Dr. Cristina Gomes cristinagomesmx@gmail - United …. Cristina Gomes [email protected] 3 diversities and inequalities that affect individual capacities, and integrate components

Dr. Cristina Gomes [email protected]

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Policy response to recent trends in family poverty and social exclusion

Good practices in anti‐poverty family‐focused policies and programs in developing countries: examples and lessons learnt

United Nations Department of Economic and Social affairs (UNDESA)

Division for Social Policy and Development

New York 15 ‐ 17 May 2012

Dr. Cristina Gomes


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Introduction and conceptual framework Amartya Sen defines development as liberty and poverty as capability deprivation. Social justice implies that income affects people's capabilities in education, health, survival, work, etc. Poverty is lack of income, but also is lack of capacity, since income level is not the only generator of capacities. The relationship between income and capabilities varies among families and individuals. There are personal differences in age, sex, race‐ethnic characteristics, health, disability, illness, which shape a diversity of capacities and needs to be taken into account by policies: children, youth, adults and elderly, men and women, have capacities and needs. Moreover, these differences may be coupled at individual, family and community levels. Individuals and families live in a diverse environment, which varies in climate, level of drought, flooding and heating needs, related to infectious diseases and risks specific for areas of residence, urban or rural. Social inequalities generate differences in income and also in quality of life, access to public services, prevalence of crime and violence, pollution and community, relation and perspectives, patterns of behavior, conventions and customs. For example, relatively poor individuals live with less poor groups, and although they can not be below the official poverty line, particularly teenagers change behaviors and some take risks to achieve the same consume level of their pairs and friends. Population heterogeneity is related to inequalities in income and capabilities, to individual, family social and environment differences. The level and distribution of resources and responsibilities in family reproduces expected roles. Maternity is related to family care and domestic obligations for women, shaping different levels of wellbeing and freedom for men and women of different ages. As a result, girls use to receive less food and frequent less the school than boys, losing opportunity to develop their higher potential and capacities in the future, reproducing the cycle of poverty reproduction inter‐generations. Women, indigenous and afro‐descents have a lower level of nutrition, health and education, they accumulate discrimination characteristics and are less likely to enter in labor market, to receive lower wages and work in skilled positions, compared to their counterparts; they have a lower life‐expectancy and will have more difficulties to convert their income in new capacities, even if they receive an additional income from cash transfer programs for poor. Poverty of capabilities can be more intense than income poverty, but they are always linked, income is a means to obtain skills, and have more skills a person can increase income. Policies to promote universal wellbeing may recognize and take into account these


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diversities and inequalities that affect individual capacities, and integrate components from diverse spheres involved in poverty reproduction. The Human Development Index is a synthetic indicator that integrate three dimensions of poverty as capability deprivation: low per‐capita income, illiteracy and low level of education and health, measured as survival, adapting Amartya Sen approach. This indicator have been very useful to compare poverty and human development among and inside countries, providing relevant information to orient integrated policies and to implement Poverty Reduction Programs (PRP).

In this article we adopt the Amartya Sen approach to analyze population and poverty trends and related policies in Latin American and the Caribbean (LAC) region.

1. Macroeconomic adjustment and crisis in the 90’s increased poverty and limited investments in human development

2. Mortality and fertility rates are higher among the poor, indigenous and African descent, at all ages, and shape different population pyramids within and among countries.

3. Families with more children are likely to be poor. 4. Poor women are likely to have more children 5. Fertility is higher among women with low education, poor, indigenous and

African‐descents.


