Enquiries, comments and suggestions for November 2009 should be directed to the address shown in (1).
Major findings8 5.1 Social Grants8 5.3 Inactive Grant Status11 5.4 Social Grant Application12 5.5 Gender 13 5.6 Marital Status1314 5.7 Citizenship14 5.
Based on data extracted from the SOCPEN system on 31 November 2009, Child Support Grant accounts for the highest proportion of grants, followed by Old Age Grant, and Disability Grant. The War Veteran Grant accounts for the least proportion of grants.
SASSA has managed to reach 478,046 children aged 1417. This is a significant increase of 12,323 from the October 2009 dataset of 465,723. The data suggest that SASSA is implementing its policy effectively to make social grant accessible to those children.
All the regions are still having backlogs in terms of approving applications received or capture on a month.
Most of the beneficiaries prefer to receive their grants through the cash payment method, as compared to the use of electronic payment method. However, North West and Mpumalanga regions are the only provinces were the use of electronic method of payment is increasing and is effective. The voucher payment method is only being used in Mpumalanga and Limpopo regions.
KZN region has the most cases of suspended Child Support Grant.
1.1 Monitoring and Evaluation Department of SASSA produces monthly statistical reports on the social assistance programme based on data sets extracted from the SOCPEN system. This is a routine monthly statistical report produced for the month of November 2009 based on individual level records of all social grants and beneficiaries.
1.2 The Department uses various methods of statistical techniques to analyse the results using the SAS programme. However, the method used for the analysis of the results are either univariate or bivariate. The presentation of the analysis is in the form of observed frequencies, frequency proportions, averages, bar chats, pie charts and histograms.
Since, SASSA manage the quality of social services to eligible and potential beneficiaries effectively and efficiently through paying the right social grant to the right person at the right time and place. It has been deemed necessary for Monitoring and Evaluation Department to produce statistical report, with the purpose of depicting the status quo of social grants transfers disbursed by the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) during the month of November 2009. However, the regions and provinces will be used interchangeably.
2.1 The report is intended to serve as a reference material to stakeholders such as the Executive Management and staff of SASSA, research and academic institutions interested in the social assistance programme as well as the general public.
3.1 Monitoring and Evaluation Department of SASSA has established that as a result of SOCPEN system not having mandatory fields on variables, the quality of raw data, will always be subjective. That is, in some of the results such as disaggregating by gender and age, missing and unknown values were encountered.
to qualify for old age grant.
Beneficiary Refers to any person who receives social assistance in terms of Sections 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 or 13 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Care Dependency Grant Refers to a grant paid to a parent or a foster parent in respect of a care dependent child in terms of Section 7 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Care Dependent Child Refers to a child between the ages of 0 and 18 years who require and receives permanent home care due to his or her severe mental or physical disability.
Child/children Refers to any person under the age of 18 years.
Child Grant Refers to child support grant, care dependency grant, and Foster Child Grant.
Child Support Grant Refers to a grant paid to a primary caregiver of a child who satisfies the criteria in terms of Section 6 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Disability Grant Refers to a grant paid to a disabled person in terms of Section 9 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Foster Child Grant Refers to a grant paid to a foster parent in terms of Section 8 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Foster Child Refers to any child who has been placed in the custody of a foster parent in terms of Chapter 3 or 6 of the Child Care Act, 1983 (Act No 74 of 1983) or Section 290 of the Criminal Procedure Act of 1977 (Act No 51 of 1977).
Foster Parent Refers to any person, except a parent of the child concerned, in whose custody a foster child has been placed under Chapter 3 or 6 of the Child Care Act of 1983, or Section 290 of the Criminal Procedure Act of 1977, or a tutor to whom a letter of tutorship has been issued in terms of Chapter IV of the Administration of Estates Act of 1965 (Act No 66 of 1965).
Grant in Aid Refers to a grant paid to a person who satisfies the criteria in terms of Section 12 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Older Person Refers to any person who has, according to the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004) attained the prescribed age in accordance to Sections 10 (a) or (b).
Old Age Grant Refers to a social grant paid to an aged person in terms of Section 10 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (No 13 of 2004).
Parent Refers to the legal parent of a child as defined in the Child Care Act of 1983 (Act No 74 of 1974).
War Veteran Grant Refers to a grant paid to a person who satisfies the criteria in terms of Section 11 of the Social Assistance Act of 2004 (Act No 13 of 2004).
Social Grants are classified into Child Support Grant (CSG), Care Dependency Grant (CDG), Foster Child Grant (FCG), Disability Grant (DG), Old Age Grant (OAG), War Veteran's Grant (WVG) and Grant in Aid (GIA).
