The Ministry of Social’s Cash Social Assistance Policy is one of the Government’s programs to maintain the purchasing power of people directly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this ...study is to analyze and evaluate the implementation of cash social assistance policies during the COVID-19 pandemic, analyze the factors that hinder the successful implementation of cash social assistance policies during the COVID-19 pandemic, and analyze the factors that support the social assistance policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. The research method used was descriptive qualitative. Informants in this study were bureaucrats, policy implementers, and the community as beneficiaries. This study found non-compliance with policy implementers in the standard and policy targets by deliberately violating them for certain benefits. Factors inhibiting cash assistance policy implementation include ineffective and inefficient policy output to target intended beneficiaries, lack of recipient’s name in the Integrated Social Welfare Data (DTKS), inaccurate redistribution of social assistance benefits, and inappropriate use of social assistance funds to purchase non-basic needs. Supporting factors are strict government supervision and evaluation monitoring on the use of social assistance funds that may reduce cash transfer and impair intended beneficiaries’ access to scarce resources in times of contemporary COVID-19 pandemic crisis-related society.
The original aim of this poverty analysis, prepared in collaboration with Egypt's Ministry of Economic Development, was to help inform the country's development strategy and guide World Bank ...assistance in support of that strategy over the coming years. This objective remains nevertheless valid, although the timeframe for addressing some of the most critical issues, such as the high rate of extreme poverty, vulnerability, and food insecurity may now be accelerated. The authors believe that the analysis presented in this note, while being based on data that precede the actual onset of the current political crisis, reveals deep tensions in the society that are linked to the high level of vulnerability and the lack of an efficient and flexible social assistance system. This report assesses the poverty and welfare changes in Egypt between 2008 and 2009 and presents a comprehensive picture of the evolution of poverty between 2004/05 and 2008/09. Poverty in Egypt decreased between 2005 and 20082, due in large part to rapid economic growth, although high inflation during this period had detrimental effects on the extreme poor. Yet, the sudden economic slowdown in the context of accelerating inflation in 2008/2009 reversed the gains in poverty reduction achieved during the period of rapid growth. The increase in poverty closely followed the accelerating inflation during 2008 causing vulnerable groups to be particularly affected by the economic turbulence. Despite these setbacks, some of the gains from the rapid growth between 2005 and 2008 were sustained over the crisis period. Policies aimed at helping households withstand the effects of the crisis were however not sufficient to prevent an increase in poverty. The crisis exposed underlying vulnerabilities in Egypt s social protection system. Finally, the adverse effects of food price shocks on the real incomes of Egypt s poor point to the need for further analytical work on labor markets, in particular wage policy, as part of the social risk management framework.
In 1989, Albania's rigid political and socioeconomic structure shattered beyond repair. Turbulence soon invaded every domain of life. As the state imploded, so did the state-run economy. This review ...explores ongoing consequences of this difficult transformation that took place since 1989 and of policy initiatives to mitigate or ameliorate its effects. Albania has been much studied; the review addresses important information gaps. It establishes, from the representative 2002 Living Standards Measurement Survey (LSMS), which kinds of families receive public income transfers and private income flows in what amounts and from what sources. It estimates the impact that these public and private income flows have in mitigating pre-transfer and post-transfer poverty among households. It does this by type of family and source of income flow, for all Albanian households and for various subsets of them. This review analyzes the relative importance of pensions and social assistance in alleviating poverty among rural households with aged members. This review also documents and links data on expenditures under social programs with data on program beneficiaries for recent years and it identifies current tradeoffs among the multiple objectives of social safety net policies, including those relating to coverage, adequacy, work incentives, equity, and effective government spending. Finally, it suggests options for future development of social safety net policies, including ways to strengthen overall policy linkages and programmatic coordination among social programs.
PDF
