Guidance
HEA: A guide for programme planners and policy makers
The Practitioners' Guide to HEA
Operational guidelines for MEB
The HEA Dashboard Manual
Data quality and reliability in HEA
Resilience measurement
Identifying which interventions build resilience and which do not (FEG 2-pager) Credit: FEG
Sector minimum expenditure baskets - HEA resilience study (2018)
A pilot study in Niger and Senegal for the ‘sector MEB’, which is based on internationally accepted minimum standards for each sector. The total cost of the sector MEB represents the minimum expenditure required to meet standards of well-being. The MEB threshold provides a higher level goal for development planners compared to survival or livelihood protection thresholds. Operational guidelines for calculating a sector MEB threshold were prepared as part of this study.
Using HEA to measure resilience
An 18-minute video produced by the Food Economy Group (2016).
The economics of resilience to drought (USAID, 2018)
A study commissioned by USAID to assess the cost savings that could result from an earlier response to drought in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia. HEA was used to model the impact of proactive response in protecting people's income and assets, using a 15-year dataset on crop production, livestock production and prices. For each wealth group in each livelihood zone for each season, a scenario analysis was run to estimate total income and any shortfall relative to the livelihoods protection threshold. The effects of a safety net and a one-off investment on income and assets were then modelled.
A cost-benefit analysis showed that every US$1 invested in building people's resilience will result in an estimated US$3 in reduced humanitarian aid and avoided losses.
Webinar: Economics of resilience - an ounce of prevention, a pound of cure
A presentation of the Economics of resilience to drought study hosted by USAID Agrilinks and Microlinks. Social protection/safety net programming and cash transfers
Support for cash programming (FEG 2-pager) Credit: FEG
Using HEA in the planning of social protection programmes
Extract from HEA: A guide for programme planners, Section 3.5, pp. 53-65
Early warning, early action and contingency planning
Achieving true early action (2018)
A summary of Save the Children's learning from 3 pilot projects to mitigate the impact of slow-onset food and nutrition
crises (2014-2017) through early actions.
The Situation and Response Analysis Framework
Full description of and guidance on how to use HEA to develop detailed and appropriate contingency planning for timely response in contexts prone to slow-onset food crises.
Poverty analysis
How families cope with poverty in Asia (2017)
Lessons from a multi-country review of HEA and Cost of the Diet assessments, 2011-15, with recommendations on how to use learning to inform child sensitive programming, and to make HEA more child sensitive.
Graduation pilot: market assessment and IGA modelling - FSD Kenya Review Issue 4 May 2017
In 2015, an outcome analysis was carried out to model the impact of a moderate drought and quantify household requirements to maintain essential expenditure. The impact of nine potential income generating activities (IGAs) was then modelled to see if they would enable households to meet this deficit, i.e. build resilience to moderate drought. Three IGAs were identified as viable.
Livelihoods at the limit: food security in a changing world - evidence from the consolidated HEA database (2013)
Draws on the results of HEA studies across the world to find common patterns in poor people's livelihoods. It highlights the need to take on board the growing importance of the cash economy, the role of livestock and the importance of casual labour. It lays out the implications for interventions.
Understanding household economy in rural Niger (2009)
An in-depth analysis of the livelihoods of poor rural people in Niger drawing on baseline assessments in five livelihood zones along with other livelihood studies. The study arose from a need to understand better the origins of the 2005 food crisis.
Emergency assessments ('rapid' HEA)
Adapting HEA to make it more rapid
Extract from The Practitioners' Guide to HEA, Chapter 6, pp. 31-36
Rapid HEA assessment in Dolakha, Nepal 2015
A rapid assessment following the earthquake of 2014. A scenario analysis was carried out to assess the needs of poor and very poor households over the coming year. It highlighted the need to support households in rebuilding homes, without which other livelihoods interventions would have minimal impact.
Rapid HEA assessment of livelihoods recovery in Samar, Philippines 2014
A rapid assessment of very poor households in two livelihoods zones one year after Typhoon Yolanda. The rapid HEA investigated to
what extent food and income access had returned to pre-Yolanda levels and
whether households faced income gaps in the coming year.
Refugees and internally displaced people (IDPs)
Displaced and host community livelihoods and food security, Borno State, Nigeria 2017
Report of an urban HEA baseline assessment of very poor and poor IDP households and very poor and poor host community households. A scenario analysis was carried out to model the deficit for these groups if they did not engage in negative coping strategies.
Rapid HEA among Muslim IDPs in Rakhine state, Myanmar 2013
A rapid assessment of three Muslim IDP camps. A scenario analysis was carried out to model the impact of a cessation of food aid, gifts, asset sales and child labour.
Rapid HEA in Bidibidi Refuge Settlement, Yumbe District, Uganda: HEA assessment conducted by DanChurchAid-DCA and Save the Children, Feb 2017
An assessment of South Sudan refugees to understand better their livelihood opportunities and identify appropriate interventions. HEA added value to previous assessments by quantifying refugees' access to food and income and their expenditure.
Urban HEA
HEA in urban areas
Extract from The Practitioners' Guide to HEA, Chapter 6, pp. 1-13
Small disasters erode household resilience: the absorptive capacity of flood-prone households in Niamey, Niger (2017)
Urban Africa Risk Knowledge Briefing No. 4 January 2017
A study using an adapted form of HEA for urban areas to examine the resilience of households in flood-prone areas of Niamey.
Monitoring
Livelihoods-based casual labor market monitoring (FEG 2-pager) Credit: FEG
Targeting
Targeting development interventions to where households need them most (FEG 2-pager) Credit: FEG
HEA-based targeting methodological guide Credit: The Niger Food Security and Cash Alliance
HEA in protracted crises
Understanding livelihoods in northern Syria: how people are coping with repeated shocks, constant change and an uncertain future (2015)
An assessment using HEA and hazard mapping to better understand livelihoods in northern Syria.
Evaluations
Assessing the impact of integrated humanitarian aid on the household economy of Syrian refugees in Lebanon 2016
The study used a minimum
expenditure basket (MEB) against which to compare refugees' income. The MEB had been established by an inter-agency group and included the cost of a broader range of goods and services than a 'survival' threshold. The income of sample households fell far short of this threshold. The study
highlighted that a high proportion of the severely vulnerable Syrian refugee
households were female-headed; had a high dependency ratio; and/or had faced a
serious illness (or health crisis) during the year.
Livelihood assistance to the poorest tsunami-affected households in Sri Lanka - post-intervention IHEA results 2010
Individual HEA was used to assess how far a cash transfer helped people meet a minimum expenditure basket (as defined by UNHCR/WFP) and survival food energy needs. Assessed how they managed the cash transfer, whether they spent any of it on assets or child-focussed goods and services, and whether they faced cash shortages.
The pre-intervention baseline assessment carried out before the cash transfer programme. See endline report above for evaluation.
HEA and other sectors
The unbearable cost of illness: poverty, ill-health and access to healthcare - evidence from Lindi District, Tanzania (2007)
HEA was used in combination with other studies to investigate the direct and indirect costs of illness among poor households, the strategies used to cope with these costs and their consequences, the impact of chronic illness, the effect of user fees on access to healthcare and the effectiveness of fee exemption mechanisms.
History of HEA
Livelihoods at the limit: The Story of HEA (2014)
A history of HEA, going back beyond the 1990s when it was first developed to 1973, when Save the Children conducted its first Sahelian nutrition survey in northern Burkina Faso (then Upper Volta). This was the first attempt to match up nutritional status with socio-economic factors.
HEA and climate change
