Ms Mawusi Agbo is an extremely poor 48-year-old unemployed woman from Pokrom Nsabaah in the Eastern Region. She said “because of my disability no one even wants to give me a place to farm in this village.

“When I first moved here, I wanted to begin a farm, but no one would give me land. I have three children now. Last year, I started going to people’s homes to sweep so I could get something to eat with my children. Sometimes I get. Sometimes I don’t.

“Many of the people whose homes I used to sweep say the disease (COVID-19) has destroyed their work. If they don’t get money how can I also get? LEAP gives me GH¢64 every two months. Whenever that money comes, it’s a lifesaver.”

This is one of the many testimonies of over 1.5 million extremely poor Ghanaians from 344,023 households in the country who are benefiting from the government’s Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) programme.

The LEAP, which is a social intervention programme, is a bi-monthly cash transfer system which also provides access to health insurance to extremely poor households across the country to alleviate short-term poverty and encourage long-term human capital development.

The money paid to beneficiaries vary based on the composition of the household. One eligible member household receives GH¢64, while two eligible member households receive GH¢76.

Households with three eligible members receive GH¢88, while those with four eligible members receive the highest amount which is GH¢106 under the programme,

Cash transfer

The programme’s first disbursement of cash grants was done in March 2008, with 1,654 households in 21 pilot districts paid. Prior to the introduction of the LEAP programme, the Department of Social Welfare with support from UNICEF was implementing a National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) project through which health insurance premiums were paid for Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC), especially those orphaned by HIV and AIDS in 21 districts.

These 21 districts were, therefore, adopted for the implementation of the LEAP programme through a pilot process.

In 2009, the programme expanded its reach to 54 districts. This was brought about as a result of the expansion of the eligibility criteria to include extremely poor households with elderly persons aged 65 years and above and without productive capacity as well as persons with severe disabilities.

The LEAP programme embarked on an expansion drive to target and enrol an additional 50,000 households onto the programme in 2016. This was to ensure that the programme met its target of 250,000 households enrolled by the end of 2016.

Eligibility is based on extreme poverty and having a household member in at least one of the four vulnerability categories: orphan or vulnerable child (OVC), elderly above 65 years without support, persons with extreme disability who are unable to work (PWD) and pregnant women and children below one year.

Social protection tool

Social protection is an effective tool for addressing poverty and vulnerability and for promoting improvements in livelihoods, and according to the Social Policy Specialist of UNICEF, Mrs Christiana Gbedemah, that was what Ghana’s LEAP programme was currently achieving.

Social protection programmes have been shown to have significant long-term, transformative impacts on households and entire countries, as they have become an effective and efficient poverty reduction tool across the developing world in recent decades.

Today, millions of people across Africa, Asia and Latin America are better off because they have been supported by various social protection programmes.

UNICEF believes that social protection schemes contribute to the creation of a healthy and educated population that directly contributes to economic growth; the creation of a cushion against economic shocks that households and a country may experience and the eradication of poverty, as well as the associated risks that households living in poverty face, such as hunger, poor health, violence and exploitation.

With the onset of COVID-19 in 2019, UNICEF estimates that globally, 190 countries including Ghana scaled up or implemented new social protection programmes to protect people from the negative socio-economic impacts of the pandemic.

Surveys over the years have shown that LEAP improves outcomes in food security, health and education – particularly among the poorest and according to a 2014 LEAP Impact Evaluation, since the programme began, households have increased their consumption by 67 per cent, using the transfer to improve both the quantity and quality of food.

Among some of the positive testimonies that the programme has are an impact on maternal health, such as increased likelihood of accessing antenatal care and improved rates of exclusive breastfeeding.

Those impacts, according to the 2014 LEAP Impact Evaluation, extended beyond individual households and also created broader positive impacts in their communities, adding that for each Ghana cedi invested in the LEAP programme, there was an estimated GH¢2.5 generated in the local economy.

LEAP yet to reach target

Ghana has made significant progress in reaching millions of citizens with different social protection programmes.

However, a large number of eligible Ghanaians are yet to benefit from the LEAP programme and this is evidently so as the Ghana Living Standard Survey seven (GLSS 7) report shows that 23.4 per cent of Ghanaians live in poverty and an estimated 8.2 per cent in extreme poverty, translating into 6.8 million and 2.4 million people respectively.

Mrs Gbedemah in an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic on Ghana's social protection, with a focus on LEAP, said that showed that LEAP had significant coverage gaps and that so far it had reached 1.5 million extremely poor people, leaving a total of 900,000 others who were waiting to be enrolled onto the programme.

Also, although it is a common perception that social protection is not affordable, Ghana, however, is said to spend much less than its neighbours and other like countries, especially on social assistance.

Giving some statistics, Mrs Gbedemah said in 2018, Ghana spent 1.04 per cent of GDP on social protection, which is significantly lower than the Sub-Saharan Africa average of 5.9 per cent, adding that social protection spending in middle-income countries, as a percentage of GDP, was between 6.7 per cent to 8.7 per cent. She noted that this had implications for scaling up social protection programmes to all eligible Ghanaians.

