Contribution of cash transfers in moderating household food insecurity in small-island communities: Experimental evidence from Indonesia

Small-island communities often heavily rely on artisanal fisheries as a source of food and income. However,seasonal variation in weather and oceanographic conditions of the fisheries makes small-island communitiesprone to food insecurity. The paper aims to assess how a lump-sum cash transfer mitigates the experience of foodinsecurity among small-island fishing communities. We conducted an artefactual field experiment on cashtransfers based on a sample of 534 fishing households in the Kei Islands of Eastern Indonesia. Food insecurity athousehold level was measured using the US Household Food Security Survey Module, which captures variousaspects of the hunger experience among adults and children in the household. We found that a lump-sum cashtransfer of Rp 17 thousand (USD 1.4) or 5% of weekly household expenditure resulted in a 2-point scorereduction on the 15-item food insecurity scale. Our results also suggest that an additional weekly householdincome of Rp 234 thousand (USD 19) is required to entirely eliminate household food insecurity in the studyarea. This amount is significantly greater than the amount provided through the official cash transfer programs inIndonesia. Our findings indicate that cash transfers could be an effective means of reducing food insecurityproblems among small-island communities in Indonesia. However, complete elimination of food insecuritythrough cash transfers alone is impractical