Toward Shock-Responsive Social Protection: Lessons from the COVID-19 Response in Six Countries

The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered an unprecedented expansion of social protection programs and systems worldwide, and has necessitated innovation in relation to how social protection is delivered during crises. The current crisis has unique characteristics: it is global, it is protracted and it affects large segments of the population. In addition, containment measures and mobility restrictions have challenged the delivery of social protection. In this context, many countries have broken new ground in relation to the delivery of shock-responsive social protection.

The Maintains program is studying how Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, Pakistan, Sierra Leone and Uganda have adapted and expanded their social protection systems to support households and mitigate the economic impact of COVID-19. This study builds on the evidence and conceptual approaches of studies of shock-responsive social protection conducted prior to the pandemic. Further, it identifies policy actions to better prepare national social protection systems to respond to future crises. Applying a conceptual framework designed by Maintains, the study analyses data from literature reviews, key informant interviews and microsimulations. This brief presents a summary of the findings from the study’s cross-country synthesis report, drawing on the findings from the six Maintains case studies.

How did social protection systems respond to the pandemic? 

This study looked at three broad response types: systems resilience, adaptation of social assistance and humanitarian assistance that leverages social protection systems, and vice versa.

All six countries took measures to maintain operational continuity and to minimize disruptions to routine service delivery (i.e., system resilience), including through implementing hygiene and social distancing measures for payment (all), making advance lump-sum payments to cover several payment cycles (Bangladesh, Ethiopia and Uganda), temporarily suspending public works requirements (Ethiopia) or adapting the modality of delivery (Kenya and Uganda). Most countries were able to issue standard operating procedures (SOPs) quickly, leading to minimal disruption of routine programs. However, in Uganda, new SOPs needed to be drafted and approved, resulting in a three-month pause in program operations of the Senior Citizen’s Grant (including payments).

To reach new individuals/households, most countries opted to implement new, time-bound programs that targeted groups of people not targeted by routine social assistance programs, rather than horizontally expanding existing programs, in line with global trends. There were several reasons for this, including perceptions around the capacity to handle an increased caseload (Kenya), lack of an ongoing routine program to expand (Sierra Leone) and concerns that it would be politically difficult to communicate to new recipients that support would only be temporarily provided through a routine program (Uganda).

Almost all countries also implemented vertical expansions to temporarily increase support to existing program recipients in light of greater needs. In most cases, benefit values were increased for a duration of one to six months. Expansions were mostly funded by development partners in Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda, and by government in Pakistan and Bangladesh.

Finally, in Kenya and Pakistan, a number of emergency, time-bound, cash-based interventions were implemented by non-state actors to complement the government’s response. Some of those interventions piggybacked on parts of the existing social protection system (e.g., using beneficiary registries to ensure caseloads did not overlap), but they mostly used separate processes for delivery, while others aligned their transfer values with those of government flagship programs. In Ethiopia, the recurring humanitarian assistance pipeline was used to provide food assistance to households not covered by the Rural Productive Safety Net Programme and facing food insecurity as a result of COVID-19.

How effective were these responses in mitigating the impact of the pandemic?

Shock-responsive social protection ideally involves expanding coverage to those made vulnerable by the crisis; benefit levels that are adequate to address the new needs, and benefits that are comprehensive and linked to longer-term rehabilitation and recovery. However, given resource constraints in regard to meeting the scale and range of needs, no single response is likely to meet all three criteria simultaneously while guaranteeing inclusion and timeliness, resulting in difficult trade-offs in designing programs to mitigate the effect on poverty.

What enabled or constrained an effective response?

This section presents a summary of the cross-country analysis of the common factors that have enabled or constrained an effective social assistance response to COVID-19, as well as recommendations on how to prepare social protection systems to be more responsive. It focuses on the policies, design features and implementation and operations that have supported or constrained an effective response.

Policy: Financing

In a context of pressing financial needs, the capacity to quickly mobilize domestic resources, create new financing sources and leverage preexisting external financial mechanisms was important. The ability to use domestic resources was a function of the fiscal space, the commitment to social protection and the leadership of the response. Strategies to leverage existing external financing entailed reorienting budget support programs, increasing lending amounts or using preexisting credit lines that could flex. However, reallocating funds earmarked for future routine social protection could have adverse effects on future routine programming if funds are not compensated. Without these financing strategies in Uganda, lengthy negotiations with donors undermined the timeliness of responses, with further delays caused by a lack of pre-agreed mechanisms for channeling and administering the funds.

Contingency budget lines and protocols that can be activated in the event of shocks can facilitate the channeling of external resources. Sierra Leone’s Social Safety Net Project included a contingency budget line that could be triggered by the declaration of a state of emergency, and released once an emergency response manual had been produced. While Ethiopia, Uganda and Kenya have funding mechanisms in place linked to their scalability frameworks, these mechanisms are designed to respond mostly to droughts, making them less useful for emergencies, such as COVID-19.

