ArticleCost effectiveness and resource allocation : C/E2018
Costs and cost-efficiency of a mobile cash transfer to prevent child undernutrition during the lean season in Burkina Faso: a mixed methods analysis from the MAM'Out randomized controlled trial.
Article in Cost effectiveness and resource allocation : C/E, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed.
- Understanding Opportunity Costs of Women Participating in Maternal and Child Nutrition Interventions in Southern Angola: Evidence From the MuCCUA Trial.Maternal & child nutrition · 2026Trial
- The effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of cash plus interventions to prevent acute malnutrition in Somalia: evidence from an adaptive cluster randomised control trial.Journal of global health · 2026Trial
- Article
- Experiences of conditional and unconditional cash transfers intended for improving health outcomes and health service use: a qualitative evidence synthesis.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2023Review
- Economic evaluation of a conditional cash transfer to retain women in the continuum of care during pregnancy, birth and the postnatal period in Kenya.PLOS global public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThis study assessed the costs and cost-efficiency of a mobile cash transfer implemented in Tapoa Province, Burkina Faso in the MAM'Out randomized controlled trial from June 2013 to December 2014, using mixed methods and taking a societal perspective by including costs to implementing partners and beneficiary households.
methodsData were collected via interviews with implementing staff from the humanitarian agency and the private partner delivering the mobile money, focus group discussions with beneficiaries, and review of accounting databases. Costs were analyzed by input category and activity-based cost centers. cost-efficiency was analyzed by cost-transfer ratios (CTR) and cost per beneficiary. Qualitative analysis was conducted to identify themes related to implementing electronic cash transfers, and barriers to efficient implementation.
resultsThe CTR was 0.82 from a societal perspective, within the same range as other humanitarian transfer programs; however the intervention did not achieve the same degree of cost-efficiency as other mobile transfer programs specifically. Challenges in coordination between humanitarian and private partners resulted in long wait times for beneficiaries, particularly in the first year of implementation. Sensitivity analyses indicated a potential 6% reduction in CTR through reducing beneficiary wait time by one-half. Actors reported that coordination challenges improved during the project, therefore inefficiencies likely would be resolved, and cost-efficiency improved, as the program passed the pilot phase.
conclusionsDespite the time required to establish trusting relationships among actors, and to set up a network of cash points in remote areas, this analysis showed that mobile transfers hold promise as a cost-efficient method of delivering cash in this setting. Implementation by local government would likely reduce costs greatly compared to those found in this study context, and improve cost-efficiency especially by subsidizing expansion of mobile money network coverage and increasing cash distribution points in remote areas which are unprofitable for private partners.
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Registered trials
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