📈 While extreme poverty globally has been on a decades-long decline, the number of extreme poor in sub-saharan Africa has only risen. 🐓 Poverty relief has been ineffective: A large share of the money meant to help families out of poverty goes to consultants or goods instead of them. Too often “experts” have said people just need laptops, water pumps, or chickens — top-down solutions that have simply not worked. 💵 Giving cash directly allows for agency. People in poverty are experts in their own needs, though they’ve largely been denied an actual say in the processes meant to help them. Instead, they’ve had to accept others’ opinions about fertilizer, job skills, or whatever the latest theory of change has deemed most important for their lives. 📊 Cash improves many aspects of well-being. Research finds people use these funds to improve their health, education, income, and self-reliance, ultimately reducing their chances of dying. And these results can be sustained years into the future. 🛖 Cash benefits the entire community. As your donations are spent by recipients, the cash multiplies. Research finds that because people spend this money locally, the local economy can grow by 2.5x what you give. #endpovertyday #EndPovertyNow #SDG1 #IDEP

Yes, extreme poverty has dropped globally, but it's only risen in Sub-Saharan Africa. #endpoverty 🐓 Poverty relief has been ineffective: A large share of the money meant to help families out of poverty goes to consultants or goods instead of them. Too often “experts” have said people just need laptops, water pumps, or chickens — top-down solutions that have simply not worked. 💵 Giving cash directly allows for agency. People in poverty are experts in their own needs, though they’ve largely been denied an actual say in the processes meant to help them. Instead, they’ve had to accept others’ opinions about fertilizer, job skills, or whatever the latest theory of change has deemed most important for their lives. 📊 Cash improves many aspects of well-being. Research finds people use these funds to improve their health, education, income, and self-reliance, ultimately reducing their chances of dying. And these results can be sustained years into the future. 🛖 Cash benefits the entire community. As your donations are spent by recipients, the cash multiplies. Research finds that because people spend this money locally, the local economy can grow by 2.5x what you give. #endpovertyday #EndPovertyNow #SDG1 #IDEP

"I prefer receiving money because we know the problems in our homes and can decide how to solve them." - Sitenala Since 2019, GiveDirectly has been delivering ~$800 no strings attached to families living in some of the poorest regions in Malawi. We’ve partnered with the Malawian government to reach the most vulnerable families. Learn more at GiveDirectly.org/malawi

Give now, link in bio. GiveDirectly.org/Morocco. We are scoping a cash response to deliver money directly to survivors of the Morocco earthquake. #morocco #earthquake #moroccoearthquake #givedirectly

Giving cash helps people in poverty survive the climate crisis they did not create. The poorest communities suffer most from climate change, though they’re the least responsible for the emissions that created it. GiveDirectly is delivering money to impacted families living in poverty, which they can spend recovering and building resilience to future crises. Learn more at GiveDirectly.org/climate Digital cash transfers reach families quickly and let them meet their own changing needs in a disaster – as opposed to receiving pre-determined aid or donated goods they are forced to sell or leave behind. Giving survivors cash directly and unconditionally allows them to both meet their short-term needs (e.g. food, water, and medical needs) and rebuild their homes and businesses in the long-term. GiveDirectly has delivered rapid-response cash in the Bahamas, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, and Nigeria. With cash, they can improve resilience to future shocks. Poverty and cyclical climate shocks prevent families from investing in themselves; targeted payments encourage development during more stable periods. Our carbon has consequences; direct cash is a solution. The average North American has contributed 11x more than the average African to climate change, yet our solutions to date have not centered their survival. Over 90% of climate funding goes to prevent future emissions, with just the small remainder for those struggling to adapt to the already warming climate. Essentially, we’re telling the family too poor to move away from floods in Mozambique or landslides in Uganda that our money would be better spent elsewhere. Yet we can do both. Let’s save lives in the future and the present. #climatechange #climatecrisis #ubi #africaclimatesummit23 #climatejustice #cashtransfers #money

From extreme climate vulnerability to climate resilience and strength. Over the past few days I spent in Baringo County 🇰🇪with communities, I got to learn and understand more about the @givedirectly Cash Transfers to communities, a localized climate finance model that is changing lives.

Since 2016, GiveDirectly has been delivering ~$800 no strings attached to families living in some of the poorest regions in Rwanda. We’ve partnered with the Rwandan government to reach the most vulnerable families living in Gicumbi, Ngoma, Gisagara, Nyamagabe, and Ngororero. Learn more at Givedirectly.org/rwanda

What can help the global refugee crisis? Direct cash. Two years after a $1000 payment, refugees were more likely to have grown assets and income. In 2019, GiveDirectly initiated a program to give $1000 transfers to all ~10,000 households in the Kiryandongo settlement and ~5,000 Ugandan households from the surrounding community. Researchers from IDinsight selected 1,090 households from the settlement to participate in a randomized controlled trial to measure the effects of this payment. They compared 556 households that received the funds to 534 in a control group from a cohort that would not yet have received funds by the end of the study. Researchers conducted a survey of outcomes in mid-2020 to study the impact of cash on households during pandemic lockdowns (results here) and a final survey in the spring of this year ~2 years after payments. The results: Business ownership increased by 9% and earnings increased by $14/month The group who received funds earned $14/month (or 64%) more from businesses than those who did not. Also the portion of refugees who started non-agricultural businesses during these two years was 9% higher for those who received the funds. The most common businesses were small shops either in the market or run from their home. Psychological well-being and self-reliance increased as well The study also showed payments had positive effects on psychological well-being and self-reliance, both of which are measured using an index of questions. The study did not find statistically significant effects on migration, female empowerment, household composition, or employment. Thanks fo the funders of this study: @ikea_foundation, The Global Innovation Fund, and @postkodlotteriet Read more at GiveDirectly.org/refugee-study

Myth: you cannot trust people in poverty with money

Rural poverty in sub-Saharan Africa can mean disconnection. Too poor to afford telephones or travel, some families struggle to keep in touch. Many cannot bank or send money securely. Global news can be slow to reach areas without a cell network. When you donate, you provide people in poverty with more than just cash; you provide connection. In our main program, GiveDirectly gives those who don’t already have a mobile phone the option to buy one, subtracting the ~$15 cost from their first transfer, an offer taken by 90% of recipients. Your donations then go directly to the SIM card in their phone, a technology called mobile money. The primary benefits of direct cash – improved earnings, health, education, etc. – may obscure a secondary benefit of our work: connecting people to a mobile network. Learn more at GiveDirectly.org.mobile-phones

Happy World Refugee Day! Today – and every day – we are celebrating the entrepreneurship, resilience and courage of refugees like Safa. When earthquakes devastated Türkiye and Syria earlier this year, Building Markets partnered with @GiveDirectly to provide critical cash grants to individuals and business owners in need. In total, 800 individuals and 275 businesses - the majority originally from Syria - will receive funds that will help them in building their new life in Türkiye through entrepreneurship. Swipe to read Safa’s story – you’ll hear how her small business and her family benefited from the grant at a key moment.

For 56 years, Stephen’s lived on the steep but fertile slopes of Mt. Elgon in Uganda in a village he now leads. The past decade has brought severe mudslides as rains worsen due to climate change. “Whenever the rainy season starts, I’m afraid that the next landslide will happen and be deadly. We’re still living in the same unsafe place because we do not have funds to relocate. When people get their [GiveDirectly] cash transfers, they'll be able to shift to living near the trading center where it's safer.”