National Program for Access to Technical Education and Employment (PRONATEC) and to the much-lauded Bolsa Familia (BF). The numbers of
BF’s
beneficiaries are being increased
through the “
Active Sear
ch”
strategy. Besides PRONATEC, among the new programmes are also
“
Water for all
”
and “Brazil Carinhoso”. PRONATEC involves the partnership with
traditional and new technical schools, offering free technical courses to applicants, basic benefit to cover costs with transport and food (during the period of the class). Water for all entails the building of water tanks/ cisterns in more desert areas, w
hile “Brazil Carinhoso”
has launched public nursery schools and daycare facilities in Brazil.
After 10 years of Bolsa Familia and almost four years of BSM, Brazilian pro-poor policies have not only originated a broad political consensus and standard forms of positive evaluations, but also generated the development of both policy debates (tensions) and a critical public opinion.
Standard (and positive) forms of evaluations highlight that PRONATEC has so far delivered 1 million certificates in late 2013, and intends to deliver more 1 million in late 2014. Regarding BF, Brazil has cut extreme poverty in half and lowered its Gini coefficient.
The country’s poorest regions have benefited the most
, and participants are almost exclusively women. Given its conditionality, improvements in health and education among BF participants are expressive as well. The ten year period saw a 14 percent reduction in premature birth rates, fewer babies are born underweight, there was a 58 percent decrease in malnutrition mortality rates, and a 46 percent decrease in diarrhea mortality rates. Students whose families are part of BF attend high school at a higher rate than their peers outside of the program. Students at age 15 are more than 20 percent more likely to be in the appropriate grade level now than they were ten years ago
–
a rate of improvement much higher than the national average. The dropout rate is lower among Bolsa Familia students than the national average. The Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA) estimates that every R$1 invested in BF stimulates a growth
of R$1.78 in Brazil’s
GDP, and that BF reduces extreme poverty in about 89%. Beyond standard evaluations, main debates concerning
BF’s
failures and challenges are connected with: 1) the lack of rigorous criteria for inclusion and 2) for exit, 3) the way