Social Assistance System Modernization and Participation of the Poor

This paper evaluates the impact of the recent Social Assistance System Modernization Project on the three outcomes – probability of application, probability of getting any assistance, and probability of participation in more than two social assistance programs. Allowing for heterogeneous effect of the Project measures on poor and non-poor families, we find that in general the re-engineering of the system considerably improves targeting. For example, the purchase of new computers and modernization of computer networks improves targeting of the system by decreasing both the application and participation rate among the non-poor and increasing among the poor. Single window application procedure has positive impact on the participation of both groups of population, although the impact on the poor is twice larger in magnitude. Renovation of premises and purchase of new office equipment leads to higher application and participation rate across all population groups