The National Social Safety Nets Coordination Office (NASSCO) says it is striving to cover more communities across the country in the implementation of Federal Government’s social intervention programme.
National Coordinator of NASSCO, Mr Apera Iorwa, said this on Wednesday in Abuja at the biennial National Protection Cross-Learning Summit.
The theme of the summit is ‘‘Improving the Lives of Poor and Vulnerable Nigerians: Lessons from Implementing Social Protection in Nigeria.”
Iorwa said that the summit was for stakeholders to assess the level of investment and progress made in 2017 and 2018 in the social protection space.
He said that the forum was also to outline agenda and strategies for the next two years, adding that the office had established a community of practitioners, donor agencies and partners in the past two years.
According to him, the office will focus on the implementation of the social protection policy approved by the Federal Government in the next two years.
‘‘We need to begin to put in strategies to implement the policy in a way and manner that it will have maximum impact in the lives of Nigerians.
‘‘The idea of social protection is targeted at the poor and vulnerable in the society and lifting them out of poverty.
‘‘What that means is to come out with a clear outline of activities that will increase investment and participation within the social protection space,” he said.
The coordinator said that most of the social intervention programmes of Federal Government in communities, including home-grown school feeding, small-scale loans to business people and N-Power programme, were generic.
He said that NASSCO was working holistically towards alleviating poverty and had developed more programmes targeted at the poor and vulnerable in the society under Safety Nets Programme.
According to him, the initiatives are the National Cash Transfer Programme, Youth Employment and Social Operation Programme and the Community and Social Development Programme.
Mrs Falilat Abdulraheem, Director of Social Development, Ministry of Budget and National Planning, commended the government for the implementation of the various social intervention programmes.
She said that the programmes had impacted positively on the lives of Nigerians in the areas of employment, increase in school enrolment as well as poverty reduction.
Source: NAN
