Programme description

Title: Indo-German Social Security Programme
Commissioned by: German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)
Country: India
Lead executing agency: Ministry of Labour and Employment
Overall term: 2011 to 2014

Context

In India, social security benefits such as health care and old age pensions are restricted to employees in the organised sector. However, about 94 % of the labour force works in the unorganised sector, and the large majority of these workers do not have adequate social protection. Various ministries and other government agencies offer social security programmes, but benefit coverage is limited and relatively few workers in the unorganised sector or their families are included. These approaches are also uncoordinated and fragmentary. As they do not have adequate access to state mechanisms of social security, the workers in the unorganised sector and their dependants face a heightened threat of poverty resulting from illness, old age, accidents or death.

Objective

The social security system for employees in the informal sector and their families is improved.

Approach

The Indo-German Social Security Programme (IGSSP) provides strategic and procedural advice to the Ministry of Labour and Employment of the Government of India for the implementation of the Unorganised Sector Workers’ Social Security Act, and to help improve the social security system for workers in the unorganised sector and their families, especially those living below the poverty line. The programme supports the Government of India in three core areas: health insurance, old age pensions and life and accident insurance; a fourth component will promote coherence between different social security systems and support an Indo-German social policy dialogue. The programme will provide policy and strategy advice at the central level, and will carry out training, capacity development and quality management work at central and state levels. At the same time, on a smaller scale, it will also distribute some flexible start-up financing. The health insurance has been introduced in cooperation with private insurance companies, and these partnerships will be developed further in the course of the programme.

The cooperation with the Ministry of Labour and Employment and its subsidiary organisations includes:

• Direct advisory support for three social security schemes:
• the national Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) health insurance system under which poor families obtain access to basic health insurance with subsidised premium contributions
• the National Pension Scheme (NPS) – a contributions-based programme for old-age pensions aimed at people working in the informal sector
• the life and accident insurance programmes Janshree Bima Yojana (JBY) and Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY) that insure workers in the unorganised sector and their families against work-related accidents and injuries.
• Participation in the Worldwide Joint Learning Network along with many countries and development partners focusing on health. This platform not only helps countries learn from each other for the provision of universal health coverage, it also arranges financial support on a small-scale to different countries for specific activities. IGSSP is involved in the secretariat of the Network, together with few other organisations.
• Support for several ministries in creating a coherent social security system, complemented by activities to improve information and communication – currently, more than 100 social security programmes are administered by 11 different ministries; the coordination between them is inadequate and they are not achieving their social policy objectives
• Strategic policy advice, provided through an Indo-German professional dialogue on social policy – the programme will include one to two bilateral social policy forums; these exchanges will help to establish a network of experts on which the programme can draw as its work progresses.

The lead executing agency is the Directorate General for Labour Welfare at the Indian Ministry of Labour and Employment, which is the body politically responsible for implementing the Unorganised Sector Workers’ Social Security Act. Along with its subordinate labour departments at the state level, and the executing organisations, this is the main programme partner. Support will also be given to other ministries in the field of social security, such as the Ministry of Finance, and their related implementing organisations. Moreover, the structure of the programme foresees public and private sector involvement at various levels.