By Spy Uganda
The Minister for Gender, Labour and Social Development on Thursday June 18, 2020, based in Tooro Sub-region to launch Social Assistance Grant (SAGE) phase 11, a government programme aimed at helping elderly people in Uganda.
Shortly after launching the programme at a function that was attended by a few elderly people because of the Ministry of Health guidelines that prohibit the gathering of many people, Minister Tumwebaze tweeted thus;
“HAPPY to launch today the universal roll-out of #SAGE ( Social Assistance Grant ) in Fort Portal to cover all the 135 districts of Uganda by including those districts that weren’t covered in the initial pilot.
The older persons are getting paid all their 6 months arrears. Arrears were accumulated because of the #COVID19 disruptions which affected payments. #Govt thru the #ministryofgender has provided Shs107b for #SAGE in 20/21 Financial Year, to cover all the older persons of 80+ yrs (with National IDs ) in all the 135 districts of Uganda.”
He added that “By end of the next financial year & universal roll-out, Slightly over 350,000 older persons in the country will be enrolled on to the #SAGE payroll. #SAGE is one of the social protection programms prioritised & pledged in the #NRM manifesto of 2016-2021. Ministry of Gender is grateful to H.E @KagutaMuseveni , @Parliament_Ug & the Social sector development partners for supporting and prioritizing this programme. #StaySafeUg.”
As part of the implementation of the Expanding Social Protection programme (ESPP) the Ugandan government aims to reduce chronic poverty and improve life chances for poor people. The Uganda Social Assistance Grants for Empowerment (SAGE) pilot programme is a key element of the ESPP and tests a range of implementation modalities to determine an efficient, cost-effective and scalable social transfer.
The two targeting methods used are:
1- the Vulnerable Family Support Grant (VFSG); and
2- the Senior Citizens Grant (SCG).
The VFSG employs a composite index measuring vulnerability to determine eligibility, whereas the SCG uses age only (all those above 65 years, or 60 years in Karamoja region, are eligible).
Under the VFSG, adult women are the recipient of the transfer, and for the SCG the transfer is given to the specific older person. For both grants, the transfer is worth UGX25,000 per month and is paid every two months.
The impact evaluation (OPM 2016) used a mixed-methods approach and assessed the impact of the SAGE pilot programme for the two targeting methodologies across four dimensions: reducing material deprivation; increasing economic security; reducing social exclusion; and increasing access to services.
The impact evaluation found evidence that SAGE has improved welfare under both targeting methods. Consumption poverty has decreased, with the poverty headcount declining by some 8 percentage points.
The poverty gap and the severity of poverty also decreased for the VFSG group (by 2 per cent and 1 per cent, respectively). SAGE also increased expenditure on food for both targeting mechanisms by around UGX9,000 for both groups, leading to reduced reported hunger for the SCG group, and improved diet for the VFSG group.
SCG households also reported reduced reliance on others and an increase in dignity, while VFSG households mentioned an improvement in their experience of poverty and an increase in subjective well-being.
SAGE improved economic security through a positive impact on livestock ownership for both groups (a 7.8 per cent increase for SCG, 16.7 per cent for VFSG), as well as increases in the purchases and sales of livestock in the last 12 months for the VFSG group (33.7 per cent and 8.3 per cent, respectively).
There was also a positive impact on households’ ability to borrow a large amount of money in an emergency, which is a key coping mechanism for households when facing shocks. However, SAGE did not cause dependence, with no impact on labour participation or livelihood activities. Child labour rates were unchanged too.
