An Experiment in Poverty Reduction and Child Development

描述（由申请人提供）：我们建议评估 墨西哥独特的健康和认知发展扶贫计划 小孩子的。该计划，PROGRESA，结合了传统的现金转移 为家庭投资人力资本提供财政激励的方案 （健康、教育和营养），从而打破 贫困的代际传递。接受现金转账， 孕妇必须获得产前护理和营养补充， 0-5岁的儿童必须得到良好的婴儿护理，并参加生长监测， 营养补充计划，家庭必须参与健康 营养和卫生教育方案。 我们的分析将利用随机对照设计。1998年， 506个村庄被随机分配到对照组和治疗组。资格 治疗村的家庭立即受益， 对控制村符合条件的家庭， 2000.对大约19 000户家庭进行干预前基线调查 超过95，000人和四个后续调查（六个月 间隔）的相同的家庭进行了为期两年的实验 期我们建议在一九九九年对同一住户进行跟进调查， 2003.这项跟踪调查将在实验结束三年后进行， 它将包括儿童健康状况和认知能力的生物医学措施， 发展 我们将利用这个无与伦比的实验来检查以下具体的 基线时年龄为0-3岁， 实验周期： 1. PROGRESA是否改善了儿童的健康、营养和认知发育？ 2.在所有患者入组后3年，观察到的差异是否持续 儿童进入PROGRESA 3.如果仅仅通过现金转移支付， 护理和监测的要求，但没有营养， 补充剂？

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): We propose to evaluate the impact of a unique anti-poverty program in Mexico on the health and cognitive development of young children. The program, PROGRESA, combines a traditional cash transfer program with financial incentives for families to invest in the human capital (health, education and nutrition) of their children, and thereby break the intergenerational transmission of poverty. To receive the cash transfers, pregnant women must obtain prenatal care and nutrition supplements, children age 0-5 must obtain well-baby care and participate in growth monitoring and nutrition supplement programs, and families must participate in health nutrition and hygiene education programs. Our analysis will take advantage of a randomized controlled design. In 1998, 506 villages were randomly assigned to control and treatment groups. Eligible households in treatment villages received benefits immediately, while benefits for eligible households in control villages were postponed until after the year 2000. A pre-intervention baseline survey of approximately 19,000 households with over 95,000 individuals and four follow-up surveys (at six month intervals) of the same households were conducted over the two-year experimental period. We propose to conduct a follow-up survey of the same households in 2003. This follow-up survey will be three years after the experiment ended and it will include biomedical measures of child health status and of cognitive development. We will use this unparalleled experiment to examine the following specific questions for children who were age 0-3 at baseline and born during the experimental period: 1. Did PROGRESA improve child health, nutrition and cognitive development? 2. Are the observed differentials sustained 3 years after the enrollment of all children into PROGRESA 3. Could the same results have been achieved through just cash transfers with the requirements for care and monitoring, but without the nutrition supplements?