Cash assistance is changing how humanitarian aid reaches people
Published on 3 October 2026 at 00:33 GMT
By Editorial Team SDG2
Humanitarian cash assistance changes a basic decision in disaster relief: who decides what a household receives. Instead of collecting a standard parcel, people can spend a transfer on their own priorities. Evidence supports cash in many circumstances, but its results depend on what money can buy, who can access it and which outcomes a programme is designed to achieve.
The shift is substantial, but cash and vouchers do not consistently account for a growing share of aid. The CALP Network, which tracks cash and voucher assistance, reported that the global volume fell from US$7.8 billion in 2023 to US$6.6 billion in 2024. Its share of international humanitarian assistance dropped to 19.6%. Those figures combine cash with vouchers; they do not measure unrestricted money alone.
In its 2024–25 annual report, CALP links the decline to funding constraints, the winding down of major responses, changing assistance in Ukraine and restrictions in parts of the Sahel. The adoption of cash therefore reflects political permission and financing as well as evidence about effectiveness.
What lower costs actually mean
Cash, vouchers and physical goods give recipients different kinds of control. Unrestricted cash can meet several needs. Vouchers limit purchases to specified goods or participating sellers. Digital delivery describes the payment channel, rather than the degree of freedom: a payment on a card is not automatically unrestricted assistance.
A four-country research collaboration between the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the World Food Programme (WFP) compared cash, food and, in Ecuador, vouchers. Its 2013 account reported lower delivery costs for cash, but different nutritional results across settings. Cash improved dietary diversity more than food in Ecuador, Uganda and Yemen; food performed better on that measure in Niger.
The same account cautioned against generalising from small programmes and a six-month evaluation. The distinction remains consequential: the cheapest transfer to administer is not necessarily the most effective intervention for every objective. A programme assessed by dietary variety can look different from one assessed by calories consumed.
The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) similarly reports that relative cost-effectiveness in Ecuador varied by outcome, while households preferred cash to vouchers. Recipient preference and a programme’s selected nutrition indicator can therefore point in different directions.
Choice and its limits
For people displaced by conflict or affected by disasters, choice can mean deciding between food and another immediate expense. J-PAL describes evidence from the Democratic Republic of the Congo in which cash recipients bought a wider range of food and non-food items than voucher recipients, including healthcare, schooling and debt repayments. Spending outside a food category is not, by itself, evidence that assistance has been diverted.
In a 2021 analysis, International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) policy adviser Pierrick Devidal described cash as supporting dignity, participation and local economies. He also questioned whether those benefits survive unchanged when payments become digital and recipients are offered no alternative. The ability to choose purchases and the ability to choose a payment system are separate questions.
When markets can respond
Cash spent in shops becomes revenue for sellers. Whether that revenue sustains wider recovery depends partly on whether businesses can replenish stocks. More purchasing power does not itself deliver grain through an impassable road or restore a destroyed marketplace. In such circumstances, a balance on a phone can coexist with an inability to obtain food.
The WFP assesses prices, food availability and supply chains alongside inflation, exchange rates and government policies. It also examines physical access, including disruption caused by insecurity and flooding. A functioning market is therefore more than an open shop: the relevant questions include whether goods arrive and whether affected households can reach them.
Inflation poses two distinct problems. Existing price rises reduce the purchasing power of a fixed transfer. Separately, extra demand can put pressure on prices where supplies cannot expand. A rise in prices during a cash programme does not, on its own, establish that the programme caused it; exchange-rate changes and supply disruption can also affect costs.
Households outside a programme receive no transfer from it to offset any price increase. Evidence about market conditions and who receives assistance therefore matters to the assessment of local effects as well as to the purchasing power of recipients.
Digital access and accountability
Digital payments can reduce recipients’ travel and waiting time. J-PAL reports that mobile-transfer recipients in a Niger evaluation saved approximately 20 hours over five months compared with recipients collecting physical cash. Initial programme costs were higher because phones were supplied, but costs per transfer were lower. These findings concern a particular programme, not every digital system.
Digital exclusion can arise when a person cannot access the device, account or identification a system requires. Devidal’s analysis warns that linking payments to personal identities creates possibilities for exclusion and surveillance. It also identifies the influence of financial providers over payment arrangements and sensitive information. Greater transaction visibility can sit alongside reduced privacy for recipients.
Fraud and diversion remain part of the debate. CALP reports that fears of diversion to armed groups, fraud and inflation have contributed to cash restrictions in parts of Africa. These are reported reasons for restrictions, not measurements proving that cash is more vulnerable than goods. A comparison of risks also depends on how losses are detected and recorded.
Beyond a single measure of success
The evidence connects directly to SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), through food access and dietary quality. It does not establish one universally superior delivery method. IFPRI describes hybrid programmes that can change between cash and goods as supply and prices change; J-PAL identifies disrupted or inaccessible markets as circumstances in which physical assistance may be more appropriate.
Programme assessments can reach different conclusions depending on whether they measure cost, nutrition, access or recipient control. The studies described by IFPRI and J-PAL compare delivery costs with household outcomes, including dietary diversity and calorie intake, showing why payments completed alone do not establish what assistance achieved.
Written by a human author, edited with AI assistance.
Further information:
CALP Network, Annual report 2024–25. Documents cash and voucher volumes, funding changes and reasons for restrictions.
IFPRI, Cash, Food or Vouchers. Reports comparative findings, limitations and hybrid approaches from four-country research.
J-PAL, Giving cash in humanitarian crises. Synthesises evidence on costs, food security, preferences and delivery conditions.
WFP, Market analysis. Explains assessment of prices, supply chains, inflation and physical access.
ICRC, Cashless cash: financial inclusion or surveillance humanitarianism? Pierrick Devidal examines dignity, digital exclusion and data risks.
