The Corona pandemic puts enormous pressure on economies and societies world-wide. This is particularly true for low and middle income countries, where many people are engaged in low-wage informal employment. The livelihoods, incomes and well-being of those are potentially at risk because they lose their jobs or incomes due to the pandemic or lockdown policies. Social protection schemes could limit the effects and hence prevent poverty to increase but few countries have effective schemes in place covering larger shares of the population. The question is, thus, what kind of social protection policies have been most effective in cushioning the effects of the pandemic and which ones could improve the resilience of people in low and middle income countries in the future. As the evidence base on this topic is still limited, the German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) and the Poverty Reduction, Equity and Growth Network (PEGNet) will jointly hold an online workshop that is meant to present existing empirical evidence on this topic and discuss current problems of social protection responses.

Moderation

• Christoph Strupat and Markus Loewe (both German Development Institute / Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE)

Schedule

Welcome Note and introduction

• DIE and PEGNet

Presentations

Did Pensions Protect the Elderly from the Impacts of COVID-19?

• Abhijit Banerjee (Massachusetts Institute of Technology and NBER)
• Esther Duflo (Massachusetts Institute of Technology and NBER)
• Madeline McKelway (Stanford University)
• Garima Sharma (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

Employment Guarantee during Times of COVID-19: Pro-poor and pro-return-migrant?

• Sudha Narayanan (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research)
• Christian Oldiges (University of Oxford) and Shree Saha (Cornell University)

Cash Transfers as a Response to COVID-19: A Randomized Experiment in Kenya

• Wyatt Brooks (Arizona State University)
• Kevin Donovan (Yale University)
• Terence R. Johnson (University of Notre Dame)
• Jackline Oluoch-Aridi (Strathmore University and University of Notre Dame)

COVID-19 and Food Security in Ethiopia: Do Social Protection Programs Protect?

• Kibrom A. Abay (IFPRI)
• Guush Berhane (IFPRI)
• John Hoddinott (Cornell University)
• Kibrom Tafere (World Bank)

Discussion