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6. Urban growth and poverty 7. Labor market: age, sex and race‐ethnical discrimination 8. Gender, informality and poverty 9. Informal work and lack of social security for women 10. Rights, legislation and policies to reconcile productive and reproductive work of

women 11. Reconciling domestic and non‐domestic work 12. Youth, low education and informal work: poverty reproduction 13. Informality and poverty: policies to promote the inclusion of women and youth 14. Adolescent pregnancy, dropping out of school 15. Poverty Reduction Programs in LAC region are based in Conditioned Cash

Transfers for families. 16. An integrated framework

Population and Poverty Trends in Latin America and the Caribbean The proportion of population living with one dollar per day in LAC region decreased from 22,6% in 1990 to 12,3% in 2010 (70 millions). Uruguay, Chile, Jamaica, Argentina, Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Panama, Brazil and Colombia had less than 10 percent of their population living with one dollar per day, and the highest proportions were found in Nicaragua (45%), El Salvador (31%) and Honduras (24%). The other countries had between 10 and 20 per cent. Poor living with one to two dollars per day was 80% in Nicaragua, 58% in El Salvador, 45% in Honduras and 41% in Ecuador. Decreasing in poverty levels happened in the region only after 2000.

1. Macroeconomic adjustment and crisis in the 90’s increased poverty and limited investments in human development

The 1980’s development in Latin America and the Caribbean start a large period of crisis, that continue during the 1990s, when restrictive policies and economic crises contributed to increase poverty, which began to decrease slightly only in the early 2000s. The rise and persistence of poverty in the 1990s and early 2000s had a negative effect on economic growth and human development in LAC. It is estimated that a 10 percent of increase in poverty reduces annual growth in 1 per cent. Instead, for each 1% of economic growth, poverty declines 1.25% in Latin America (World Bank, 2006).

This period corresponded to the first decade of demographic bonus in LAC region. Between 1950 and 2000 life expectancy increased from 45 to 70 years, and between 1960 to 1990 fertility reduced to a half, from 6 to 3 children per woman in average. The rapid demographic transition impacted national and family economy, the labor market, policies and societies. From 1970 to 2000 the ratio of producers by dependents contributed to raise the annual rate of growth of output per effective consumer by about 0.5 to 0.6 percentage points annually. This period of demographic dividends was similar in Asia and Latin America, but in Asia it contributed to increase capital accumulation, while in Latin America, this contribution was not completely realized, due to insufficient investments in schooling, employment, timing and level of


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childbearing, and policies that make it easier for young parents to work (Lee and Manson).

The crisis and economic adjustment in the 1990’s were coincident with the highest rates of growth of youth, without the necessary investments in education and health and employment generation, and LAC countries did not took enough advantage of the demographic dividend in the two first decades of this potential bonus, as Asian countries did.

On the other side, in the next decades productivity at older ages will depend on “health and disability, tax incentives and disincentives, and, particularly, the structure of pension programs and retirement policies. On the consumption side, some countries, like those in East Asia, place a high value on education expenditures for children”, but as in LAC these investments in the first demographic bonus were limited.

2. Mortality and fertility rates are higher among the poor, indigenous and African descent, at all ages, and shape different population pyramids within and among countries.

Mortality and fertility are higher among the population groups who are poor, indigenous and African descents at all ages. These groups have a lower life expectancy, are younger and have more children than their counterparts, who live longer, control their fertility and have less dependent children. The intermediate groups such as moderately poor and “mullato‐mestizo” are in an intermediate position in the demographic transition. As a result, these individual and social inequalities produce different populations inside and within countries and outlines specific demographic pyramids for different social groups. Population Pyramids by Poverty Condition, Mexico and Argentina 2005


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Population Pyramid by Race, Brazil 2010 3. Families with more children are likely to be poor.

Families with more children are likely to be poor, and the proportions of poor children are above the average and the proportions of poor for all the other age groups. Mexico Percentage of poor men and women by age groups according to poverty line of food, 2000

4. Poor women are likely to have small children.


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Fertility is higher among women with low education level, poor, indigenous and Afro‐descendents. Families with a greater number of small children and where women do not work are those with a higher proportion of poverty. Poor women (and many poor children) spend most time in domestic work and caring small children. They do not have enough time to study and work outside the home to generate additional income to leave poverty. The predominantly domestic role of poor women is related to the combination of gender and social inequalities: women, poor, indigenous and afro‐descendants are discriminated entering the labor market. They have higher unemployment rates, receive lower wages and have more difficulty to enter in the most skilled positions and to access social security and protection, compared to their counterparts. An important indicator of gender discrimination is the income gap between male and female wages. In LAC countries this gap is negatively related to the size of GDP, due to gender wage gap lies in inequality of labor insertion and women discrimination.

