Targeting vulnerable households for humanitarian cash transfers: using a community based, participatory approach to target the most vulnerable in Zimbabwe’s cash-first response

Over 73,000 drought affected households across 15 districts in Zimbabwe received monthly multi-purpose, unconditional cash transfers. With such a large caseload over a wide area, 100% verification of the households would not have been the most resource efficient approach. Moreover, there would have been a lack of community ownership in the process.

This case study explores the participatory targeting approach used by CARE Zimbabwe and WorldVision to ensure the most appropriate households were selected, thereby reducing inclusion/exclusion errors and supporting community ownership, whilst maximising resource efficiency and effectiveness.

The case study highlights the challenges experienced during the process, how they were overcome and what lessons were learnt during this 22 month programme that should be applied to future programmes.