Liberia Gender Ministry To Roll Out Social Safety Nets Project

The Minister of Gender, Children and Social Protection, Williametta Saydee-Tarr has announced that the Liberia Social Safety Nets Project (LSSN), implemented by the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection is expected to roll out on Thursday May 9, 2019.

Speaking Thursday, May 9, 2019, at the Ministry of Information, Cultural Affairs and Tourism’s, regular press briefing, Minister Saydee-Tarr stressed that the rollout will commence with activities aimed at recertifying former beneficiaries of the Ministry’s Social Cash Transfer Programme.

She mentioned that the LSSN team has departed for Maryland and Grand Kru Counties to have consultations with local officials including Superintendents, Development Superintendents, and District Commissioners amongst others.

According to the Minister, the team which is headed by the Social Cash Transfer Manager will remain in the counties to form the County Social Protection Committees (CSPC) and train other support personnel based in the two counties.

Minister Saydee-Tarr pointed out that Consultation and formation of the CSPCs will be followed by the recertification of former beneficiaries of the Social Cash Transfer Programme in Maryland and Grand Kru Counties.

She disclosed that those expected to receive the Cash are categorized as extremely poor and food insecure household and the money will help recipient households improve nutrition intake through gardens and increased productive domestic activities that support food sufficiency.

The Gender, Children and Social Protection Boss mentioned that the County Consultations are a core requirement for this phase of the Project, which will be launched by her Institution.

“While in the Counties, the LSSN team will have community re-entry meetings, at which time separate conversations will be held with chiefs and relevant community stakeholders.” Minister Saydee-Tarr averred.

The Minister indicated that Maryland and Grand Kru Counties are the first to benefit from this phase of the Social Cash Transfer, because of their rank as the most poverty prevalent counties in Liberia and River Gee and Bomi also rank highly and will benefit during the next phase of the cash transfer.

She stressed that the current beneficiary list of the program shows that over four thousand people received money during the first phase of the program and that the number could shift below or remain the same based on the recertification of beneficiaries, a process expected to begin immediately after the County Consultations.

Minister Saydee-Tarr noted that two thousand people, a thousand per county for Grand Kru and Maryland, will benefit and receive cash under the pending payment, and the remaining two thousand plus in the two counties (Bomi and Rivergee) will follow after.

“The Liberia Social Safety Net (LSSN) project is financed by the World Bank and USAID. The project supports the Government of Liberia to establish building blocks of a safety net, while continuing to provide cash transfers to extremely poor and food insecure families in targeted counties. It is also expected to foster partnership and strengthen coordination between the Government and its development partners.

The Ministry is focusing on: (i) building a robust, coherent and transparent institutional and legal framework for the coordination of Social Protection programs; and (ii) building unified systems for delivering Social Protection.” She added.

The Gender, Children and Social Protection Chief revealed that the Government of Liberia (GoL) has ongoing efforts to build an effective social protection system through the design and development of a Social Registry and implementation system for social protection.

“The objective of this support is to improve efficiency, enhance capacity, and strengthen the National Social Safety Net System in Liberia through the development of the basic building blocks of a safety net delivery system.

To that end, we are also pleased to report that we are concluding negotiations for our Data Collection project under the LSSN Program, to be carried out in Bong, Nimba, Maryland and Bomi Counties, to outfit our Management Information Systems with the relevant data needed to respond to social protection issues in Liberia. We will be partnering with LISGIS and NIR to ensure proper execution and give us direct access to the demography on where our poor and vulnerable are” Minister Tarr mentioned.