The deeper gender gaps in Chile, Argentina, Mexico and Peru, does not correspond to the high GDP of these countries. In Haiti, Bolivia and Nicaragua the gender gaps are considerably smaller than in richer LAC countries, but it may simply reflect the homogeneity of low wages and poverty for men and women in poorest countries.

5. Fertility is higher among women with low education, poor, indigenous and


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African‐descents. In most of Latin American countries, particularly in the less developed, the majority of the women do not work. Women with a higher level of education are more often working, plan their lives, have higher expectations of the future and have fewer children. In the other extreme, illiterate women or those with lower education level have more difficulty to enter in the labor market, receive lower wages and have more children. The gender wage gap is not explained only by education, but by specific gender discrimination in the labor market. These inequalities are unacceptable, they undermine social cohesion and efficiency, generating and reproducing conflicts. In these countries, additional years of education and income for women, combined to day care institutions for children would be crucial components for poverty reduction, considering income and capabilities.

6. Urban growth and poverty

In LAC region the urban population will increase from 394 to 609,000,000 between 2000 and 2030. Currently 77 per cent of the population lives in cities and it is currently the most urbanized developing region in the world.

However, 35% of the urban population is poor and 135 million live in informal settlements and slums. The proportions of poverty are three times lower in urban areas (28% of poor and extremely poor 12%) than in rural areas. However, half of the extremely poor people live in urban areas (46 million). Currently, the urban population growth is due more to high fertility of the urban poor to the rural‐urban migration. Most of the urban poor population is not migrants, and migrants from rural areas are no longer primarily responsible for the expansion of poverty or poor urban communities. The social security systems covering formal workers, and both are concentrated in urban areas. In 2007, 58.6% of workers in the region were working in the informal


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sector (ILO, 2008). Only 41.4% of them may be contributing to social security systems, with guaranteed access to health services, savings and pensions. And only a third of the urban poor workers in the formal sector have the right to health and pension contributions. (World Bank, 2005) Cities have the highest supply of education and health services, but its coverage is not universal, quality is poor and the cost to access them are greater in urban areas compared to rural areas. In crowded cities these trends generate public health problems. For example, in many countries child mortality among the urban population is higher than in rural areas, despite the increased availability and proximity to health services (World Bank 2005). As a higher proportion of urban poor people get sick and incur expenses, those could be catastrophic for their income level. Education and health expenditures are higher for poor people in urban areas; they spend more with school supplies, books and transportation than poor population living in rural areas. Life in the cities mean higher housing costs. The housing shortage increases the cost of rent and possession. The result is overcrowding in urban dwellings. Housing of the poor people living in urban areas are of poorer quality, in conditions of illegality, insecurity and risk, insecure tenure and property. These conditions do not motivate poor people to make improvements in their homes or preserving their neighborhoods, which suffer with problems of lack of planning and inadequate location: after poor have settled in precarious areas is more difficult to install water and sewage networks, electricity or sanitation or public transport. Moreover, market distortions lead them to pay high market prices for informal housing alternatives, compared to prices in the formal market. Governments have a key role in regulate the ownership of land and homes and to facilitate access to the land of the poor, particularly women who are heads of households. Mobilizing capacities of the poor to acquire and to formalize land tenure and housing in urban areas and providing infrastructure for water, sewer and electricity in poor communities, as well free education and health services are important components to reduce poverty in urban communities.

