Familias en Acción
Familias en Acción was Colombia's flagship national conditional cash transfer program, launched in 2001-2002 and run by the government agency Prosperidad Social (formerly Acción Social/DPS). It paid low-income households bimonthly health and education cash incentives, conditioned on children's school attendance and growth/health checkups, to reduce poverty and build human capital. The program was funded by the Colombian national government, seeded initially with loans from the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank. At its peak it reached roughly 2.6 million families and over 5 million children before being phased out and absorbed into the successor program Renta Ciudadana starting January 2024.
Conditional Cash Transfer, SISBEN Targeting, Child Health and Education, Rural and Urban Poverty, World Bank and IDB Financed, Colombia, Predecessor to Renta Ciudadana
Headquarters
- Organization Name
- Prosperidad Social (Departamento Administrativo para la Prosperidad Social)
- City
- Bogotá
- State / Province
- Bogotá D.C.
- Country
- Colombia
Contact
- Phone
- +57 601 379 1088
- Social media links
Status & Funding
- Organization status
- Active
- Program status
- Inactive
- Application status
- Timed
- Number of recipients
- 1,862,103
- Funding type
- Government
Benefits
- Currency Type
- Fiat
- Payment frequency
- Variable
- How long the program lasts
- 276 months
- Distribution Type
- Direct deposit (bank account), Debit/prepaid card, Mobile wallet (Daviplata), Cash pickup via banking correspondents (Banco Agrario) in rural areas
- Benefit details
Households received two conditional incentives: a health incentive for each child under 6 (paid up to 6 times/year, contingent on growth-and-development checkups) and an education incentive for each child aged roughly 5-18 enrolled in school (paid up to 5 times/year, since no payment covered December-January, with the amount increasing by grade level), covering up to 3 qualifying children per household. Regardless of the number of qualifying children, total payment per household per two-month cycle was capped (historically around 1,000,000 COP per cycle in its final years). Funds were disbursed bimonthly through Banco Agrario accounts or the Daviplata mobile wallet, and unbanked families were 'bancarizados' (given a bank account) as part of enrollment. Amounts and rules were adjusted repeatedly over the program's 20+ year run (e.g., under the 2012 'Más Familias en Acción' redesign and again during the 2022-2024 transition to Renta Ciudadana).
Eligibility
Overview
- Eligibility details
Beneficiary households were identified as being among the poorest via Colombia's SISBEN proxy-means-test classification system, inclusion in the victims' registry (RUV) for displaced/conflict-affected families, or recognized indigenous cabildos/reservations, and needed at least one child under 18 (health incentive for under-6, education incentive for school-age children) living in the household. The cash was paid to a designated household 'titular,' in practice usually the mother or a female head of household. Coverage expanded over time from small rural municipalities (under 100,000 residents) to nationwide, including urban areas, indigenous communities, and displaced populations.
Demographics
- Minimum age
- 0
- Maximum age
- 18
- Race / ethnicity targets
- Indigenous communities and cabildos, and internally displaced/conflict-victim households (via the RUV registry), received priority inclusion, though the program was not limited to these groups.
- Education level
- Preschool, Elementary, Middle School, High School
Family
- Family Status
- Parent
- Number of dependents (minimum)
- 1
Financial
- Banked status
- Unbanked, Underbanked
Citizenship
- Citizenship / immigration status
- Citizen
Geography
- Countries covered
- Colombia
- Residency of Target Geography
- Yes
Application Process
- How to apply
Eligible households were generally identified through their SISBEN socioeconomic classification, the victims' registry, or indigenous community rolls; families that appeared on official target lists then had to complete local registration ('inscripción') at Prosperidad Social/municipal enrollment points, providing identification and proof of children's school enrollment or health-checkup records, and open or link a Banco Agrario or Daviplata account to receive payments. As of January 1, 2024, the program stopped accepting new registrations as it was folded into Renta Ciudadana, which uses automatic government data-matching rather than individual applications.
- Selection process
Selection was driven by Colombia's SISBEN proxy-means-test poverty targeting system (households scoring below a set threshold in eligible municipalities), supplemented by automatic inclusion of registered conflict-displacement victims (RUV) and recognized indigenous communities/cabildos. Selected households were then required to complete local enrollment and verification steps to become active 'titulares' of the incentive.
