Productive Social Safety Net (PSSN) phase two

The results below reflects activities carried out during the period 1 July 2023. to 30 June 2024. 1.1 Category 1: Conditional Cash transfer (CCT) different components The conditional cash transfer (CCT) is composed by a system of interrelated benefits that include: (i) a fixed transfer offered to all PSSN households; (ii) a fixed transfer for vulnerable groups provided to all households that include a child aged 0-18 years old (Child Grant) and to those that include a person with a disability (Disability Grant); and (iii) a variable Human Capital Transfer (HCT) offered to households with children, subject to compliance with health or education conditionalities. More specifically, the compliance requirements entail that children below five need to do quarterly health check-ups at health centres and children of school age not to have an attendance of at least 80 %. Over 80 % of PSSNs direct beneficiaries are women, and about 56 % of all direct and indirect beneficiaries, including all benefitting household members, are women. Given that women are far more likely to exercise control over the use of their own cash, targeting women is an empowering feature of the program design and likely to contribute to reducing gaps in poverty and resilience. In fact, the midline evaluation of the parent project, PSSN I, found that cash transfers granted through the program led to womens empowerment by increasing the share of women having a say in the use of their own earnings, primary decision-making regarding childrens health and education, and household purchases. Furthermore, the targeting of women is also based on evidence which suggests that when women are the recipients of cash transfers, benefits do not simply accrue to the women but, rather, filter through to the whole household. The CCT has thus been catalytical in addressing the gender gaps and inequalities and has contributed to women meeting their households basic needs as well as providing smaller capital to invest income generating activities. Furthermore, the gender sensitization done during community sessions, organised prior to the payments, has raise awareness of the beneficiaries on gender issues, including gender-based violence. For example, of success stories on how women have been socially and economically empowered by the cash transfer and other components of the program see annex. For example, the Community sessions implemented in March 2024 were designated to discuss gender based violence GBV and to sensitize community and beneficiaries and to encourage women to take on leading roles such as community management?? committees CMC member, local service provier LSP or as a GBV focal point. 1.1.1 CCT updates In 2023/2024, a total of six payment windows of CCT payments were made. Due to delays in payments double payments have been carried out (how many times or when). The payment delays are partly due to the certification process but recurrent delays are also caused by the cumbersome administrative payment process. All in all, with all verification steps the preparation for a payment window takes up to 45 days. The different procedures were discussed during the mission in January 2024 and as result TASAF reported during the July mission that the process has now been reduced to 27 days. If fully adhered to the revised process should imply that moving ahead timely payments is to be expected. In the last payment window for March/April, 1,264 978 households were paid. The average CCT transfers in the last window, paid in June close to 30 900 Tsh per household per payment window which is conducted bimonthly. Heavy El-Niño rains highly affected some areas of the country which resulted in the TASAF payment teams not being able to reach some beneficiaries. As a results arrangement were made to pay concerned beneficiaries in the subsequent payment window. 1.1.2 The roll out of the new disability grant The disability grant was rolled out in 2022/2023 as a result of a comprehensive but also rather cumbersome administrative process which included verifications at household levels. The purpose of the disability grant was to pilot the inclusion of a new vulnerable group and to show the Government of Tanzania (GoT) the results that social protection in the life cycle can have. In brief, the disability grant is a bi-monthly payment for beneficiary households living with persons with disabilities to compensate for the extra costs associated with having a disability. The grant, while modest, 5,000 TZ, per month, has potential to make a difference for the most vulnerable families, not the least for women who are the prime caregivers. In the last payment windows about 100 000 households having a person with disability were paid. It is worth noting that a number of people living with disabilities (PLWD) are part of the HH selected for exit in 2024 due to overall budget constraint of the programme. More specifically, approx. 24,000 households with a disabled family member will leave the program. 1.2 Category 2: Labour Intensive Public works (including targeted infrastructure projects) Public Works Program (PWP) is a safety net intervention that provides temporary employment to enrolled poor households with labour capacity to work on labour intensive activities while providing income support and skills gain to participating beneficiary households and contributing to the creation of community assets. The assets created are intended to address supply-side constraints towards livelihoods development and socio-economic service access of extreme poor households. Public work infrastructure projects are expected to be carried during 60 days, spread over a period of 6 months. Work is carried out 4 hours per day. In 2023/2024 a total of 624,234 households were paid public work wages in different windows. Moving ahead the public work to be implemented in 2024/2025 will take place in 63 PAAs and enrol a significantly lower number of households at about 247,300. For the coming PW rounds work is thus concentrated on the 63 PAAs which have not yet implemented PW while PW in other PAAs is phased out. The priorities made are based on the original design in the PSSN II project document. During 2023/24 TASAF started the preparation of climate smart PW implementation. A total of 30 villages will be involved in the implementing climate smart PW such as tree planting and building dams. Gender continues to be integrated during PWP execution. An example of this is how as part of the preparations of public work projects women are encouraged to apply for the role as local service providers (LSP). The number of women currently taking on this role is weak. Currently, only 698 LSPs, thus 7 % are women. Furthermore, pregnant and lactating women are exempted from work and temporary toilets are required to be arranged at every work site. Based on the PW implementation model, the household register a household representative and a replacement. Most of household representatives are women based on PSSN design. The replacement is not necessarily a woman, it can for example be a husband or a son. The average gender ratio during public works is by the TASAF PW lead estimated to vary between 70- 85 %. During missions the Embassy o Sweden has noticed that it is often elderly women who participate during PW and carry out rather heavy manual labour work. The low salary of 3 000 Tsh per day is likely to explain why women are primarily appointed to do the work on behalf of their household. PSSN is also reported by TASAF to be perceived by many beneficiaries as a programme for women. Women are therefore tasked to follow up on the programme conditionalities regarding children schooling and health checks ups, but also to participate in public works. 