7. Labor market: age, sex and race‐ethnical discrimination Unemployment rates of young, women and afro‐descendant people tend to be higher than for other age groups, with variations between countries. The 2008 crisis stronger affected mainly young people, particularly those living in urban areas. It is estimated that the number of young unemployed increased from 11 to 17 million between 2008 and 2009, an increase of 12% in 2008 and 14‐15% in 2009 (ILO, 2009). Women are more likely to lose jobs in times of economic crisis, compared to men. In March 2009 the unemployment rate of women exceeded the percentage of male unemployment. Female, youth and urban employment are more susceptible to the


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effects of the economic crisis. Past experiences show that, after recovery of the economy, it takes 4 to 5 years for the labor market recovers. This means that young adults and women affected by the crisis probably will suffer for many more years of his adult life the loss of opportunities experienced in crisis years. As urban employment are more affected during economic crisis than rural, women and young people living in urban areas accumulating a double risk of unemployment, underemployment and poverty. Poor families are impacted particularly by unemployment of the head of the household. Even considering unemployment benefits, the individual may suffer less by income than by the loss of its value as a person, the value of having a rewarding occupation. Unemployment not only entails the loss of income, but also a psychological damage, loss of motivation, skills and confidence, diseases, disruption of family relationships and social life, social exclusion, racial tensions and gender and age asymmetries.

8. Gender, informality and poverty Rates of social security coverage of the Economically Active Population (EAP) by sex show the gender gaps in the labor market. The largest gaps are present in Chile and Uruguay, the countries with the highest coverage ‐ more than half of the EAP is included in the social security system. Coverage rates in Brazil and Argentina are 45 and 35% respectively, and in Guatemala it is 20% and in Bolivia 10%. In all the countries women have coverage rates 5% lower than those of men. The highest social security coverage is not necessarily accompanied by gender equality, so it is recommended that all new pension and health plans pay special attention to promoting and ensuring social protection for women.

9. Informal work and lack of social security for women Women are overrepresented in the informal labor marked, a fact that reaffirms the relationship between wage and labor and gender discrimination. Many women working in the informal sector are in the stages of marriage and motherhood, and in many cases they are single and/or married mothers with small children. Particularly poor women need to work flexible hours to support or supplement the household income, due to lack of social protection and day care institutions for their children. After six years old children have obligatory public education in all the countries, however, they stay at school only four or five hours per day, and full time schools are rare. The ability to reconcile productive and reproductive roles depends on the level of poverty among women. For example, in Mexico moderately poor women had fewer


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children and work at lower rates compared to those living in extreme poverty. Half of poor working women are employed in the informal sector, half of them work less than 40 hours per week and one third part of them assume the role of wife of a head of household, they work to supplement the household income, ensuring that their families are not living in extreme poverty. Social protection such as day care for children would be indispensable to increase the availability of time for poor women to increase their working time and contribution to prevent family poverty. Female heads of household are major contributors of income in their households, and they are more likely not to be poor, compared with male heads (Lustig and Székely, 1997). Women who are spouses work much less than female heads. The only exception are spouses in families living in extreme poverty, who work in larger proportions, particularly when their husbands are self‐employed and have no regular income. In brief, family poverty and the higher working hours for poor women may be greater in the cases where poor mother with many children try to escape from poverty combining the role of spouses and their husbands do not have a regular income. (Gomes, 2006).

