Thursday, June 25, 2026

Brazil: Bolsa Família

 https://policybasket.endhungerandpoverty.org/index.php/Brazil:_Bolsa_Fam%C3%ADlia

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Specific implementation example

Specific implementation examples (country experiences).
2.1. CountryBrazil
2.2. Implementation details and approach to reach poor and vulnerable groupsThe Bolsa Família program is a conditional cash transfer that pays monthly cash benefits to poor families and has education and health conditionalities. The program has three main objectives: - combat hunger, through direct transfer of income to beneficiary families; II - contribute to interrupting the cycle of reproduction of poverty between generations; and III - promote the development and social protection of families, especially children, adolescents and young people in situations of poverty (BRASIL, 2023).
  • Payment made preferentially to women;
  • Benefit varying with family composition with additional benefits per children;
  • “Active Search” for potential beneficiaries to reduce exclusion errors;
  • Priority access to the benefit for indigenous populations, quilombolas (former slave communities), people rescued from work in situation analogous to slavery, recyclable material collectors and family with members in child labor situations;
  • Special module for traditional and specific populations on the single registry to capture the needs of specific populations, besides the five groups with priority access, the special module includes the homeless, family farmers, artisanal fishers, imprisoned persons, people displaced by infrastructure investment (e.g. dams); gypsies, etc.
  • Distinct set of rules to enroll indigenous peoples respecting ethnic characteristics.
2.3. Coverage indicatorsNumber of beneficiary families:
  • 20,8 million families (55 million people) - around 26% of Brazilian population (april/2024)

Coverage rate (total number of families served compared to the program's estimated service):

  • 155% (05/2023 - Percentage of coverage of PBF families based on the poor population estimate from the 2010 IBGE Census)
2.4. Cost indicatorsTotal PBF budget in 2024:
  • R$ 169,511,975,980.00 (around U$ 33 billions)

Budget allocated to payment of benefits in 2024:

  • R$ 168,595,506,249.00 (around U$ 33 billions)

Average amount received per family per month in 2024:

  • R$ 680,90 (April/2024) (around U$135)
2.5. Type of governanceSummary: Multi-level governance involving national government (budget, guidance, policies), state/province (health and education follow-up, services) and local level governments (registering, visiting families, care and social assistance, ancillary services). Oversight mechanisms through local social councils.


Governance description:

The Bolsa Familia is a family-based, means-tested, conditional cash transfer program. It has a multilevel governance that is based on the Unique System of Social Assistance (SUAS), which integrates and organizes municipal, state, and national governments for the social services provision.

At local level, the municipalities manage the Reference Centers for Social Assistance (CRAS), which are the places where families may go to register themselves into the Single Registry, an information base that keeps track of vulnerable families that fall under half a minimum wage of per capita income. Families have to go to a CRAS to apply for Bolsa Familia through Single Registry.

After registering itself, a family may have to wait for the approval of their compliance with the program’s conditions, which is in charge of the National Government and, more specifically, of the Ministry of Development and Social Assistance, Family and Fight Against Hunger (MDS). MDS cross checks data about income sources, family composition and regular documentation, as well as verifies children’s enrolment and attendance to schools – which is an information received from municipal and state education departments – and children’s regular vaccination and checkup of nutritional status – which is reported by municipal and state health departments that are nationally organized under the Unified Health System (SUS). Lastly, pregnant women must be compliant with the pre-natal exams schedule.

If the family is actually classified as eligible to receive Bolsa Familia transfers, it is either included as a beneficiary or still has to wait in the program’s queue. The overall number of effectively beneficiary families is determined by the annual federal budget, but has also local quotas. Each municipality receives a share of the national total of slots based on local poverty estimates by the National Statistical Office of Brazil (IBGE). These are not strict quotas, but define the allocation of new available slots across municipalities. Government revises the municipal quotas every three years. Moreover, every month the program’s system managed by MDS automatically identifies families to be included or excluded of the beneficiary list according to data updates.

Finally, social assistance councils oversee social control and participation mechanisms at the local level.

2.6. Management Information SystemsBolsa Família e Cadastro Único no Seu Município - portal with information necessary to verify the management of the Bolsa Família Program and the Single Registry in all municipalities;

Vis Data - management and visualization system for the various programs, actions and services, such as the Bolsa Família Program;

Cecad - Consultation, Selection and Extraction of Information from the Single Registry. This tool allows you to know the socioeconomic characteristics of families and people included in the Single Registry (domicile, age group, work, income, etc.) as well as knowing which families are beneficiaries of the Bolsa Família Program;

Sistema PBF na Saúde (Health) - Ministry of Health platform to access documents and reports monitoring the Bolsa Família's conditionalities;

Sistema Presença (Education) - system developed by the Ministry of Education with the aim of monitoring and monitoring the school attendance of students beneficiaries of the Bolsa Família Program.

