Social Protection for Inclusive Climate Action

Geneva – The FAO Liaison Office in Geneva and the Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division (ESP), in collaboration with partner agencies, organized a dialogue on Social Protection for Inclusive Climate Action as part of its Social Protection Dialogue Series, inviting Permanent Representations and Government officials, from Geneva and abroad.

Socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis have caused disruptions in agrifood systems, revealing huge gaps in the coverage and responsiveness of social protection systems, particularly for the 1.1 billion people in poverty who live and work in rural areas. In her introduction, Lauren Phillips, Deputy Director of FAO’s Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division mentioned the role of social protection in both protecting individuals from vulnerabilities related to climate and also in contributing to more sustainable agriculture and natural resource management practices. She deplored that “despite these clear linkages, there is still a need for increased coherence between social protection and climate adaptation policies in agrifood systems.”

Country examples from India and Malawi

Speakers From Malawi and India provided concrete examples of efforts made by their respective countries to strengthen and expand social protection systems as a core ingredient of strategies seeking to promote more resilient, inclusive, sustainable and efficient agrifood systems.

Dr Bessie Muasa, Chief Economist of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs of Malawi, provided a direct account of Malawi’s experience in designing climate sensitive social protection programmes. She explained that the Public Work Programs (PWP) is grounded in adaptive social protection, as it links social protection, climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction. Beneficiaries of the PWP receive cash transfers for contributing to natural resource management activities, and are also linked to complementary activities such as savings and loans groups to increase their enhanced adaptive capacity to manage risks, including those deriving from climate change.

Professor Ravindranath, from the Indian Institute of Science and author of many IPCC reports, presented a critical assessment of India’s National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), the world’s largest social security and rural employment programme, in terms of the opportunities and challenges for both strengthening resilient livelihoods for poor rural communities and for enhancing climate change adaptation efforts. He stressed that quantified evidence of environmental and socioeconomic benefits of NREGS shows enhanced adaptive capacities of recipient households, and a reduction in their vulnerability to climate risks.

Geneva-based partners share their experience

Dr Bailey, Manager of the Climate-responsive Social Protection and Climate-Health Nexus Lead at the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre, shared how social protection can enable inclusivity in climate action and what the evidence at hand is so far. They provided the example of the Nepal Social Security Allowance, in which the integration of climate information services, and of a dashboard for monitoring hazards and vulnerability, enabled to better target recipients in advance and after extreme events.

Christina Dankmeyer, Social Protection and Climate Change Specialist at the International Labour Organization (ILO) emphasized the growing recognition in the climate community of the role of social protection and stated that “we will not succeed in climate action unless we address the socioeconomic impacts deriving from climate change. We will not succeed in closing social protection gaps, unless we consider the current and future impacts of climate change.”

Finally, Marco Knowles, FAO Senior Policy Officer noted than only 1.7 percent of climate financing is benefiting small-scale food producers, and that the case studies where social protection is being used to support adaptation and enable resilient livelihoods are limited. Regarding financing, he stressed the need to recognize social protection as a priority action to support climate change adaptation and pointed to the need to invest in adaptation.

FAO Geneva Social Protection Dialogue Series

FAO Liaison Office in Geneva and the Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division (ESP) regularly organize the Social Protection Dialogue Series to raise awareness on the role of social protection as a key instrument for poverty reduction and inclusive growth in rural areas, and in turn as a key instrument for achieving the objectives and targets of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. It stresses the need to increase investments at domestic and international levels to expand social protection coverage, adequacy and comprehensiveness and thus contribute to more resilient and sustainable rural livelihoods.

Contact

Anna Ricoy, Liaison Officer, FAO Liaison Office in Geneva (FAOLOG)
[email protected]

Marco Knowles, Senior Social Protection Officer, FAO Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division (ESP)
[email protected]

Related links

- FAO social protection website