10. Rights, legislation and policies to reconcile productive and reproductive work of women

In LAC, most women work in the informal sector and therefore they are excluded from rules that protect only formal workers, and guarantee female rights to balance productive and reproductive work. This is the case of domestic workers, caregivers, casual workers, farmers and other informal workers in the vast majority of countries in the region. According to the ILO (2005), legislation that guarantees protection in the maternity period is restricted to women working in formal sector. In all LAC countries have legislation to protect maternity, and most of the women who are working have 12 to 13 weeks maternity leave. The laws that allow the most extensive maternity period are those of Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Cuba and Venezuela (17 or more weeks). In 18 countries the wage is fully paid, and in the other mothers receive 80% or less of the monthly salary. For example, in Paraguay they receive 50% of the salary as maternity leave, and Nicaragua, Antigua and the Bahamas and Barbados this proportion is 60%. In most countries, this payment is made with social security resources, except in the Bahamas, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras and Trinidad and Tobago, where the employee also contributes to the payment. The share of employed in the pay of maternity leave varies between countries. In Trinidad and Tobago they contribute 100% for one month and 50% for two months in the Dominican Republic with 50% for four weeks out of the 12‐week maternity period. In Ecuador, women receive 25% in the Bahamas, Guatemala and Honduras third of the value of the benefit. Another mechanism of protection of women is legislation that prohibits the hiring


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pregnancy test for women, which is not explicitly regulated in most countries. Only in Venezuela there is no explicit prohibition, but in Brazil, Chile and Colombia have applied constraints to the use of pregnancy tests when they are used for purposes of discrimination. It also prohibits the dismissal of women during maternity in Chile and Panama (from pregnancy to one year after the conclusion of the license), in Bolivia and Venezuela (up to one year after delivery), Argentina (up to seven months postpartum.) Also in Chile, in case of maternal death, the parent becomes entitled to not be resigned for a year. Failure to comply with these regulations involves the payment of compensation equivalent to one year's remuneration in Argentina and Ecuador, five months of salary in the Dominican Republic, and six months in Colombia and Honduras. Upon returning to work, the legislation should also ensure that women taking the same position it occupied before pregnancy. In Uruguay discrimination that violates the principles of equality and opportunity for both sexes is prohibited. This set of rights, although established in law, is not always effective in practice, so it must be continuously monitored. Also, the biggest challenge FTA in this area is the inclusion of a large majority of women are in informal employment in this set of rights, through alternative schemes of social protection that promote reconciliation between productive and reproductive work.

11. Reconciling domestic and non‐domestic work

Women's work is an important determinant of poverty reduction of households (Gomes, 2006; Adama, 2006). Although the OECD countries has been estimated that investment in child care generates significant return rates through increased taxes, reduced spending on social benefits and greater child development, such return is only taken into account for companies whose employees are not easily replaceable (Adama, 2006). In sectors in which the poor women and labor is abundant, such returns are not as visible, and the cost of investment in children rests solely with the family, a large disadvantage for poor families. For example, in Brazil, a total of 11.5 million children aged zero to three years old, only 1.5 million, 14% of them had the opportunity to attend a day care center and less than 30% of children aged four to six years were not in child education. Gaps in early childhood education opportunities are presented by income or poverty. In households with income less than a quarter of the minimum wage only 8.4% of children from toddlers attending day care, while 30.9% of children from families with incomes above twice the minimum wage have this opportunity (IBGE, 2004).

Thus, policies to reduce poverty must include mechanisms to make easier the cost of child‐care for poor women who want to work and/or study. In LAC there are some mechanisms to promote the reconciliation of productive and reproductive work for poor women, such as day care programs in Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Costa Rica, the programs "Child Development" in Ecuador, "Community Homes" in Guatemala,


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"Companies maternal" in Honduras and “Wawa Wasi” in Peru. Since 2007 the federal government in Brazil is implementing the program “ProInfância”, to collaborate with local governments in building and providing equipments for day‐care and schools for children in pre‐school ages, with special priority to children with special needs, combining pedagogic, administrative, recreation, sport and food components. This program invested in building more than one thousand of day‐care and pre‐schools between 2007 and 2008. In 2010 the program had built 1667 day‐care, 30 per cent more than the initial goal. In 2010 local governments signed agreements to build other 1500 pre‐schools and to provide equipments to 300 day‐care public institutions, covering mainly poor communities. In the favelas of de Rio de Janeiro this program has increased the coverage of poor babies and children, who are the main beneficiaries. As the program does not link the objective to promote children care, education and health, it does not promote mothers inclusion, since they do not include obligatory conditions for mothers to increase adult education level and labor inclusion. In Mexico a day‐care program developed by the National Social Security Institute (IMSS‐Oportunidades) promotes public and private collaboration and combine the creation of new and small day‐care as small business among women. However, the program does not promote directly poor mothers education or participation in the labor market. Other programs to support the heads of households offer child‐care during the period of training mothers in entering the labor market, but not during working hours (Camacho and Martinez, 2006).