1.3 Category 3: Livelihood support- productive inclusion 1.3 Livelihood Support 1.3.1 Basic livelihoods activities The basic livelihood support package aims at promoting self-employment and wage employment opportunities through savings and trainings on investment promotion. These trainings include basic economic literacy trainings and efforts of linking beneficiary households to the extension agents at local government level. In 2023/2024 a total of 11 050 savings groups with 147 214 members (16 757 and 130 457 females) were formed in 67 PAAs. The cumulative total of savings groups created during PSSN I and PSSN II amounts to a total of 60 327 groups with 715 660 members (83 394 males and 623 266 females) in all 186 PAAs. Members in the savings groups are being trained on behavioural nudges to gradually push beneficiaries toward financial services and to educate them on the importance of savings. Based on the cumulative data savings groups 87 % of beneficiaries of basic livelihood enhancement activities are women. The savings groups are considered as an important mechanism for women to access finance for individual productive investments. Some groups also use the savings for joint income generating activities such as making soaps or baskets. PAA officers are meant to assist the savings groups to register and link up with financial institutions. The TASAF lead for EL estimated that about 100 savings groups got loans from the previous government loan scheme at district level. TASAF has been requested to provide data on the number of registered groups and more details on what type of external funding some of them have been able to secure. Beneficiaries who graduate from PSSN are encouraged to stay in the savings groups. The savings groups could be a long term structure to promote womens economic empowerment in the longer term. According to the TASAF the composition of the groups and the community context will be decisive for the sustainability of the groups. Elderly members tend to have less incentives to continue doing savings, and for exiting PSSN members the lack of CCT cash flows is likely to reduce their ability to put money aside for savings. Exiting PSSN members may also prefer to adhere to other informal savings groups. Other savings groups often split up all the savings and shared profit from joint income generating activities on an annual basis. This practice is sometimes also applied in PSSN groups which reduces the sustainability and prospect of savings groups acquiring external funding and loans. Furthermore, TASF is working with payment service providers on digitalization of savings and investment group. The mobile app for savings groups from Tigo Kikoba and M-Pesa have been piloted in two group. The digitalisation is expected to increase the transparency of the funds, ensure timely and accurate reporting. TASAFs assessment is that the two pilots are overall working well, but the transfers fees applied by the mobile operators has been identified as a constraint. 1.3.2 Enhanced livelihood package The enhanced livelihood support package provides a more comprehensive set of livelihood support activities to beneficiary household. The package which is designed to prepare the beneficiaries to exit the programme includes savings group, entrepreneurial skills trainings and livelihood grants. The productive grant is a strong enabler for women's economic empowerment. According to TASAF LE lead up to 95 percent of those receiving productive grants are women. Beneficiaries who have attended savings groups, attended trainings and developed a viable business plan may apply for a livelihood grant to finance a household enterprise or invest in a specialised skills training to access wage employment. The livelihood enhancement activities are also helping beneficiaries diversify livelihoods, build resilience to climate change and shift away from climate vulnerable livelihood options. Following receiving the full grant beneficiaries are requested to exit the program. For 2023/2024 the plan was to disburse the livelihood productive grants to 50 000 beneficiary households in 15 new PAAs and an additional 10 000 households which is a backlog from the previous financial year. By June 2024, 31 984 households had been paid which represents 60,7 % of the target. Over the last years a total of 84 674 beneficiary households received the first installment and 77 929 has received their full grants. In the next financial year 2024/2025, the revised total target of reaching 100 000 beneficiary households is expected to be met. Furthermore, as part of the revision made during the extension of the programme, the maximum amount of the productive grant has been reduced from 500 000 to 350 000 Tsh. Instead of being paid out in two tranches, which was a source for delays, the grants are paid in one payment and most often part of the CCT payments. Lastly, TASAF has during 2023/24 carried out a small qualitative study together with the WB in seven PAAs to gather insights and lessons learnt to feed into the programming of PSSN III.

The objective of the project is to improve access to income-earning opportunities and socio-economic services for targeted poor households while enhancing and protecting the human capital of their children. The expected outcomes of the project is to; improve consumption for about 1.4 million households; engage households in improved income-generating activities; increase school-enrollment and health seeking behaviour for children; improve access to community assets and services. The project aims to reach the objective through timely and predictable delivery of transfers to beneficiaries, combined with skills training, grants and promotion of savings. Households will also receive additional benefit as an incentive to send their children to school/regularly attend health check-up and a number of sub-projects will be constructed through the public works component that will improve community assets.