no effect on food expenditure or on anthropometry (BMI) by the Older Person's Grant, or remittances. However, some positive effects were found on children's BMI from the Child Support Grant. We discuss why we observe different effects from different transfers, as well as giving several reasons why income transfers are failing to close the nutritional deficits in South Africa.

The Prevalence and Socio-Demographic Correlates of Food Insecurity in Poland

“…These patterns of spending the benefit confirm its investment character, i.e., improving the health status and education of children, which translates into an improvement in the quality of life of future generations. There is strong evidence that cash transfers are likely to improve food security in respect of food consumption and diet quality [ 59 , 60 ]. However, their impact on nutrition and nutritional status of individuals (especially children) is rather inconclusive and needs more research [ 60 ].…”

“…There is strong evidence that cash transfers are likely to improve food security in respect of food consumption and diet quality [ 59 , 60 ]. However, their impact on nutrition and nutritional status of individuals (especially children) is rather inconclusive and needs more research [ 60 ].…”

Innovative and Sustainable Food Production and Food Consumption Entrepreneurship: A Conceptual Recipe for Delivering Development Success in South Africa

“…Ideally, the levels of availability, accessibility, and affordability of food within vulnerable communities is a big food security issue in SA. Advancing the arguments raised by Queenan et al [42] in research addressing food consumption patterns and sustainability, other scholars argue that socially, physically, and economically food security is designed to combat hunger and malnutrition, which are major development problems affecting health and well-being in SA [2,[72][73][74][75]. Supporting these research arguments, FAO confirms that the high levels of food insecurity are a major challenge to SA, especially within vulnerable communities [11,76,77].…”

“…However, this assumption continues to be tested with negative results in SA [78]. Many people remain malnourished and poor with limited patterns of food consumption [2,42,73,74,79]. Currently, agriculture constitutes 32% of economic development in SA [71].…”

Urban-Sensitive Social Protection: How Universalized Social Protection Can Reduce Urban Vulnerabilities Post COVID-19

“…The number of beneficiaries has more than doubled from almost 8 million in 2003to 17.8 million in 2019(SaSSa, 2019, almost onethird of the population. This expansion mainly reflects an increase in direct cash transfers to children, two-thirds of whom receive the Child Support grant every month (Waidler and Devereux, 2019). Ferguson (2015) has labelled this hybrid of neoliberal economic policies and expansionist social spending a 'neoliberal welfare state'.…”