12. Youth, low education and informal work: poverty reproduction Informal work concentrates youth with low education and forming a new family, reproducing poverty among generations. In LAC region around 40 per cent of the youth dropout the high school. Most of the youth are informal workers, self‐employed, and/or work at small business with older adults with educational backwardness. Self‐employed adults outsource their young children in their small businesses, promoting early school dropout and reproducing the low productivity of the family business and poverty among successive generations. In some cases families miss the higher level of education of their children who made an effort to conclude the secondary levels. Instead to find a work according to their qualification, they start working in businesses with low productivity, helping parents in agriculture of subsistence or small and low productive businesses (Valenti, 2006). In Mexico, in urban areas, poor informal workers are likely younger and heads of their households, compared to non‐poor. Most of young people are in informal work and do not depend of their parents anymore. They transit to adult life early and are forming and heading their new household; some expect to expand their training and experience after completing studies or are just waiting for better opportunities while maintaining their family. Many young heads of households and their families depend only on their income, that is often low and irregular, from informal employment, and all their family members have no social protection (Gomes, 2006).


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Informal workers include mostly young people leaving school early, who remain in the informal market without exceeding the high school neither received training for the job, reproducing the lower education and productivity level of their parents, many of them becoming heads of their households early. This group brings together women who are single mothers or young spouses who work to supplement household income. That is the situation of many heads of households living in extreme poverty, with more children and without social security. Combined family, institutional and labor market mechanisms promote the reproduction of low education level and low productivity among generations. These mechanisms are related to family poverty and are reflected also in the self‐employment of female heads and spouses, but mainly in the transit to adult life of teens and youth. Most of the youth marry and start working at informal and unskilled positions to maintain a new family; some are employees and support their family business with low productivity and without payment; and some girls get married and pregnant, leave school and take on household roles as wife and mothers without work outside home.

13. Informality and poverty: policies to promote the inclusion of women and youth

The relationship between informality‐poverty and youth‐gender discrimination, should be treated in a comprehensive framework to generate and formalize employment, to take the right incentives that will enable young people and women to develop their own micro businesses successfully, promoting increases in productivity and the inclusion of their businesses in productive channels of economy, and promoting also the formalization of workers. Transits of young people and women from the informal to formal labor market should be a major focus from two perspectives: first, because poverty is related to informal work, particularly for younger household heads; and secondly because poor young people who remain living in their parents households and working in the family business contribute to poverty reproduction. Both trends put obstacles to youth careers and expectations to be more productive and improve their income and wellbeing. Surveys in Brazil and Paraguay show that workers are willing to formalize their jobs or their businesses. Thus, policies oriented to formalize this group of workers should be established, with mechanisms to require the responsibility of the beneficiaries to complete levels of education and training in business management, new technologies and / or micro‐credit. These capacities can allow young people and women to acquire knowledge and experience in more productive sectors, strengthening their potential as skilled workers, as employees or employers at micro‐business. These programs should include comprehensive social protection mechanisms for the whole family, and initially focusing on youth and women, including those who dropped out of school and are not working, those working in informal sector, and those who


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are heads of households with small children. It is essential to combine social protection packages including safe motherhood and child care to enable the reconciliation of productive and reproductive roles of women. Although education provision is a key to increasing productivity and income, if isolated of mechanisms to formalize and increase the productivity of the work for youth and women, it would not be sufficient by itself to achieve a high‐level of human resources in education and training and to absorb these resources in highly productive jobs. Human capital increases must be matched in institutional environments and in companies with technological strengths to take advantage of skilled workers, as well as their integration into large‐scale supply chains. Only the combination of these conditions would increase the productivity of workers and enterprises, promoting better wages, social protection and effective poverty reduction.

