Exiting Poverty in Rwanda (Social Protection) Exiting Poverty in Rwanda (Social Protection) Exiting Poverty in Rwanda program supports social protection transfers under the Government of Rwanda’s social protection program and a long-term Technical Assistance facility (TA) to support the implementation of GoR’s social protection policy and strategy. The expected outcome of the program is to “enhance the resilience of vulnerable men, women and children and of the social protection system that helps sustain them” Exiting Poverty in Rwanda syfte är att stärka Rwandas möjligheter att genomföra sin nationella strategi för social trygghet samt utöka stödet till fattiga och extremt fattiga människor i Rwanda. The programs expected impact is: Extreme poverty eradicated, and poverty levels reduced in Rwanda.

The programs key outcome is: The resilience of vulnerable men, women and children and of the social protection systems that help sustain them enhanced.  

Through a financial contribution and technical assistance to the Rwandan national social protection system, the program will support expanded coverage under the Vision Umurenge Program (VUP) to support poor and extreme poor households not covered by the program and contribute to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the of social protection instruments, delivery systems and graduation support packages to increase impact and help households exit poverty.

The three proposed key outputs for the program are:

(1) Improved access to more effective social protection for vulnerable groups, including in response to shocks through:

Cash Transfers targeting the most vulnerable: (i) the scale up of Nutrition Sensitive Direct Support (NSDS) for improved nutrition outcomes for the poorest. Targeting pregnant women and children under 2, the program will enable 100% of those eligible to be reached nationally or approximately 160,000 additional households. This instrument includes conditions on recipients to access healthcare support during/after pregnancy and receive additional information on nutrition and sanitation; (ii) expanded Direct Support for people with disabilities (PwD) - adding a new category of people caring for PwD and around 40,000 households.

Shock-responsive social protection: responding to national data on the scale of destruction to assets and savings as a result of climate-related shocks, the program will support the development of a system that is able to respond and adapt to households needs after a climate-related shock in order to protect livelihood gains from being eroded.

Climate-sensitive and Expanded Public Works (PW): (i) modest expansion of Expanded Public Works focused on labor-constrained households (mainly women with caring responsibilities), covering up to 36,000 additional households; (ii) support to around 30,000 households through climate-sensitive public works that will focus on the poorest regions most affected by climate and other shocks.

(2) Strengthened linkages between social protection and complementary services that enable sustainable graduation from extreme poverty through:

Multi-Sectoral Graduation Package: building on an initial pilot on interventions aimed at supporting people to graduate  or exit  from poverty, this program will support future pilots that explore the best packages required to lift different groups of the population out of poverty, including investments and skills development providing livelihood support, access to markets, strengthened services (education and health), increased job opportunities to approximately 12,500 households with the potential to graduate from extreme poverty.

(3) The institutional capacity for evidence-based planning and social protection service delivery enhanced by:

1) Technical assistance to support the implementation of Government of Rwandas new social protection policy and strategy;

2) Implementation support for critical staff at central and district level to support social protection implementation;

3) Independent monitoring, evaluation, and analytical work to understand the impact of social protection for improved policy design, programming and delivery.

Key results to be delivered by 2026 include:

- 65,000 households (approximately 250,000 people) lifted out of extreme poverty by the last year of the program.

- Lives of at least 4,800 children saved due to improved nutrition.

- Improved targeting of People with Disabilities, increased level of climate-sensitive and shock responsive financing.