Summary of NASSCO-EU-ILO consultantion meeting held on Thursday 23rd July on Strengthening and Expanding the National Social Registry (NSR) as a shock-responsive social protection system in Nigeria
In order to involve key stakeholders in the designing stage of the full proposal under their upcoming collaboration, ILO, NASSCO and EU Nigeria organized an online stakeholder consultation meeting on Thursday July 23 2020 to introduce the project and ask for feedback. The meeting was opened by the Permanent Secretary from the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, disaster management and social development, Mr. Arabi Jalal who expressed appreciation to EU and ILO on the project towards achieving the mandate of the ministry and that of the President in lifting 100 million people out of poverty in Nigeria. Over 50 participants attended from development agencies such as EU, ILO, WB, UNDP, WHO, DFID, OXFAM, Action Contra la Faim (ACF) as well as government officials from NASSCO, Adamawa State Health Insurance Scheme and the Yobe state Ministry of Health etc. NECA, the Employers organization was represented by their Director General.
Participants were asked to focus on highlighting the projects strengths and weaknesses and think about maximizing impact of the project and the role their respective agencies could have in that. Main contributions in the debate came from Oxfam, NECA, the World Bank, ACF and the Centre of Health Education and highlighted the following issues, which the project team has incorporated in this proposal:
- Appreciation for the consultation session being organized at the planning stage of the project and emphasis on the need to continue an inclusive and participatory approach throughout the project.
- Need to move beyond the usual key stakeholders at federal level and involve state level actors in the project and NSR development in general to increase impact of the project. Make sure to use other efforts in the area of Social Protection, such as the Social Protection Sector Review to map and reach out to relevant stakeholders
- The project should focus on building capacity of NASSCO but also be mindful of the limited capacity at state level and organize training activities at different levels.
The project is very ambitious and should have a clear work-plan of roles and responsibilities including resource utilization. The work plan should speak to and take into account existing interventions by other donors including the World Bank and Unicef