The Cabinet Division and the European Union (EU) Technical Assistance to Support Social Security in Bangladesh (TA SSSR) held a workshop on social protection systems.
The workshop, titled “Lifecycle Based Social Protection Systems in Bangladesh”, was organized in the InterContinental Dhaka hotel in the capital on Sunday, said a press release.
Several government officials from Cabinet Division and other social protection focal ministries attended the event.
The EU funded the workshop under the framework of its budget support program in the social protection sector, which aims to support the Government of Bangladesh (GoB) to accelerate social security reforms, in line with the spirit of the 2015 National Social Security Strategy (NSSS), reads the press release.
This budget support operation amounts to 247 million euros ($266,971,185), as direct tranches to the government, and 6.5 million euros ($7,025,557.5) for technical assistance to support the Cabinet Division and other ministries to better services and increase the number of citizens reached through social security plans and programs.
Md Rahat Anwar, additional secretary at Coordination Wing of Cabinet Division, Md Shamsul Arefin, secretary at Coordination and Reforms, Cabinet Division and Khandker Anwarul Islam, cabinet secretary, participated in the event respectively as special guests and chief guest.
The technical session, led by Kavim V Bhatnagar of TA SSSR, reviewed the NSSS focus to consolidate social security programs within a lifecycle framework.
In a typical life cycle, ranging from early pregnancy to old age, individuals face different risks and vulnerabilities at different stages. Thus, the need for policies to support individuals at each stage of their life, and for social protection strategies to mitigate risks at each stage.
It also highlighted the need for the GoB to address the most important gaps in lifecycle coverage, for the early childhood and the working-age populations, said Bhatnagar.
Moreover, the technical presentation explored the possibilities of providing social insurance (unemployment, injury, sickness, and maternity) and contributory pension, as envisaged under the National Social Insurance Scheme (NSIS), embedded in the NSSS.
With a rapidly aging population of the elderly, the NSSS acknowledged the need to develop a comprehensive pension system that provides a state-guaranteed minimum income for senior citizens belonging to the poor and vulnerable group.
Creating a contributory pension system for families of working age who wish to provide for themselves a higher level of retirement income was also discussed.
Syed Saad Hussain Gilani, chief technical advisor of ILO, and Syed Moazzem Hussain, senior technical advisor of GIZ presented their recent projects to pilot an employment injury scheme in the formal sector, showing how the NSIS spirit is translated into reality.
Among the discussants, Dr Md Khairuzzaman Mozumder, additional secretary of Finance Division highlighted the progressive increment in the national social security budget over the past years and the achievements in the digitalization of beneficiaries’ data and in the number of cash transfers beneficiaries paid through G2P.
Mohammad Khaled Hasan, joint secretary of Cabinet Division presented the “Beveridge Model” which inspired the lifecycle approach embedded in the National Social Security Strategy and presented the way forward for important social protection institutional reforms.
The event also witnessed the participation of Hans Lambrecht, head of cooperation, delegation of the EU to Bangladesh highlighted that: “One of the challenges for delivery pro-poor, inclusive and shock responsive social assistance, and social insurance interventions, is the absence of updated and reliable beneficiaries’ data.
For this reason, the EU welcomes with enthusiasm the new MoLE planned project to develop a Labour Information Management System (LIMS), with a module on a digital workers registry. Data are a fundamental asset, which needs to be placed in the hand of the GoB to ensure that the social security interventions reach the people in need in the shortest time possible.
The EU is ready to support the GoB to accelerate this essential reform.
The chief guest, Khandker Anwarul Islam, made the event interactive and participatory. In his closing remarks, he reminded the audience that social safety nets have played a vital role in containing the socio-economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.
He requested the development partners to join hands with the government and envisage innovative policy instruments to combine social security and capacity building, in order to provide the poor and vulnerable with the instruments for sustainable development.