2.7. Knowledge GenerationBolsa Familia program has a proven record of positive impacts on reducing poverty, increasing school attendance and access to health care primary services, reducing child mortality; increasing access to food, with improvement in the nutritional status of beneficiary families; higher school attendance and reduced dropout, contributing to women’s empowerment (prioritized as family responsible), leading to positive impact on local economies, including increase in overall formalization, and negligible impacts on labor force participation and informality, if any. Excellent relative targeting performance when compared to similar programmes that do not use self-report income to select beneficiaries. Below one can find One Pagers, Policy briefs and papers that summarize Bolsa Familia impact on different dimensions and outcomes of interest. It includes the research of national and international academics and institutions, including the World Bank, IFPRI and IPEA (national think tank):
  1. Impact of poverty and inequality:
  2. Targeting:
  3. Education:
  4. Health and nutrition:
  5. Gender empowerment:
  6. Labour market, local economy, exit from the programme:
  7. Growth/multiplier effects:
  8. Governance:
2.8. Lessons learnedThrough regular monitoring and evaluation and specific studies, the program made some adjustments to cater for the need to:
  • consider the dynamics of poverty (mobility in and out of poverty) in the its rules;
  • provide transfers values sufficient to raise the majority of beneficiary families to levels above the poverty line;
  • adequately fund and incentivize local administration responsible to collect the information that feeds the single registry;
  • regularly train all programme staff, particularly at the local level;
  • provide clear information to both staff and the target population about the programmes objectives, eligibility criteria and conditionalities;
  • protect the real transfer value from inflation, with periodic adjustments (maximum every two years);
  • implement a well-designed benefit structure and mechanisms for verification and registration review to avoid negative inducement (such as behavior leading to splitting one’s family to artificially maximize the total household transfer value and/or by omitting some family members or income in the Single Registry);
  • ensure a gradual and smooth exit mechanism when eligibility conditions are not met anymore (e.g., when an adult member find a formal job capable of bringing the per capita income of the family about the eligibility poverty line), as well as easier conditions for returning to the program, in case of a drop in family income;
  • cross-checking income and other family information across different administrative records;
  • special attention to ensure registration and payment in isolated areas (difficult access), crossing with the self-declared data in the Single Registry;
  • special attention to ensure registration and payment in isolated areas (difficult access);
  • acting through intersectoral coordination and with other levels of government.
2.9. Knowledge institutionsIn Brazil:


International:

2.10. Websitehttps://www.gov.br/mds/pt-br/acoes-e-programas/bolsa-familia
2.11 Additional resources 
2.12. Specific SDGs affectedSDG 1 - No poverty
  • Target 1.1 - By 2030, eradicate extreme poverty for all people everywhere, currently measured as people living on less than $1.25 a day.
    • Indicator 1.1.1 - Proportion of the population living below the international poverty line by sex, age, employment status and geographical location (urban/rural)
  • Target 1.2 - By 2030, reduce at least by half the proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty in all its dimensions according to national definitions.
    • Indicator 1.2.1 - Proportion of population living below the national poverty line, by sex and age
    • Indicator 1.2.2 - Proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty in all its dimensions according to national definitions
  • Target 1.3 - Implement nationally appropriate social protection systems and measures for all, including floors, and by 2030 achieve substantial coverage of the poor and the vulnerable.
    • Indicator 1.3.1 - Proportion of population covered by social protection floors/systems, by sex, distinguishing children, unemployed persons, older persons, persons with disabilities, pregnant women, newborns, work-injury victims and the poor and the vulnerable


SDG 2 - Zero hunger

  • Target 2.1 - By 2030, end hunger and ensure access by all people, in particular the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round.
    • Indicator 2.1.1 - Prevalence of undernourishment
    • Indicator 2.1.2 - Prevalence of moderate or severe food insecurity in the population, based on the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES)
  • Target 2.2 - By 2030, end all forms of malnutrition, including achieving, by 2025, the internationally agreed targets on stunting and wasting in children under 5 years of age, and address the nutritional needs of adolescent girls, pregnant and lactating women and older persons.
    • Indicator 2.2.1 - Prevalence of stunting (height for age <-2 standard deviation from the median of the World Health Organization (WHO) Child Growth Standards) among children under 5 years of age
    • Indicator 2.2.2 - Prevalence of malnutrition (weight for height >+2 or <-2 standard deviation from the median of the WHO Child Growth Standards) among children under 5 years of age, by type (wasting and overweight)
    • Indicator 2.2.3 - Prevalence of anaemia in women aged 15 to 49 years, by pregnancy status (percentage)
2.13. Linkages with other Policy InstrumentsSocial registry;
Access to basic education;
Access to basic health care;
Integrated programmes for human capital development, including health and education and early childhood development;
Social care services



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