Recommendations for policymakers: Planning for shock response should be developed on the basis of pre-agreed financial commitments, combining different financing strategies and instruments, triggers for activation and a contingency plan to guide disbursement. To respond to a range of shocks (including less predictable, large-scale shocks), commitments need to be flexible and based on broad triggers. The capacity to absorb additional funding from development partners in times of crisis should be developed. Disbursement mechanisms and protocols should be designed so they can be used to deliver financial support in line with partners’ requirements.

Policy: Legislation and Strategies

The lack of policy frameworks for sector-wide, shock-responsive social protection was one of the main constraining factors. Strategies for shock-responsive social protection that exist at the program level did not have sufficient flexibility to support the response to COVID-19. Although program-level strategies can be effective in responding to predictable/high-frequency, localized events like droughts, they may not be sufficient for responding to harder to predict, geographically widespread events like the COVID-19 pandemic, as the scale of the shock may exceed the capacities of a single program, and because such strategies are not designed or prepared to identify or reach people affected by pandemics or other shocks.

However, the lack of scalability frameworks has not always hindered the use of programs to respond to shocks. While the Benazir Income Support Programme in Pakistan and Social Safety Net in Sierra Leone do not have scalability frameworks, these programs have been used for this purpose prior to and during the pandemic. Further, small vertical expansions were implemented without using the scalability frameworks in Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda.

Recommendations for policymakers: Preparedness requires not only contingency planning but also ensuring social protection systems have the flexibility required for responding to shocks. A truly shock-responsive system, capable of responding to a range of shocks, requires a flexible approach: a social protection system — not just a single program — with in-built features to allow flexing and responses to unforeseen circumstances. Shock-responsive social protection should be mainstreamed in social protection and disaster risk management (DRM) legislative frameworks, policies and strategies, including a vision for the sector, and roles and mandates for social protection actors within this. This must be supported by the development of a sector-wide, shock-responsive institutional framework (beyond program-level frameworks) to facilitate swift decision-making during times of shock. This should: define the processes for responding to shocks, outline the roles and responsibilities of social protection actors and actors in other ministries/agencies, detail triggers for response, outline financing mechanisms, articulate coordination structures and lay out protocols and principles to guide alignment in the design and implementation of programs, including whether and how to link vulnerable groups of people to social services.

Policy: Governance and Coordination

Governance mechanisms and strong leadership were key enablers of large-scale and timely responses. However, mandates for leading responses to shocks, and social protection ministries’ roles within these structures, are often ill-defined, which can obstruct well-coordinated responses. Similarly, a lack of governance mechanisms resulted in a proliferation of coordination bodies and working groups, contributing to piecemeal responses.

The effectiveness of partnerships with development and humanitarian actors seemed to depend largely on the strength of previous collaboration (including the role of government in such collaborations), and on preexisting mechanisms. Unsurprisingly, less-developed mechanisms or structures designed for other purposes (i.e., donor coordination only) were not very effective platforms for coordination and partnerships in the COVID-19 response.

Recommendations for policymakers: Coordination mechanisms need to be strengthened to enhance coordination within the social sector; between social protection, DRM and other sectors; among different administrative levels; and between governments and development partners, humanitarian agencies and civil society. Coordination mechanisms should be based on: clear mandates and roles established by laws and policies, operational opportunities and finding areas of collaboration that benefit different actors, and agreements on how to respond and the roles and responsibilities of each actor.

Information Systems and Data Sharing

There is currently much enthusiasm in global discussions of the role of social registries in informing shock responses, but having a social registry in place is not a prerequisite for responding to large-scale shocks. Our results suggest we should have more realistic expectations about the role of social registries in shock response, and that having a social registry is not the only route to success. The country studies have shown that information systems are, overall, immature, and that this is an area requiring a lot of investment. Social registry data did not play a strong role in the social protection response in these six countries, in contrast to experiences in other countries, where leveraging such data enabled relatively timely and large-scale responses. Only Pakistan had a social registry in use, and it was five years out of date by the time the pandemic struck, necessitating the use of other administrative databases to complement social registry data.

On the other hand, program registries, integrated beneficiary registries and other administrative databases enabled responses. Program registries were used to implement vertical expansions and to facilitate de-duplication of responses (if they were well-developed). The use of other administrative databases to complement social protection data and inform identification, registration and the delivery of payments was found to be a key enabling factor of effective social responses to COVID-19. Finally, the lack of interoperability mechanisms and protocols for data sharing was a constraining factor that prevented a more effective response. The need to comply with data protection regulations limited the degree to which data could be shared.

