The Anchoring Role of Social Safety Nets and Coping Strategies: A Study on the Rural Households of Manipur in North-East India

Abstract

Abstract Empirical research on the effects of social safety nets in developing countries is becoming increasingly important in order to create a comprehensive programme that may assist the targeted groups to minimise their vulnerability to poverty. This paper examines the impact of social safety nets in the rural areas of Manipur, India and its role in increasing the choices of coping strategies ex-post shocks. Based on primary data collected in 2021-22, we estimate the vulnerability to poverty score of the households using three Stage Feasible Generalized Least Square (3S FGLS) and categorised them into different poverty status. We used simultaneous endogenous switching regression to estimate the impact of social safety nets and further employed propensity score matching to check the robustness of the result. Results reveal that household’s vulnerability to poverty reduced by 14.2 percent for the participants in social safety nets. We also evaluate the existing coping strategies that households deploy post shocks and analyse the impact of social safety nets in affecting the choices of decision in coping strategies using a multivariate probit model. The results indicate that choice of coping strategies depend on economic endowment and stability of household income sources. Households facing economic shock are more likely to work intensively for consumption smoothing, while households that are well-endowed are less likely to adopt ex-post coping strategies as they have sufficient resources to tide over the shocks. JEL Classifications: C21 C34, D04, I32, I38