A Brownbag Lunch Series Presentation. In this talk, Barbara Piperata will consider the effects of the world’s largest conditional cash transfer program, Brazil’s Bolsa Familia Program, in rural Amazonian communities. Bolsa Família was initiated in 2003, in response to high rates of poverty and inequality in in the country and has the goals of breaking the intergenerational cycle of poverty and ending hunger among Brazil’s 44 million poorest citizens. The World Bank has widely touted the success of the program which now serves as the model for new conditional cash transfer programs being implemented in other world regions, especially Africa. To date, the impact of the program has been assessed primarily in urban areas. Much less is known about its role in poverty alleviation and food security in rural zones and no studies have considered is effects in the Amazon, the most rural and poorest region in the country. Drawing on a unique longitudinal dataset collected before the Bolsa Familia Program was initiated and, again, 4 years after funds from the program arrived in these rural Amazonian communities, this paper considers the impact of the program on household economic strategies, health, diet and food security.
Lunch will be provided. To confirm your attendance please RSVP to Michelle Wibbelsman.
Barbara A. Piperata is associate professor of anthropology at The Ohio State University. Her research applies life history theory and takes a bio-cultural approach in understanding human ecology, reproduction and nutrition. Her research to date has been conducted in Latin America, with a particular focus on rural Amazonian populations. Recent research has focused on human reproductive energetics among rural Amazonian women and sought to understand how women in this environment accommodated the additional energy demands of lactation. Taking a bio-cultural perspective, she explores the interplay between cultural beliefs and practices, human reproductive strategies and health outcomes. She is currently beginning a new research project among Quilombo populations in southern Brazil and rural Amazonian populations focused on the nutrition transition and the relationship between changes in economic strategies, work loads, dietary changes and overall nutritional status, including the concurrence of overweight/obesity and underweight in the same household. She plans to extend her research on the nutrition transition to studies of migrant and refugee populations in the United States in the future.
Kendra McSweeney is associate professor of geography at The Ohio State University. Her primary research interest is in human-environment interactions, with focus on issues in cultural and political ecology, conservation and development, resilience, demography, and land use/cover change. Current projects include a long-term study of indigenous livelihoods in eastern Honduras, an NSF-funded project on human-forest dynamics in SE Ohio, and a research program that tracks the nature and implications of demographic change among Latin America's indigenous populations.
Sponsored by:
- Continuity and Change in the Andes and Amazonia
- Humanities Institute Working Group
- The CEnter for Latin American Studies Andean Studies Working Group
