Acting Before Disaster Strikes: The impacts of anticipatory cash transfers on climate resilience in Northeast Nigeria

Author(s)
IRC & IFPRI
Publication language
English
Pages
6pp
Date published
25 Jul 2023
Publisher
International Rescue Committee (IRC)
Type
Research, reports and studies
Keywords
Disaster preparedness, resilience and risk reduction
Countries
Nigeria

In flood-prone communities in Northeast Nigeria, we used a randomized evaluation to measure the impacts of providing cash transfers to households before the onset of a shock (“anticipatory cash”) compared to the standard practice of providing cash transfers after a shock occurs.

Results indicate that providing anticipatory cash to households in flood-prone areas reduced negative coping strategies, increased pre-emptive climate adaptive actions, and enhanced investment in productive assets compared to households that received cash after peak flooding occurred.

The findings suggest that large, one-time anticipatory cash transfers can build households’ climate- adaptive and resilience capacity, making them a promising intervention to reduce household vulnerability to future climate shocks.