Social Protection Programs for Africa's Drylands

by Carlo Del Ninno, Sarah Coll-Black, Pierre Fallavier

Overview

Social Protection Programs for Africa’s Drylands explores the role of social protection in promoting the well-being and prosperity of people living in dryland regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, with a specifi c focus on the Sahel and the Horn of Africa. Based on a review of recent experience, it argues that social protection policies and programs have an important role in promoting the resilience of the people residing in these areas. Social protection programs, when well designed and carefully implemented at scale, can reduce vulnerability to droughts and other shocks and promote coping capacity. If present trends continue, by 2030 dryland regions of East and West Africa will be home to an estimated 429 million people, up to 24 percent of whom will be living in chronic poverty. Many others will depend on livelihood strategies that are sensitive to the shocks that will hit the region with increasing frequency and severity, making them vulnerable to falling into transient poverty. Social protection programs will be needed in the drylands to provide support to those unable to meet their basic needs. Some of these people will require long-term support, while others will require periodic short-term support because of income losses due to shocks (for example, crop failure following a drought) or as a result of lifecycle changes (for example, loss of a breadwinner). Safety net programs can increase resilience in the short term by improving coping capacity of vulnerable households. Rapidly scalable safety nets that provide cash, food, or other resources to shock-affected households can allow them to recover from unexpected shocks. Scaling up an existing safety net program can be far less expensive than relying on appeals for humanitarian assistance to meet urgent needs. Social protection programs can increase resilience over the longer term by reducing sensitivity to shocks of vulnerable households especially if combined with other development programs. Providing predictable support to chronically poor households and enabling them to invest in productive assets and access basic social services can effectively reduce these households’ sensitivity to future shocks, help them participate in the growth process, and take advantage of the investments made in agricultural and pastoralist activities proposed in the drylands.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781464808463
Publisher:	World Bank Publications
Publication date:	08/17/2016
Series:	World Bank Studies
Pages:	82
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.30(d)

Table of Contents

Foreword ix

Acknowledgments xi

About the Authors xiii

Executive Summary xv

Abbreviations xxv

Chapter 1 Introduction-The Case for Social Protection in Africa 1

Chapter 2 Poverty, Vulnerability, and the Need for Social Protection in Africa's Drylands 3

Notes 9

Chapter 3 Conceptual Framework-Social Protection Reduces Vulnerability and Improves Capacity to Cope 11

Notes 15

Chapter 4 Social Protection Programming in the Drylands 17

Coverage of Social Protection 17

Capacity of National Social Protection Programs to Respond to Dryland Vulnerabilities 22

Humanitarian Response as a Social Protection Instrument 25

Notes 29

Chapter 5 Opportunity for Reducing Sensitivity and Improving Coping Capacity 31

Reducing Sensitivity 31

Improving Coping Capacity 33

Notes 34

Chapter 6 Building Adaptive Social Protection Systems that Respond to the Needs of People in Drylands 35

Notes 39

Chapter 7 Financing a National Adaptive Social Protection System 41

Costing of Safety Net Coverage in Africa's Drylands 42

Notes 46

Chapter 8 Conclusion 49

Appendix A 51

Bibliography 53

Boxes

2.1 Groups Most Sensitive to the Impacts of Climate Change 5

3.1 Defining Social Protection Instruments 11

3.2 Resilience as the Ability to Overcome Shocks 12

6.1 Synergies between Social Protection, Disaster Risk Reduction, and Humanitarian Aid 38

Figures

2.1 Natural Disasters in the Sahel, 1980-2013 4

2.2 Population Living in Drylands, East and West Africa, 2010-30 (Million People) 7

2.3 Rural Population Sensitive to Shocks, East and West Africa, 2010-30 7

2.4 Vulnerability to Shocks in an Average Year, 2010-30 (Million People) 9

4.1 Government and Donor Spending on Social Safety Nets as a Percent of GDP, Selected Countries 21

4.2 Humanitarian Aid Received, Selected Countries, Horn of Africa and Sahel (2000-11] 26

4.3 Breakdown of Safety Net Programs by Type in Burkina Faso, 2009 28

4.4 Evolution of Safety Nets Use in Mali, 2007-09 28

7.1 Share of GDP Required to Protect Drought-Vulnerable Population with Safety Net Support, Selected Countries, 2030 43

7.2 Percent of Vulnerable Population Covered in 2030 with 1 Percent of GDP 45

7.3 Cost of Covering Vulnerable Population in 2030 in a Regular Year or in the Case of Mild, Moderate and Severe Drought in Percentage of GDP 46