Another source of worry is whether LEAP will continue to be able to help eliminate household poverty as the 2022 budget indicated. The Finance Minister, Mr Ken Ofori- Atta, said the LEAP programme had paid five cycles of cash grants to 344,023 households and registered 76 per cent of all beneficiaries onto the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), adding that "in 2022, Government will facilitate the disbursement of the bi-monthly cash grants to beneficiaries."

This statement has, however, become a source of concern to many as according to them, the Finance Minister was not emphatic as to whether the cash grant will be increased to reflect the changes in purchasing power and also if the scope will be broadened to rope in more eligible beneficiaries who are in dire need of this social intervention.

According to Mrs Gbedemah, social protection was more than poverty reduction as it protected all Ghanaians when they needed it, saying that every Ghanaian at a point would need some form of social protection from birth, childhood, adolescence, working life, pregnancy, adult life or in their old age.

Testimonies

Monica Darkoaa, a 49-year-old woman who lives at Atwakan village in the Ga South District in the Greater Accra Region, said thanks to the money “I invested, my children are healthy and they all attend school".

Her story is that when her husband died she had to look after their three children. A couple of years ago, her eldest son also passed away, leaving a wife and two children behind.

As her daughter-in-law went to live with her parents, Monica had no choice but to adopt her two grandchildren.

Most households in Atwakan live off the land and Monica is no exception. But as she took on two extra mouths to feed, she quickly realised that her farming activities were no longer sufficient to cope with the food, health and education needs of her family.

If she were to fulfil her children's educational aspirations, she urgently needed to invest in an activity that would generate more income.

Monica, a beneficiary of the LEAP programme, receives GH¢60 every two months for the two orphans she is looking after.

"The first time I received a cash transfer from LEAP, I invested the money in a provisions store. With the profit I made, I was able to buy school supplies for the children," she said.

Further cash grants helped her buy cassava sticks and maize seeds to increase the output of her farm.

The programme has empowered Monica to make her own decisions and plan for the future of her family. "Prior to being enrolled with LEAP, I was farming on a very small scale. I could not afford looking after all my children and was struggling with food and school supplies", she recalls. "Now with the money I make from the shop, I have been able to expand my farm by hiring labourers. I am pleased that all the children are healthy, and they attend school regularly".

Another beneficiary, 25-year-old Faustina Ametefe, from the Odom community, also in the Ga South District was born with many physical challenges and has never been able to walk. Though her parents were too poor to afford her siblings' school fees, they each found a way to pay for their education and subsequently left for the big city. Faustina did not dream of finding the money, since she would not have had a chance to attend school anyway, as there were no facilities for people with disabilities.

But the 25-year-old does not feel sorry for herself, nor is she afraid of hard work. "I used to gather, crack and sell palm kernels," she recalls. "On average, it would take me two weeks to collect a large tin of nuts, which I would sell for GHC7 at the market". The painful and tedious labour barely enabled her to survive.

For the past few years Faustina has been enrolled on LEAP, however, the programme has had a significant impact on her life. "Before LEAP, I used to struggle to get through the month, just selling palm kernels. Life was so hard", she recounts. "Now, with the money that I collect from the agent every two months, I am able to buy food and some basic household items such as soap or cooking ingredients".

Faustina did not just stop there, as she saw an opportunity to start a small business. "I decided to invest some of the money in the retailing of gari and kerosene.

In the morning my mother buys the items for me on the market, and in the evening I sell them outside my house for a profit". And since she is far-sighted, Faustina has also been saving some money in a bank account. "Just in case one day, with my physical condition I become unable to work and need to look after myself", she explained.

Nowadays, in a good month, Faustina makes a profit of about GHC60, with a much less labour-intensive job. Through her choices, and with the help of the LEAP money, she has been able to see returns on her investments and improved her living conditions, while reducing the toll on her body. "With my limited mobility", Faustina concludes, "it is important that I find activities that allow me to earn money and not depend on others. I am so thankful for this programme".

Changing lives

To ensure that LEAP makes a positive and lasting impact on the extremely poor in society, Mrs Gbedemah says UNICEF believes that there is the need for the number of persons currently on the programme to be scaled up so as to cover the number of people who have been left behind according to the GLSS 7.

Also, UNICEF, she says, believes that there is the need for the government to be more proactive in the payment of the cash grant on time to enable beneficiaries to plan their lives around it so that it will not push those who are already extremely poor into adopting negative coping strategies and erode the gains made over the years.

This concern of UNICEF ties in with a recent press statement, where SEND GHANA said the erratic payment of grants affected the consumption of the pattern of beneficiaries and impacted negatively on their livelihoods which has been exacerbated by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

UNICEF’s third concern on how to make LEAP a tool that will help eliminate household poverty is that there is the need for the cash grant to be increased periodically. This is because an amount that was given some years ago is currently not worth the same amount due to inflation.

To back this point, a survey by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) on the impact of COVID-19 on the social and economic lives of Ghanaians, revealed that approximately 22 million people had been affected by reduced household income; 77 per cent of households are reported to be severely affected by an increase in prices of food, and more than half, that is 52 per cent of households, have experienced reduced food consumption.

As COVID-19 has come to stay and is affecting the lives of many extremely poor Ghanaians such as Mawusi which has worsened the poverty situation of many more people , it behoves the government to ensure that the Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection is well resourced to increase the amount given to beneficiaries and also rope in more of the extremely poor in society so that they can also be cushioned by this timely cash grant to better their lives.