Joint Social Protection Field Visit at Chimwemwe Primary School, Chawama

It gives me great pleasure to be here today with all of you, as we commemorate expanded partnerships for social protection in Zambia. Poverty rates in the country are high and social protection has been a pivotal strategy in reducing poverty. The journey of strengthening social protection is one that continues to unfold with many success stories, through the astute leadership of the Government of the Republic of Zambia and the support and commitment of cooperating partners, UN agencies, the World Bank, civil society and other development partners.  

The Social Cash Transfer Programme, as we may know, started off as a pilot in one district, back in 2003. Today, it is the flagship social assistance programme which provides cash support to approximately 1 million and 27 thousand  [1,027,000] of the poorest and most vulnerable households across Zambia -- covering every district. This represents almost 30 percent of the population and 50 percent of the poor. Plans are in motion to further expand the coverage of the programme to 1,345,000 households by end of this year. 

Ladies and gentlemen, 

This is an enormous and commendable commitment made by the Government of the Republic of Zambia and backed by investments from domestic resources and support from the cooperating partners and the World Bank. 

In the spirit of partnership, the UN family, through its cooperating partners, further pledges its support to the Government to make social protection systems in Zambia more efficient and effective through a Joint Programme. The GRZ and UN Joint Programme on Social Protection which began in 2015, with phase II which was set to end in 2022, received an extension of two more years until 2024, with additional funding of around  $10 million US Dollars (approximately 200 million Kwacha). This joint programme stands to consolidate and trial integrated ways to build the resilience of the most vulnerable households across the country, through cash plus and shock-responsiveness, disability inclusion and social accountability. But the good news does not end here.

The Girls’ Education and Women’s Empowerment and Livelihoods Project (GEWEL) Multi-Donor Trust Fund (MDTF) has also been extended. It was established in 2019 with the objective of supporting the Government of Zambia to expand social assistance and strengthen its social protection system with the aim of enhancing household welfare and resilience. As such, the MDTF supports vulnerable young adolescent girls to access and complete secondary school for improved education outcomes, as well as finances SCT payments to beneficiary households. 

It invests in institutional strengthening and systems building for more accountable and effective delivery of social assistance. Thanks to the MDTF and support by the World Bank, the Government has successfully stabilized the Social Cash Transfer financing for predictable and reliable cash payments; supported over 100,000 girls to attend secondary school; developed the Zambia Integrated Social Protection Information System (ZISPIS) with a digital payment platform; established a sensitive grievance redress mechanism; and developed a Scalability Framework to guide Social Cash Transfer scale up during emergencies.

These expansions have become possible with funding from the governments of Germany, Ireland, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and will complement the ongoing scale-up of the Social Cash Transfer programme and aims to strengthen systems, making the social cash transfer shock-responsive in order to proactively respond to the occurrence of national or local shocks and disasters due to, for example, climate change, droughts, floods or epidemics. Allow me to commend the commitment from these donors and show our appreciation to them for their generous contributions. 

Ensuring continued reach to the most vulnerable groups by expanding coverage to other categories in the Social Cash Transfer programme such as children in need of care and protection and the Most Critical 1,000 first days of life, continues to be a priority for us and our partners.

Honorable Minister, 

It is encouraging to see the Government walking the talk of leaving no one behind and increasing its investments in social protection programmes, strengthening the systems for efficiency, adopting a cash-plus approach to maximize programme benefits and a life-cycle approach to cater for those unique needs one faces in life. 

Evidence shows us that we have an opportunity arising from the massive scale of the Social Cash Transfer programme. It is the opportunity to not only reduce poverty in all its dimensions, but to break inter-generational poverty cycles for good, to lift Social Cash Transfer beneficiaries, such as the ones we are meeting here today, out of poverty permanently. 

This requires conjoining social and economic policy to link the vulnerable populations protected by social protection to economic opportunities and to provide them with support to start generating their own income. This is what drives inclusive growth, social and economic participation and mitigates disasters by building the resilience and supporting the well-being of vulnerable populations. 

Before I conclude, allow me to underscore the commitment of the UN family, the World Bank and cooperating partners, and affirm our continued support to the Government of the Republic of Zambia for enhancing social protection programmes and systems, ensuring that it is gender transformative, disability inclusive and based on a human rights approach. We remain committed to supporting the attainment of Sustainable Development Goals, the African Union Agenda 2063 and the Zambian Vision 2030.

We look forward to continued partnerships and collaboration towards commemorating more positive milestones like this one today, as we journey on together.

I thank you.