UN Partner Agencies Increase Synergy with the Ministry of Social Affairs in Adaptive Social Protection Programs

JAKARTA (November 13, 2019) - Director General of Social Protection and Security, Harry Hikmat received an audience from representatives of UN Partner Agencies consisting of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN-OCHA), United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and World Food Program (WFP) led by Fernando Carrera, Chief of Cluster Social Policy, UNICEF Indonesia.

On this occasion, Fernando said that the Ministry of Social Affairs is the main partner in the social protection program which is the entry point in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Therefore, Fernando emphasized that this UN Partner Agency will fully support the Ministry of Social Affairs collaboratively in relation to social protection programs, especially adaptive social protection programs.

Indonesia's position which is on the Ring of Fire, causes people living in disaster-prone areas to have a great potential to be included in the vulnerable underprivileged groups.

No less than 2,300 disasters occur every year. For this reason, government policies and disaster management based on social protection need to be supported and further strengthened by involving all related components.

This is in line with several SDGs goals, namely reducing poverty, building inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable cities and settlements, and combating climate change and its impacts, according to the SDGs action plan in points 1, 11 and 13.

"The Ministry of Social Affairs highly appreciates this support," said Harry.

But all of this, he continued, in order to run in an integrated and synergized manner, it must be in line with existing government policies so that the strengthening that is carried out is sustainable.

One of the impacts of natural disasters is triggering the birth of new poverty.

"The victims affected by the disaster who lost their property, lost their source of livelihood, of course, immediately entered the new poor group," said Harry.

This has a broad impact, for that the government has made safety net efforts in order to minimize the greater impact.

One of them is by including heavily affected victims as recipients of adaptive social protection. This program, said Harry in front of the UN partnership agencies who were present, had been running in the last earthquake in Lombok and Central Sulawesi.

In a disaster perspective, especially in the area of contingency planning, Harry hopes that Fernando and his team can describe the social protection system scheme through a cash transfer program, along with its analysis, for example the minimum aid index, budget availability, distribution mechanisms, accountability, monitoring and evaluation to build a sustainable system. , is consolidated and there is synergy between the government and the four UN partner agencies.

A joint workshop is needed related to understanding the SDGs and social protection in a comprehensive manner that can be carried out by the UN partnership agency by inviting all internal parties in the Ministry of Social Affairs as a first step to common perceptions.

Then, this step needs to be continued with a workshop with synergized actors, including the National Development Agency (Bappenas), the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB), the Ministry of Environment and Forestry (KLHK), the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG), Coordinating Ministry for Human Development and Culture (Kemenko PMK), Ministry of Home Affairs (Kemendagri), and other institutions / NGOs.

Supporting the government in strengthening the social protection system, this means being in line with the government's targets for disaster management as stated in the 2015-2019 National Medium Term Development Plan (RPJMN) related to disaster risk reduction.

Meanwhile, the support provided by four partners of UN Partner Agencies for adaptive social protection programs in Indonesia is planned in the form of funding, human resource enhancement and regulation, including helping to build a database system that is integrated with NIK in calculating the number of disaster victims during a disaster. Fernando said this in front of the Director General of Social Protection and Security and his staff.

Also present at the hearing were the Director of Social Protection for Natural Disaster Victims (PSKBA), Rachmat Koesnadi and the Head of the Sub-Directorate for Preparedness and Mitigation of the PSKBA Directorate, Tetri Darwis.