14. Adolescent pregnancy, dropping out of school Fertility rates have decrease in all LAC countries, however, poor, low educated women, indigenous and afro‐descendants have fertility rates until three times superior to their counterparts. And adolescent pregnancy and motherhood persist in several countries of the region, related to cultural values, but also to difficulties for women in accessing education, work, health services and contraceptives methods.


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15. Poverty Reduction Programs in LAC region are based in Conditioned Cash Transfers for families.

Amartya Sen’s approach of poverty as capacities has been applied in the Human Development Index and also has been very useful to compare poverty and human development among and inside countries, providing relevant information to orient integrated policies and inter‐sector actions. One example is Poverty Reduction Programs (PRP). Programs of Conditioned Cash Transfers (CCT) provide a complementary income and encourage access to basic health services and education for poor families, protecting the family income and consumption in the short term, and also contributing to human development in the long term. During the last 15 years, CCT has reached an important coverage in the region, raising public support and political consensus. Currently there are 18 countries implementing such programs, covering approximately 25 million households and more than 133 million people, and representing 19% of the Latin American and Caribbean. The largest program, Bolsa Familia in Brazil, starts in 1995, in 2002 its represented 6.9 percent of the GDP, and in 2009 9.3 percent Although CCT take a diversity of designs and execution types, they share common characteristics: ‐ Concept of poverty integrating income and capacities (nutrition, health, education) ‐ Family commitment with capacities to continue receiving transfers ‐ Selection of poor families with children in school‐age children ‐ The role of women as a recipient of transfers ‐ The concept that cash transfers provides freedom and autonomy to poor people to


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decide about their needs and how to use the benefit. CCT have been positively evaluated in several countries, particularly in improvements in nutrition, education and poverty reduction, and additionally in strengthening local economies, citizen empowerment, social inclusion and cohesion. The main obstacles faced by CCT in Latin America are to establish synergies between the program and health and education systems. Structural problems of administration, transparency and quality of services cannot be solved by CCT, and are under responsibility of other authorities and Ministries, which are very complex. Evaluation processes have indicated the relevance to improve not only the budget and coverage, but the quality in education and health provided for poor groups. In Mexico, the program Oportunidades has been evaluated since the beginning, 2007, and a very important achievement is gender equality in basic school, since the program girls received for more than ten years a higher value of benefit. This procedure reverted the cultural trend to do not value girl’s education among poor and indigenous families. Another additional component are the meetings with mothers to promote practices of sexual and reproductive health and the obligation to all members of the family to be examined two times annually, in order to prevent illnesses, particularly infections that can affect children and school assistance. In Brazil, the program Bolsa Familia has no gender preference for girls, but for ethnic groups. The indigenous and afro‐descendants have facilities to be selected, and to receive special civil registration to be included in the program, since a high proportion of them could not prove their existence as citizens, because they do not have a birth registration or a official ID. These documents have been provided for ten years, even in Amazonia forest, with increasing participation in the program and in other civil and social rights, such as vote and citizenship participation. This procedure contributed to identify exclusion‐errors of the program, and provided solutions for inclusion of some of the poorest groups. The national coverage of Bolsa Familia increased from 1.15 millions of families in 2003 to 12.37 millions in 2009. In the poorest region (North‐East) the program covered 2.13 millions of families in 2003 and increased to 6.2 in 2009, representing half of all the families receiving the program. Special components to other vulnerable groups have been also successful. Evaluation processes of CCTs have indicated other poverty dimensions to be integrated or complemented contribute to achieve dignity to poor people: land and housing property, infrastructure and access to water, electricity and gas, access to technology (communication) and employment are examples. In Mexico qualitative evaluation demonstrated that poor elderly living in extremely high (more than 40 centigrades in the border with the US) or extremely low temperatures in mountains or in the forest, cannot pay for electricity or combustible, for gas and water. Some of them live in regions where the temperature exceeds 40 degrees Celsius, but cannot pay for electricity, even when they have refrigerators, fans or conditioned air, and these equipments are disconnected. Other live under 15 grades without water and hot bath,


