Social Protection Podcast

The UN General Assembly has declared 2022 as the International Year of Artisanal Fisheries and Aquaculture (IYAFA 2022) to enhance global awareness and promote collaboration around the theme. To provide guidance for related initiatives, the IYAFA Action Plan was structured around seven pillars, including social and environmental sustainability. Social protection can provide valuable contributions...

In this episode, we are talking about social protection and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent triple crisis of food, energy and finance have set back progress towards the SDGs. Social protection is seen as an SDG accelerator that can contribute to many, even most of the SDG targets from ending poverty and hunger to improving gender equality and a...

Targeting is one of the most widely debated topics in social protection. Who should receive support from social protection systems? How do we identify the ‘right’ people, and reach them? The way countries choose to target programmes involves weighing up a complex set of issues, including cost and coverage, the likely degree of ‘error’ over who is excluded and included, the need to respond dynamica...

What do social protection systems need to look like to promote inclusion, autonomy and participation for people with disabilities? Cash transfers are certainly important to meet basic living costs, as well the ‘extra’ costs that people with disabilities often need to pay just to access essential services. However, people with disabilities also have high needs for healthcare, assistive devices, and...

In this episode, we will tackle the elephant in the room when it comes to discussions around universal approaches to social protection: financing. While high- and middle-income countries are in a better position to increase the share of domestic resources allocated to social protection, either through taxation, social contributions, etc., a considerable number of countries lack the means for domes...

Last month, we had a bonus episode about the conflict in Ukraine, and how social protection systems could support a fast-growing refugee crisis. As we enter the seventh week of the conflict, the challenge of supporting both the population staying and fleeing deepens. However, this episode carries a glimmer of hope: today, we are talking to specialists who are making the most of social protection s...

This month, we celebrate our first year of the Social Protection Podcast. Over 16 episodes, we have explored controversial ideas like Universal Basic Income, dived deep on landmark programmes like Bolsa Familia and explored the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on social protection systems worldwide. In this episode, we are talking about another ambitious agenda, Universal Social Protection or USP20...

Since the conflict in Ukraine broke out at the end of February, the world has witnessed the fastest growing refugee crisis since World War II, with over two million people – mostly women, children and the elderly- fleeing into neighbouring countries. The outpouring of voluntary support and solidarity for Ukrainian refugees has been remarkable. But for those without family and friends in the region...

This is the second of a two-part series about UBI. You can find the first episode here .    This month we continue our discussion on the Universal Basic Income (UBI), a radical idea to extend regular, unconditional cash benefits to everyone. The UBI challenges certain social protection orthodoxies, for example by providing an equal amount of support to all, independent of needs, and by removing ob...

This is the first episode of a two-part series about UBI. You can find the second episode here .    The first episode of the year in the Social Protection Podcast brings a radical proposal for extending social protections: the Universal Basic Income, or UBI. Fundamentally, a universal basic income is a benefit provided in cash without conditions to everyone. It is a large topic that has been gener...

It's December and we've made it to the end of 2021. This was another year dominated by COVID-19 in the field of social protection - and we've certainly spent plenty of time talking about that on this show. But while we were preoccupied with the pandemic, what else did we see happening in the social protection world? In this episode, we bring three guests to spotlight non-COVID related news, papers...

We like our metaphors in social protection. We talk about safety nets, even ropes and ladders, to catch people as they fall into poverty, and help them climb out of it. In this episode we’re talking about Social Protection Floors - the nationally defined set of social protection systems that provide basic health and income support guarantees to all citizens. The crisis created by COVID-19 has shon...

The COVID-19 pandemic has created unprecedented challenges for people and governments worldwide, as well as massive new demands for social protection. It has also sparked an  extraordinary collective effort  to track developments in the field. socialprotection.org has played a role in that collective effort, hosting a dedicated  online community   webinars ,  papers , and  conferences  devoted to...

The COVID-19 pandemic has created unprecedented challenges for people and governments all over the world, as well as massive new demands for social protection. It has also sparked an  extraordinary collective effort  to track social protection development. Our team at socialprotection.org has played a role in that collective effort, hosting a dedicated  online community   webinars ,  papers , and ...

Once in a while, a social protection programme becomes famous. Whether because they are efficient, ground-breaking, innovative - or quite the opposite - , these programmes somehow become part of the popular imagery, serving as an international reference of what to do (or not to do). These top-of-mind programmes have been researched and evaluated thoroughly for many years, but while you may know th...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In the months of June and July, the Social Protection Podcast is hosting a special series in partnership with ODI and GIZ. Across six episodes, our guest host Francesca Bastagli, Director of the Equity and Social Policy programme and Principal Research Fellow at ODI, will moderate conversations around the guiding question: “Covid-19: a turning point for social protection?”. These six episodes are...

In March, the United States brought in a temporary, near-universal child benefit as part of the American Rescue Plan, enacted as a response to COVID-19. Many in government are pushing to make it permanent, and that would make it a significant change in US social policy. But, of course, child-focused social protection benefits are relatively common in other countries, including lower and middle inc...

In this episode, we’re talking about economic inclusion. Economic inclusion programmes typically target the poorest people and seek to address the many barriers to escaping poverty by providing multiple, complementary interventions. These generally include providing cash transfer assets, but also training, mentoring, access to finance and so on. These programmes are increasing in popularity as evi...

This month, March, marks a year since COVID-19 swept over the globe, and triggered the first waves of closures and lockdowns in many countries. It has been a big year for social protection, as governments, international organisations and communities raced to extend safety nets to the many millions of people who lost work or became more vulnerable due to the pandemic.   In our first episode of the...

This is a teaser for our first episode which will launch on March 26. Subscribe now so you don't miss it! If you have discovered this podcast, you probably already know that the last year has been big for social protection. Worldwide, governments, international organisations and communities raced to extend safety nets to the many millions of people who lost work or became more vulnerable due to CO...