Table 1 provides a summary of social grants type by region. The table shows that a total of 13, 729, 049 South African people benefited from social grants as at 31 November 2009. KZN has the highest number of grants, followed by ECP and LIM regions respectively.
The table suggests that most of the beneficiaries are found in the most rural regions. This indicates that the rural regions need more intervention on eradicating or minimizing poverty. Northern Cape (NCP) has the lowest number of social grants. The information suggests that NCP have the lowest beneficiaries; and this could be because of its lowest total population or lack of accessing services that would enable them to register for social assistance grants.
Table 2 provides a summary of beneficiaries by social grant type and regions. The data reflects that there were 9,654,290 beneficiaries as at 31 November 2009. The table depicts that KZN, ECP, GAU and LIM regions has the highest number of beneficiaries who receive social grants respectively. NCP and FST regions have the lowest number of beneficiaries. This could be as a result of different demographic characteristics of the regions.
Figure 1, shows the transfers of social grant recipients by grant type and age category as at 31 November 2009. The graph shows that children aged between 04 year's accounts for the highest number of beneficiaries on CSG. Children between the ages 1820 are the least beneficiaries of all children's grants nationally. This data suggest that the age group 1820 years have not yet benefited more on the social grant system. This could be as a result of not qualifying based on SASSA means test. The data further depicts that SASSA has managed to reach 478,046 children aged 1417. This is a significant increase of 12,323 from the October 2009 dataset of 465,723. The data suggest that SASSA is implementing its policy effectively to make social grant accessible to those children.
Furthermore, the graph shows that adults aged between 65 and 79 years accounts for the highest number of beneficiaries receiving the OAG followed by adults aged between 6064 years. Adults aged 2135 years accounts for the least number of beneficiaries on adult grants. This might be because beneficiaries can only qualify for the DG and GIA within the adult grants.
Figure 2, summarises the number of inactive social grants by grant type and region as at 31 November 2009. The data shows that among the adult grants there are fewer numbers of beneficiaries that are declared deceased especially those receiving the DG and OAG. For the children's grants, KZN shows having the highest number of suspended grants among those receiving CSG and FCG followed by ECP and LIM regions. The data suggests that there are more beneficiaries in KZN whose grants are either suspended or the beneficiaries are deceased.
Figure 3, shows the number of applications captured and approved per month and within a day during the month of November 2009. The table shows that KZN and ECP regions accounts for the highest number of applications that were captured within a month. However, the data shows that 1 month approval is slightly lower than the application received or captured. This suggests that there is a backlog of approvals per month experienced in all the regions.
NCP region seems to be the least region that captures applications. The data shows that NCP region managed to approve 1,805 applications per month out of 2,971 applications captured. This data indicates serious backlogs of applications in all the regions. This further shows that the turnaround time set, has not been met.
Figure 4, shows the transfers by region and gender as at 31 November 2009. The graph shows that females in all the regions accounts for the highest number of social grant beneficiaries as compared to their male counterparts. The graph further shows a small number of unspecified beneficiaries in terms of their gender classification.
Figure 5, summarises the number of social grant type by marital status during the month of November 2009. The graph indicates the never married beneficiaries who receive the DG and OAG accounts for the highest number in the country. However, the beneficiaries who are divorced, deserted, in customary marriages, permanently cohabiting and being paid lobola do not benefit much on the grants system as they account for the least numbers. The widows also account for the highest number of those receiving the OAG.
Figure 6, graph summarises the social grant recipients by citizenship and region as at November 2009. The graph suggests that most of the nonSouth Africans with the highest number of beneficiaries receiving social grants is mainly found in LIM, GAU and MPU regions. However, this number has increased as compared to the October 2009 dataset.
Figure 7, shows the number of beneficiary transfers by payment methods and regions as at 31 November 2009. The graph indicates the number of beneficiary transfers using electronic and cash grant payment method by region. The figure shows that GAU, KZN, ECP and LIM regions account for the highest number of beneficiaries using cash payment method. MPU and NWP are the least regions where the uses of electronic payment methods are effective. The voucher payment method is being used in the MPU and LIM regions effectively.
The information on the table suggests that, there is a need to promote the use of electronic payments with regions to minimize long queues experienced by beneficiaries and considering their illhealth. SASSA must consider the fact that pension robberies are experienced by the beneficiaries and the use of electronic method could minimize such robberies. The GAU region requires the promotion on the use of electronic payment method as it is more urbanised with the entire infrastructure. The electronic systems can be easily accessible.