The BOTA Foundation has been set up to improve the welfare of children and young people in Kazakhstan in poor families by providing programmes that support the accumulation of human capital through investment in education and health opportunities. In 2009 it launched a Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programme that provides cash transfers to poor households provided that they meet conditions relating to investments in education and health of children.

IFS has been contracted, in consortium with Oxford Policy Management and a local data collection company, to conduct a two year impact and process (operational) evaluation of the CCT programme. Based on a randomized roll-out design, the study covers an assessment of programme targeting and implementation and aims at measuring the effect of the programme on the following intended impacts: a) improvement in welfare of recipient households; b) improved knowledge about access to childcare services as well as uptake of these services; c) improved time use and cognitive development of children aged 4-6 years (achieved through pre-school attendance); d) labour supply and time use of caregivers; and, possibly, d) increased knowledge of pregnant and lactating women concerning antenatal and postnatal care (obtained through mandatory training).

At national level the evaluation will contribute to a discussion about whether a cash transfer scheme should be absorbed into the government budget and/or be scaled up. At global level the evaluation will add to the body of international evidence on the benefits of cash transfer programmes. The evidence on the effectiveness on cash transfers (largely from Latin America but increasingly from Africa) appears positive in terms of cost effective impact, but precise information on many areas of impact is not yet available in CIS countries where the political, economic and social context is different.