Brazil Bolsa Familia Program: Analysing The Impact of The Conditionalities on School Enrolment, Health and Child Labor

Abstract: Abstract With high poverty and inequality rate, the Government in Brazil have adopted several social assistance programs and strategies in the fight against the ever growing rate of poverty and inequality within it’s population since the 1990s. In recent years, the Bolsa Familia Program have been a major social assistance program in Brazil, and the program have affected more than 13 million poor households in their everyday life. The program is seen as a model for other developing countries and it is the largest conditional cash transfer program in Latin America. Bolsa Familia Program have played an important role towards the achievement of MDGs targets in the short-term through poverty alleviation and long-term human capital through investment in education and health. However, the effort of the program is also without criticisms, which focusses on the inabilities of the program to provide other alternative exist root out of poverty for the beneficiaries and the dependency on the program. Considering all these arguments, the paper is aimed at reviewing the existing literature, which will help to investigate the evidence, potential gaps and evaluations of the impact of Bolsa Familia Program on school enrolment, health and child labor. The paper will focus more on a larger number of the impact evaluation of the Bolsa Familia Program which have been carefully constructed. This research will provide more clear argument on the impact of Bolsa Familia Program have had on school enrolment/attainment, health and child labor. The concept of human capital and breaking intergenerational of cycle of poverty is evident in the program. The findings on the program’s frame work, targeting, monitoring and evaluations will help explain the structural changes that have occurred and provide more evidence on the impact of the program on educational outcomes, health and child labor.