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heaters, and have to carry wood and water from the field, and prevent to have hygiene practices due to lack of infrastructure. Governments have created exemptions for these groups do not pay electricity bills and gas. The implementation of CCPs put in evidence that Civil Registration and Identity services are indispensable to guarantee the recognition of the self‐declaration of age and identity for indigenous living in the Amazonia and afro‐descendents living in “quilombolas”, who could receive their birth certificate and IDs for the first time, to participate not only in CCT, but also by the State and policies. In Brazil, México, Peru, Honduras and other countries in LAC region there are examples of increasing the coverage of identity and citizenship among poorest groups, through the elimination of taxes to provide birth certificate, des‐burocratization and extension of free services to isolated groups. In Mexico the recognition of the Baptism certificate for poor elderly who have never had a birth certificate, was relevant to increase coverage. Currently several countries provide IDs for children and adolescents, in order to guarantee their inclusion in social programs. Moreover, in Mexico and Brazil the programs achieved positive unexpected results in mobilizing local markets in poorest regions, since the cash transfers are reinvested as popular consumption at local level, which have been benefited, particularly in periods of economic crisis.

16. An integrated framework Moving the concept of poverty to development as capacities and freedom, the ideal policies to reduce poverty and inequalities should involve all the spheres of economy and society. Countries where the State has assumed a pro‐activism conducting not only the macro‐economic stability, but also to abandon the paradigm of minimal state, it is possible to reorient government investments to promote economic sustainable development with income distribution, and to enlarge social policies. That is the case of Brazil, where the State plans has prioritized increases in internal consumption and credits for development, employment generation with formalization and social security and protection, and citizenship participation in policies and budgets distribution. Social Policy: as education and health are decentralized to local governments, the protection of vulnerable groups depends mainly of the efficiency of national policies and budget distribution. The federative role to promote cooperation among federal, State and municipal governments, as well as citizenship participation are indispensable to surpass the obstacles in quality of services provision. A legal mechanism to promote collaboration is the Consortia Law, to guarantee responsibilities and fiscal instruments at all levels of government.


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Economic Policy: the annual growth from 1.9 percent in 1995‐2002 to 4,6 percent from 2003‐2008 is particularly due to incentives in infrastructure of oil and gas, and hydroelectric energy and civil construction; as well as credits provided by public banks to industrialization and consume have stimulated a investment cycle. From 2003 to 2009 public banks increased credits to productive sector from 25 to 45 percent, more than 300 thousand dollars. This policy has contributed also for employment generation and formalization of work and business. Employment generation and income distribution have increased internal market of consumers, promoting the return of investments to development. But have contributed also to re‐equilibrate the Social Security System, since the number and level of contributions increased. Despite the economic crisis in 2008‐2009, quotes and pensions achieved the high level in the history of the system, demonstrating that development, social and economic inclusion can be compatibles. That positive balance is fundamental to guarantee the inclusion of rural workers who are non‐contributors but receive pensions of one minimum wage, according to the established by 1988 Constitution. And to guarantee the universal access offered by the Unique Health System (SUS). That combination of policies: rural pension and universal health system, unemployment benefit, Bolsa Familia cash transfer, the minimum wage policy (that maintain and increase the value of the minimum wage, currently corrected not by inflation, but according the GDP level of growth), increasing in consume and productive credit, have converged with distribution effects, particularly including in the marked the poor.

Documents

Dr. Cristina Gomes cristinagomesmx@gmail - United …. Cristina Gomes [email protected] 3 diversities and inequalities that affect individual capacities, and integrate components