The Impact of Productive Safety Net Program on the Livelihood of Rural Households; the Case of Malka Balo District, East Hararge, Oromia Region.

Abstract

Background: Developing countries including Ethiopia are affected by food insecurity problems. Many individuals and households especially the rural poor are the main victims of the problem. Ethiopian government with other development partners introduced the PSNP in 2005 to help chronically food-insecure households. Thus, this study has examined the impact of productive safety net program (PSNP) on the Livelihood of rural households in Malka Balo district, East Hararge, Oromia region. Specifically, it emphasized on assessing the impact of the program on beneficiaries‟ food consumption, creation and protection of households‟ asset and finally perception of beneficiaries towards the program. Methodology: The study used both qualitative and quantitative research approaches while techniques used for data collection were Key informant interview, focus group discussion, observation and Household survey. Moreover, secondary data source was also used from different offices. A total of 240 beneficiary households were selected using both purposive and simple random sampling techniques. Descriptive statistics such as Frequency, Mean and percentage were used to summarize results and present in tables. Results and Conclusion: The finding indicates that PSNP have made a positive impact on food consumption since the transfer insured gaining access to food for majority of households and on household asset accumulation except livestock asset which did not bring significant change. On the other hand, the program negatively affected the attitude of beneficiary households toward their work on their own farm land. Recommendation: Despite the efforts put on bringing the desired impacts, the study also revealed that there is still area of improvements that government and development partners must work on in terms of the program implementation strategy so that it focused mainly on households‟ livelihood diversification in order to bring sustainable development.