The Politics of Targeting the Poor: Poverty and Safety Nets in Zambia

1. The Politics of Targeting the Poor: Poverty and Safety Nets in the Zambian PRSP Process By Neo Simutanyi Institute of Economic and Social Research University of Zambia

2. Introduction • Does politics matter in poverty reduction? • Are social safety nets well targeted to the intended beneficiaries or is there a serious effort to make them effective/ • Do social safety nets contribute to poverty reduction?

3. Background to Poverty Reduction in Zambia • Poverty reduction as part of ‘structural adjustment with a human face.’ • Attempts made in early 1990s, e.g. Social Action Programme. • Poverty reduction guiding principle of World Bank/IMF lending and donor interventions.

4. Background to Poverty Reduction (contd) • PRSP June/July, 2002. • PRSP specifically addresses, among other things, the need for cushioning the very poor and vulnerable against the impact of economic reform. • PRSP recognises need for ‘better targeting of the core poor and vulnerable people.’

5. Background to Poverty Reduction (contd) • PRSP recommends that better targeting of the core poor can be achieved through prioritisation and community participation (PRSP 2002: 16).

6. What are Safety Nets? • Safety nets are designed to sustain or enhance welfare of poor or vulnerable groups during adjustment. • Ability of safety nets to reach the truly poor and vulnerable may depend to a large extent on the political context and administrative capacity.

7. What are Safety Nets (contd)? • Safety nets may play a political function of legitimation and patronage. • Targeting of safety nets affected by policy and politics.

8. Safety Nets in Zambia • Safety nets date back to 1950s. Originally used to cater for war veterans after the second world war. • Types of safety nets: • Compensatory programmes - assets transfers and training for able-bodied out of employment (eg the retraining of retrenchees through Future Search).

9. Safety Nets in Zambia (contd) • Consumer and income transfers for vulnerable groups. • Other schemes include, food-for-work programmes.

10. Underlying Assumptions for Safety Nets • Temporary intervention to enable beneficiaries recover from serious economic shocks, such as drought and famine. • Targets the very poor and vulnerable, who are unable to engage in productive work. • Contributes to poverty reduction.

11. Problems of Conceptualising Poverty and Vulnerability • World Bank defines poverty and vulnerability in three different ways: • chronically poor – those who lack the resources to free themselves from poverty. • New poor – those who have fallen below the poverty line as a result of economic shocks and reforms; and • Vulnerable groups – those who are severely affected by adjustment, but do not necessarily fall below the poverty line.

12. Problems of Conceptualising Poverty (contd) • Government has defined poverty using three indicators: • Incidence of poverty, measured by the numbers of people in the population living below the poverty line. • Intensity of poverty, reflected in the extent to which the incomes of the poor lie below the poverty line.

13. Problems of Conceptualising Poverty (contd) • Degree of inequality among the poor, weighting the poorest more than the better off poor. • Thus poor classified into two groups: • Moderately poor • Extremely poor.

14. Vulnerability in Zambia It is the people classified as extremely poor who constitute the vulnerable group. The MCDSS has defined the vulnerable group as:

15. Vulnerability in Zambia (contd) • The aged, the handicaped or ill- and the unsupported women and children. • Indigent persons waiting repatriation of Zambians returning from abroad or displaced persons. • Other persons who are victims of disasters, such as fire, floods, droughts or robberies (GRZ 1994).

16. Vulnerability in Zambia (contd) • There measurement and conceptual problems with poverty and vulnerability. • Lack of policy clarity on who constitute the very poor and vulnerable has implications for interventions. • In the government definition of vulnerable group, there are very few people who qualify for support.

17. Research Findings • Coverage The PWAS programme targets 2 % of the population or approximately 200,000 beneficiaries. - Studies have shown that the number of vulnerable people is far much larger than estimated by MCDSS. It ranges between 6.7% to about 9 % (8.7 %).

18. Research Findings (contd) Coverage (Contd) Despite having a national target of 200,000 beneficiaries, PWAS only covered 26,221 households by end of 2003 (9,503 female-headed and 16,718 male-headed).

19. Research Findings Coverage (contd) Case Study of Senanga reveals that: • The PWAS programme covered very few beneficiaries: • Social Support – Out of 124 potential beneficiaries only 23 received support. • Education Support – out of 10,500 eligible pupils only 1,680 received assistance. At one school, only 20 out of 145 eligible pupils received support.

20. Research Findings (Contd) Health Care Cost Scheme – the scheme has very low coverage. - It is not known and widely publicised. - Few beneficiaries, both at national and local level. User fee system poorly administered to have any meaningful impact.

21. Research Findings (contd) Adequacy of safety Nets • How adequate are safety nets? • Amounts involved are too little to make any meaningful impact. • Beneficiaries too few. • System of rotational support a mockery to poverty reduction.

22. Research Findings (Contd) Effectiveness of Safety Nets • System of rotational support. A mockery to reduction of social destitution. • Disbursements of PWAS financial resources slow, inadequate and low. • Too many eligible beneficiaries against too little funds. • Programme over-ambitious and unrealistic.

23. Conclusions & Recommendatiosn • Safety nets in the PRSP process not aimed at reducing poverty. • They are short-term, unreliable and unstainable. • Recommended that funding to PWAS be increased, especially a political commitment to releasing approved allocations.

24. Conclusions & Recommendations • There is need for a more integrated and viable policy on social protection, as PWAS is not providing adequate and meaningful social protection to the majority of its potential clients. • Any future system of social protection should be realistic and aim to offer adequate assistance to those it covers.