LEAP reassessment begins

The Ghana National Household Registry has begun data collection across the country as part of the first countrywide reassessment of the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) programme.

The Chief of Social Policy and Inclusion of UNICEF Ghana Office, Pauliina Sarvilahti, who disclosed this, said currently there had been a pilot of reassessment of the programme in 10 districts where it was evident that while some of the beneficiaries could graduate out of LEAP, others could be retained and potential new ones could also be enrolled on it.

The reassessment, which is being sponsored jointly by the government, the World Bank and UNICEF, is expected to determine who falls within the LEAP category and who the beneficiaries are.

“At this stage, there is, of course, conversation going on about how the criteria of those people will be established, and how we can make it more dynamic,” Ms Sarvilahti said.

She disclosed this in Accra last Thursday at a media cafe organised by UNICEF Ghana Office for journalists.

She was responding to questions and concerns from journalists about the inability of the LEAP programme to graduate those on it and enrol new ones since it started in 2008.

This was after she had made a presentation on the topic: Child poverty eradication from global and country perspectives.

LEAP

The Ghana National Household Registry (GNHR) is a unit under the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MoGCSP) with the mandate to establish a single national household register from which social protection programmes will select their beneficiaries in Ghana.

The registry was launched in Accra in October 2015.

LEAP, also administered by the Gender Ministry, is a cash transfer programme introduced by the government in 2008 for extremely poor and vulnerable households. 

The three categories of eligible beneficiaries are orphaned and vulnerable children; persons with severe disability without any productive capacity, and elderly persons who are 65 years and above.

The objective of the programme is to reduce poverty by increasing and smoothening consumption, and promoting access to services and opportunities among the extremely poor and vulnerable.

Ms Sarvilahti said for any graduation to be done, they needed to identify the vulnerable ones but at the moment the country did not have a universal coverage on that.

She pointed out that one of the difficulties with the programme currently was the different information management systems, explaining that a lot of time was spent harmonising them to understand the targeted population.

In Brazil, where Ghana was looking up to with regard to how it successfully implemented its social protection programme, known as Bolsa Família, she said, they had a good unified data system.

LEAP benefits

Touching on the benefits of the LEAP programme, Ms Sarvilahti said it reduced the pressure on families, increased household reported happiness and the general well-being of the household.

She added that evidence also showed that it reduced intimate partner violence and increased school attendance.

“It also has positive impact on health, especially on access to health insurance enrolment. We have higher rates in communities with higher quality of services and health.

It was associated with an increase in birth weights and reduced the odds of low birth rates. We have the impact on increased probability of infants which were exclusively breastfed. So there are a lot of benefits,” the Chief of Social Policy and Inclusion of UNICEF Ghana stated.

Recertification

A Social Protection Specialist at the UNICEF Ghana Office, Christiana Gbedemah, said before doing any recertification, they had to look at the whole population and make sure that nobody had been left behind and the government had to have that commitment to do those recertifications as a process.

She explained that recertification should be able to get to a point where the programme was opened up and was regularly bringing people in and out, adding that the best way out for Ghana was a dynamic enrolment where people were able to walk to a social welfare officer to subject themselves to the PMT questionnaire, a vulnerability test kit, to determine their eligibility and be onboarded onto the programme.

Ms Gbedemah said some countries had done that and it was one of the ways Ghana could also adopt.

Citing the example of Brazil, she said there was a lot Ghana could learn from that country because of the cash transfer programme, Bolsa Família.  

Present at the media cafe was the Brazilian Ambassador to Ghana, Mariana Madeira, who spoke on the opportunity for Ghana to commit to the Global Alliance Against Hunger Poverty, an initiative of the G20 Brazilian Presidency.

The innovative compact aims to contribute to global need to turbo-charge and search solutions through partnerships, funding opportunities and policy commitments to reduce hunger and poverty globally.

Many of the identified policy priorities of the alliance, Ambassador Madeira explained, were already in process in Ghana and it would give an opportunity for the country to showcase and improve actions as a regional hub.