Do incentives matter? - Evaluation of a family planning program in India

Indian Family Planning programs in the past have introduced a:number of app roaches such as providing monetary benefits, and motivational programs to i mprove contraceptive use among rural illiterate women. Under the Ammanpetta i family welfare program, the Melatur PHC administered three program types involving a combination of monetary and motivational approaches to improve contraceptive use in three treatment areas,; The program was introduced dur ing January 1989 and was simultaneously discontinued after a period of two years. The present evaluation was conducted in 1994, Data from a random sam ple of 933 non-sterilized women at the time of social survey using a questi onnaire approach is used in this study. The implementation of incentive pro grams in a socio-economically homogenous population has resulted in an incr ease in the likelihood of current of contraceptive use. The results of this study suggest that motivational programs are more likely to improve long t erm use of temporary family planning methods than cash incentive programs. One implication of our finding is that motivational programs should provide peer based family planning education and training in community work to con tact persons who make door to door visits to promote family planning progra ms.