almost all conditional cash transfer programmes with the exception of south africa require some time commitment by participants necessitating a reorganization of household time patterns with potential impacts on time to engage in paid labour because of gendered norms it is primarily women who perform the unpaid tasks of fulfilling conditions required to access programme payments and thus such programmes may actually reduce women s relative access to income or gender equality even as childrens status improves this result is indicative of more gender egalitarianism and movement towards a high road strategy of social reproduction