Fiji Social Protection COVID-19 Response and System Development Project - Additional Financing

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Closed

The proposed AF in the amount of US$50 million equivalent will expand the parent project’s scope from the formal to the informal sector in Fiji and complement the benefit provision with activation and employment support measures. The AF will support (a) cash transfers to individuals who have lost their employment or livelihoods in both formal and informal sectors because of the COVID-19 pandemic, (b) temporary employment programs building on the Government’s Jobs for Nature initiative that has been introduced as part of the emergency package, and (c) TA and capacity-building activities to enable the Government to effectively deliver these programs. Activities of (a) and (b) under the AF will be added as new components.Component 3: Unemployment Assistance (US$40 million). This component will support conditional cash transfers to individuals who lost their jobs or livelihoods in formal and informal sectors because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Eligible beneficiaries are those unemployed in the formal sector with insufficient FNPF General Account balances across Fiji or those affected in the informal sector in Viti Levu, Fiji’s largest island with almost all of the COVID-19 cases reported. The program eligibility is narrowed down to Viti Levu since business closures and movement restrictions emanating from the COVID-19 crisis have almost exclusively affected employment and earnings opportunities there. The UA provides FJD 120 per month for six months, from August 2021 to January 2022, to eligible beneficiaries. The cash payments were transferred in two rounds: (a) the first payment of FJD 360 was made in August 2021 to cater for the three-month period ending in October 2021 to eligible Fijians who opted to register for the program and received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccination by August 27, 2021 and (b) the second payment of FJD 360 was paid out in November to cater for the three months ending January 2022 to eligible Fijians who are fully vaccinated by October 31, 2021. Component 4 will finance the implementation of a green and labor-inclusive public works program titled Jobs for Nature (JFN) 2.0. This component will not require retroactive financing. The program will be implemented by MOE, in collaboration with the Department of Environment (DOE) within the Ministry of Waterways and Environment (MOWE), and the Ministry of iTaukei Affairs (MTA). It will leverage the Government’s ongoing JFN initiative, which plans to provide grants ranging between FJD 10,000 and FJD 20,000 to rural communities and civil society groups (women’s associations, youth groups) in Fiji (for the purposes of the project, the eligible expenditures will be the labor costs under these grants). Building on this program, the IDA financing allocated to Component 4 is expected to pay wages to approx. 10,000 public works participants who will receive job opportunities for about three to six months with the possibility of extending up to one year. The central government’s budget allocation will focus on goods and services procuring, capital expenditures, and materials needed for the implementation of these programs in the form of parallel financing. Component 4 will provide financing activities related to the protection, restoration, and rehabilitation of natural resources in Fiji through a preliminary list of activities, including (a) wetlands protection: mangrove planting, seagrass planting, waterways restoration, and waste and wastewater management; (b) riverbank rehabilitation and coastal bank protection: mangrove planting and vetiver grass planting; and (c) enhancement of biodiversity: forest restoration, land degradation through native tree planting, and coral reef protection. To support the effective delivery of social protection programs, including those supported under Components 3 and 4, the project will support additional activities under Component 2 Institutional Strengthening, including (a) provisions for TA for trainings to community groups participating in Jobs for Nature 2.0 on key technical and basic skills, and (b) provision of TA for the development of an economic inclusion framework comprising a bundle of coordinated interventions and tailored support, standard operating procedure (SOP) and information system investments to build effective links between beneficiaries of the Unemployment Assistance program (financed under Component 3) and social assistance programs (such as the Poverty Benefit Scheme) to ensure that vulnerable beneficiaries of social assistance and unemployment support programs are prioritized for employment in these activities. In alignment with the Adaptive Social Protection Strategy under the parent project, Component 2 will also help summarize the lessons learned from the Unemployment Assistance implementation (e.g., efficiency, effectiveness, and inclusiveness of the digital registration and delivery mechanisms) that informs the design of the future emergency cash transfers programs.

FY17 - Social Protection

World Bank

Project

Water Supply and Storage, Commercial, Government