Recommendations for policymakers: Investment in information systems needs to ensure that data in the registries are relevant, adequate, accurate, current and secure, and have the coverage required, including of vulnerable groups; that interoperability and data sharing can take place; and that protocols and processes are fit for purpose in regard to making data accessible, while also ensuring privacy and security. In countries where registries are not complete or current, or where large investments to develop social registries are not feasible or desirable, social protection ministries should identify administrative databases that could be used for response, with memoranda of understanding for accessing data agreed in advance. It should be best practice for data collected as part of shock-responsive registration activities to be fed back into existing databases, and information technology (IT) infrastructure should allow for this.

Design of Shock Responsive Programs

The response programs were designed in contexts of uncertainty and were typically not informed by evidence or reliable estimates of population needs. Given the widespread effects of the crisis and the speed at which it escalated, governments reacted based on the information available at the time. This meant there was not always a precise understanding of how and to what extent certain populations had been affected. As a result, program eligibility criteria were not always closely linked to an understanding of who would be most in need as a result of COVID-19. Similarly, transfer values were defined largely based on budget availability and the intended coverage, rather than estimates of needs.

Recommendations for policymakers: As part of a broader shock-responsive framework, guidelines for program design should be developed, which outline design principles, key definitions and agreements in place to facilitate response. These guidelines should include considerations and principles agreed with development partners and humanitarian agencies to facilitate alignment in identifying the appropriate target population, setting the benefit level and duration and ensuring the response is inclusive.

Implementation and Operations: Registration, Verification and Enrollment

Innovative approaches to registration enabled responses that were wide-reaching and facilitated timely implementation, while traditional approaches to registration took longer to implement. In addition, demand-driven mechanisms to identify recipients were key in the case of Pakistan, which has been the case in other countries too. This can have important implications for the future of social assistance programs, which are usually tied to annual budgets and rigid, supply-driven approaches: truly responsive systems may benefit from demand-driven approaches.

Rapidly designed and implemented approaches to registration and enrollment sometimes came at the cost of a more inclusive and transparent response. A lack of checks and balances, or processes for verification of eligibility, can result in a high degree of discretion in the registration and enrolling of households and in the qualitative assessment of eligibility.

Recommendations for policymakers: Protocols for the registration, verification and enrollment of recipients during times of shock should be developed and documented based on existing processes and shock-responsive experience. As appropriate, they should include both remote and rapid strategies and community-based/in-person identification of households in need. To strengthen accountability, this should be combined with protocols for verification.

Implementation and Operations: Delivery of Payments

A strong enabling environment for banking, mobile money and internet-enabled digital payments supported more timely delivery of cash. Although mobile money is not used in routine social protection in Kenya, well-developed infrastructure and the enabling environment (including fee waivers on low-value transactions using mobile money during COVID-19) supported the widespread adoption of mobile money in the response to the pandemic. Other countries (Uganda and Sierra Leone) used the COVID-19 response as an opportunity to pilot mobile money payments to recipients in urban areas.

Overall, technology can improve service delivery, especially in terms of its timeliness, cost and transparency, but it can also lead to the exclusion of the most vulnerable groups of society, who tend to have less access to such technologies. New approaches to service delivery should be designed according to the needs and preferences of all program recipients, and of the most vulnerable people in particular. This does not mean denying the benefits of bank transfers and mobile money (for example); however, such mechanisms might need to be combined with traditional approaches to service delivery. Cost and ease should not come at the expense of marginalized groups — which are the groups that are most in need of assistance.

Recommendations for policymakers: The use of digital payment solutions should be expanded to support timely responses. However, to avoid the exclusion of vulnerable populations, it is crucial to develop strategies to support registration with digital payment providers and to ensure alternative payment modalities are available to those unable, or unwilling, to use these platforms. Where digital payments are not part of routine social protection, pre-shock agreements outlining ways of working and conditions for engagement with payment service providers should be developed to facilitate preparedness.

Implementation and Operations: Accountability Mechanisms

The overall lack of accountability mechanisms, including in existing social protection systems, is a concern, and certainly an area of investment for future responses. The responses studied in this report focused largely on two service delivery processes: targeting and payments. Grievance redress mechanisms were largely absent or ineffective, as were case management and monitoring and evaluation mechanisms. A lack of accountability may undermine the inclusiveness of social protection responses. The social protection sector can learn from humanitarian actors and the DRM sector regarding the development of accountability mechanisms that can be scaled up when needed.

Recommendations for policymakers: Clear and consistent communications should take place in advance of registration on enrollment methods and eligibility criteria. Governments should utilize a wide variety of communications channels, including strategies to ensure that the most disadvantaged communities, individuals and households have access to information regarding programs. Investments in grievance redressal and accountability mechanisms, both in routine programs and for shock response, need to be made. While technical platforms currently exist to facilitate complaints and appeals in many countries, information regarding these mechanisms needs to be communicated openly and clearly to applicants and recipients. While it may not be feasible or cost-effective to undertake a full evaluation of each shock response that takes place, a minimum level of monitoring should be undertaken, which must include reporting on recipient numbers disaggregated by gender. This information should be publicly available.