Can cash transfers reduce violence within the home, keeping women safe from intimate partner violence?
This episode features IFPRI Senior Research Fellow Melissa Hidrobo and Research Fellow Shalini Roy who, in a conversation with Sivan Yosef, tell the story of how development programs can sometimes have surprising impacts. When Melissa found that a cash transfer program in Ecuador reduced intimate partner violence, defined as physical, sexual, or emotional harm by a current or former partner or spouse, she and Shalini decided to team up and see whether the same results held in Bangladesh and Mali. Their work shows the vast potential of cash transfer programs, which are already used by many countries around the world, to reduce intimate partner violence at a large scale.