“Social protection is important. Aging is irreversible, and the aged depend on the young. That’s why we plan, and we are happy that the government has reduced the eligibility of SAGE beneficiaries from 80 to 65 years, and increased the fund from sh25,000 to 35,000.”
Thirty Suspects Including Headteachers, Schools Inspectors Remanded Over PLE Malpractice
The Regional Director, Human Development for East Asia and the Pacific Region at the World Bank, Daniel Dulitziky, has hailed the Government of Uganda for revising the age of Social Assistance Grants for Empowerment (SAGE) beneficiaries from 80 to 65 years.
Dulitziky who had last Friday led a World Bank delegation to Uganda, was attending a high-level meeting at the Ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development (MGLSD) where he said the development is a big step forward.
Dulitziky praised MGLSD for the role they continue to play towards social protection, and called for the development of a social registry as a mechanism to identify the most vulnerable and least affluent elderly and target those, noting that whenever people talk of Uganda, they recognize it as a country for a youthful population, but that the elderly are also many as they account for close to 2.5 million people, which is not a small number.
Uganda has the second youngest population globally, with 73.5% of the people aged 30 and below, whereas 5% are aged 60 years and above.
While delivering remarks on behalf of Minister of Gender, Labour and Social Development, Betty Amongi, State Minister for the Elderly Dominic Gidudu Mafwabi thanked the World Bank for their continued support to Uganda’s various development, social protection and skilling programmes.
He told the delegation that Uganda’s informal sector is big because there are no jobs. “Everyone is trying to survive. That’s why the Ministry comes in to identify these people and organise them into a productive force,” he said.
Gidudu added that the Government of Uganda is committed to improving productivity, creating employment for young people, and building a social protection system for sustainable livelihoods.
“Only NRM Will Protect Uganda From Replicating Instabilities in Neighbouring Countries” Museveni
This, he said, is demonstrated through implementing programmes such as SAGE, Generating Growth Opportunities and Productivity for Women Enterprises (GROW), Youth Livelihood Programme (YLP), Supporting Jua-Kali (Informal Sector) Enterprises to Transition into the Formal Economy (SENTE), and National Apprenticeships and Graduate Volunteer (NAGV), among others.
The minister requested the World Bank and other development partners to support priority areas such as strengthening evidence generation, expanding entrepreneurship support and employment creation programmes especially for youth, and expanding coverage of social protection across the life cycle including building transformative social protection delivery systems such as the Social Registry, Payment Systems, and Management Information Systems (MIS), among others.
“Social protection is important. Aging is irreversible, and the aged depend on the young. That’s why we plan, and we are happy that the government has reduced the eligibility of SAGE beneficiaries from 80 to 65 years, and increased the fund from sh25,000 to 35,000.”
The Commissioner for Labour, Industrial Relations and Productivity Alex Asiimnwe who represented the PS Aggrey Kibenge told the delegation that to address unemployment, the government is focusing on strengthening evidence generation through undertaking job and productivity diagnostics, public expenditure reviews, modelling and impact evaluations; expanding entrepreneurship support and employment creation programmes especially for the youth; and improving productivity and competitiveness for the youth workforce and better labour market transitions, among other interventions.
“It is good that the World Bank is leading on skills and evidence production,” he said. He recognized the burden on school dropouts and called for skilling so that such youth can enter the labour market, and also appealed for a collective responsibility with government agencies and development partners to spur skilling and enhance productivity.
In agreement with Asiimwe was Pedro Cerdan, Lead Economist, Education and Skills at the World Bank who said that when someone drops out of school, all they need is skilling so they can be brought into the job system.
