Improving livelihoods of poorest households — The LEAP Programme
Government, in its quest to meet and also complement the vision of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) , which were designed to rid the world of extreme poverty, has implemented a number of pro-poor interventions through different sector ministries under its National Social Protection Strategy (NSPS).
One of such social intervention programmes is the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) which aims at improving the socio-economic status of poorest households in the country and promoting the survival and development of their children. The programme is a strategy by the government to promote the welfare of the vulnerable and the marginalised in the society.
LEAP is actually a social cash transfer programme which provides cash every two months ( six times a year) to extremely poor households across the country to alleviate short-term poverty and encourage long-term human capital development.
In addition to the provision of cash, the programme promotes an integrated social development approach which seeks to link beneficiaries to complementary services in the health, education and agriculture ministries to provide free access to the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), free school uniforms and access to support for agriculture as well as linkages to micro-credit through the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection (MoGCSP).
LEAP is funded from general revenues of the Government of Ghana (50 per cent), donation from DFID and a loan from the World Bank. It is a flagship programme of Ghana NSPS and is implemented by the Department of Social Welfare (DSW) in the MoGCSP.
Eligibility is based on poverty and having household members in at least one of the three demographic categories designed by DSW – single parent with orphan or vulnerable child (OVC), elderly poor or a person with extreme disability unable to work (PWD). Initial selection of households is done through a community-based process and is verified centrally with a proxy means test.
How much one gets depends on the number of eligible beneficiaries of the family and ranges from GHc 48 for one beneficiary to GHc 90 for four or more beneficiaries. The caregiver of the family receives the money on behalf of all the members of the family and the cash is supposed to be for the benefit of all the members of the family even though only one person receives the cash.
The LEAP programme started in March 2008 reaching 1,654 beneficiary households in 21 selected districts. It then began expanding gradually in 2009 and 2010, and by July 2013, the programme had reached over 70,000 households across the country with an annual expenditure of approximately US$ 20m. By July 2014, a total of 72,780 beneficiary households of the LEAP programme in 100 districts in all the ten regions across the country had received GHc 9,128,896.
While 8,324 beneficiary households in nine districts from seven regions received their payments electronically, 64,456 were paid manually. The electronic payment is the ministry’s latest innovation in the cash transfer programme aimed at reducing transaction costs for government and recipient, faster payments and reconciliation after payments, reducing waiting and travel times for beneficiaries as well as promoting financial inclusion and supporting the trend of cashless transactions among others.
A significant number of 7,860 persons with disability households currently benefit from the bi-monthly cash grant transfer programme. As the programme expands to cover another 4,576 beneficiary households, this number of persons with severe disability and no production capacity is expected to increase.
Through the LEAP programme, government is improving the lives of its citizens, reducing the level of poverty in the nation and increasing the socio-economic standard. Many households and individuals have been able to provide for their basic needs and have access to education, health care and food. Beneficiaries have also had some financial capital to start small-scale business ventures for sustainable income to ultimately stay out of abject poverty.
It is significant to observe that many Sub-Saharan African Governments are now adopting social protection initiatives to reach the poorest people with income generation opportunities and cash transfers. The ultimate goal is to reduce poverty rate and to help make faster progress towards the Millennium Development Goals.
Since the launch of the programme in the country, studies have shown that LEAP is reaching the poorest households in particular; a World Bank study compared the targeting effectiveness of the main Social Protection Programmes in Ghana and found LEAP to be the most effective. As Ghana strives to attain improved economic status, it is important to ensure equitable and sustainable development towards a positive social change by putting in such interventions that would address issues of vulnerability and extreme poverty.
It is hoped that MoGCSP, which is mandated to co-ordinate the many pro-poor interventions in the country to improve the socio-economic status of poorest households in Ghana, would not relent in its efforts towards the implementation of the various government initiatives, programmes and policies to bring smiles onto the faces of the disadvantaged.
The writer is a journalist with the Information Services Department ( I. S. D.) of the Ministry of Communication.
