Social Grants Impact on Household Livelihoods: Empirical Evidence from International Migrants in Cape Town, South Africa

Social Grants Impact on Household Livelihoods: Empirical Evidence from International Migrants in Cape Town, South Africa

Jonas Nzabamwita & Emmanuel Ndhlovu

Issue: Vol.5 No.14 Issue Article 6 pp.2518-2533
DOI: https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.20245146 | Published online 28th November, 2024
© 2024 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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ABSTRACT

South Africa has rolled out several social protection programmes targeted at various categories of people, including children, the elderly, the disabled, and the unemployed. Migrants also access social assistance as a livelihood mechanism. However, while existing studies link the country’s social protection initiatives with reductions in poverty, inequality, and unemployment, much of the data used to back these claims are drawn from quantitative surveys that rarely incorporate the livelihood plight of migrants. This has enormous policy and practical implications. This article seeks to close this gap by examining the role of social grants in migrants’ livelihoods in Cape Town, South Africa. Underpinned by exploratory and descriptive research designs, this mixed research methods study used primary data drawn from migrant household heads receiving social grants and key informants from migrant-serving organisations and focus group discussions. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used for quantitative data, while thematic data analysis was used for qualitative data. The results showed that besides the traditional short-term protective role of consumptive expenditure, social grants play a long-term promotive role in facilitating access to education and health and improving access to accommodation, water, and energy for migrants. To maximise social grants’ protective and promotive roles in migrant communities, this article recommends deploying proactive steps, including raising the value of grants, providing financial literacy training, and combining social grants with other programmes. The study adds to ongoing debates on the quality and effectiveness of social protection strategies in South Africa. It also flags policy directions for policymakers and other stakeholders working on social protection in South Africa.

Keywords: Households, International Migrants, Social Grant, Poverty, Refugees, Livelihoods, South Africa

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ABOUT AUTHOR(S)

Jonas Nzabamwita holds a PhD in Development Studies from the University of Western Cape, South Africa. He is a Senior Research Fellow at the DSI-NRF South African Research Chair Industrial Development, at the School of Economics, the University of Johannesburg in South Africa. He also teaches economics and international development courses at the University of Lay Adventists of Kigali. Jonas has worked for various development organizations in refugee camps in Tanzania and has volunteered in numerous refugee and migrant communities of Zambia, Uganda, Malawi, and South Africa. His research interests cover a wide range of topics, including migration and remittances, social protection, food security and poverty, informal economy, and other areas of macroeconomics and labour economics.

Emmanuel Ndhlovu holds a PhD in Development Studies from the University of South Africa, South Africa. He is currently a Research Fellow within the College of Business and Economics at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. His research interests cover a wide range of development topics including political economy, land reform, food systems, agriculture peasant livelihoods, and social protection. Emmanuel has published numerous journal articles and book chapters and has co-edited eight books.

TO CITE ARTICLE

Nzabamwita, Jonas & Emmanuel Ndhlovu. “Social Grants Impact on Household Livelihoods: Empirical Evidence from International Migrants in Cape Town, South Africa,” E-Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences 5, no.14 (2024):2518-2533. https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.20245146