The World Meteorological Organization states that disasters related to weather, climate or water hazards occurred on average every day from 1970 to 2019. These disasters resulted in 115 deaths and economic losses worth USD 202 million, daily. Between 2019–2022, that is during the COVID-19 pandemic, global poverty rates rose by 8%, pushing 54 million people into poverty. Studies also show that climate change and disasters disproportionately affect low-income countries.

Nine out of the 10 countries most exposed to the risk of flooding are low-income or middle-income countries such as Bangladesh, Iraq, Myanmar, etc. Poor households often lack the capacity to cope and recover from serious destruction related to such events, increasing their vulnerability. Furthermore, existing social protection schemes are less successful in meeting the needs of those affected during disasters. Such schemes often fail to scale up flexibly to meet surges in demand for support during shocks. As a result, Adaptive or Shock Responsive Social Protection (ASP) systems have been introduced to help vulnerable populations prepare for, cope with, and recover from shocks.

What is Adaptive Social Protection?

ASP responds to the widespread demand of using social protection (SP) as a tool to build the resilience of poor and vulnerable households to covariate shocks such as natural disasters, economic crises, pandemics, and forced displacement. Traditional SP systems fall short as they are primarily designed to address life cycle shocks that an individual could face such as job loss or illnesses. These systems fail to respond to large-scale covariate shocks as they are slower in identifying those affected, targeting beneficiaries, and dispatching support during emergencies.

In contrast, ASP addresses both life cycle and covariate shocks and can ideally recognise affected populations and dispatch benefits quickly, to meet the demand for support during such shocks. ASP is not a standalone system but an approach to strengthen existing SP programmes. To succeed in this, ASP requires the integration of social protection with disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation policies. Such an integration enables a system to anticipate disasters and act promptly on forecasted or emerging shocks. Further, the systems can scale up swiftly through existing delivery mechanisms and coordinate effectively across governance structures to protect vulnerable populations before, during, and after a crisis.

Important Features of Adaptive Social Protection

A key ASP feature is the scalability. It is crucial that sufficient and immediate support reaches those affected during an emergency. This is achieved through vertical and horizontal expansion. Vertical expansion refers to a temporary increase in the benefit and/or duration of the programme during a crisis. Such an expansion needs to be supported by a horizontal expansion, which is a temporary increase in the beneficiaries enrolled either by expanding geographical coverage or adjusting the eligibility criteria.

For example, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sri Lanka undertook both horizontal and vertical expansions of various social assistance programmes such as Samurdhi and the senior citizens’ assistance scheme. These extended their coverage to include individuals on existing waiting lists, thereby broadening the beneficiary base – a horizontal expansion. Simultaneously, the value of cash transfers under these programmes increased, reflecting a vertical expansion. For instance, Samurdhi recipients received a top-up of LKR 5,000 in addition to their regular benefits.

An integrated social registry is another key factor in ASP. Social registries are information systems used for outreach, intake, registration, and determination of potential eligibility for one or more social programmes. Integrated registries help the government to coordinate targeting across multiple programmes. For instance, poverty-targeting cash assistance, disability support, and labour market programmes, such as job placements, can be managed through a single registry. This allows different government agencies and programmes to share and use the same data about individuals and households. During a shock, governments can easily scale up assistance by targeting pre-identified at-risk households using registries and national identification systems.

Early Warning Systems (EWS) form another vital component of ASP. EWS detects and predicts hazards, assesses risks and shares timely information so that people, communities and organisations can take early action. Integrating such disaster risk reduction measures enhances the preparedness of SP systems. Furthermore, triggers can be established using climate data. Triggers act as predefined conditions, for example early signs of a drought, that, when met, activate an automatic rapid social protection response.

To address issues caused by erratic and insufficient rainfall, Uganda uses satellite-based tools to monitor vegetation and weather conditions. One such tool, provided by the Global Agriculture Monitoring System (GLAM), uses satellite data on rainfall and temperature to track the health of crops over time. When vegetation levels drop below certain thresholds, indicating poor rainfall, the system triggers alerts so that the government can act before a crisis unfolds.

This approach proved effective in June 2017, when early signs of crop failure were detected in Karamoja region. This early warning allowed the government to respond in advance by releasing USD 4.1 million, reaching around 28,600 households. Since the response came early, the government was able to save USD 2.6 million in food aid costs and redirect these funds to boost food security for households.

Adaptive Social Protection in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka too is susceptible to various recurrent disasters such as flooding and landslides. Studies show that nearly half of the country’s population lacks disaster preparedness, increasing their vulnerability to rising climate risks. Sri Lanka has previously demonstrated some capacity to mobilise resources in response to covariate shocks. As mentioned before, during the COVID-19 pandemic, multiple rounds of cash transfers amounting to LKR 5,000 were given to affected groups. Initial cash transfers reached 66% of households, covering 97% of the poorest decile.

However, inefficiencies were noted, as significant portions of the population remained excluded, such as 31% of the third poorest decile, 31% of middle-income decile, over 30% of children under the age of 10 and 30% of people aged 70 or older. The absence of comprehensive data to rapidly identify vulnerable households resulted in reliance on existing social protection beneficiary lists, waiting lists and the use of local agents to manually identify others in need. This experience underscores the necessity for more effective targeting mechanisms, improved data systems and inclusive delivery approaches in Sri Lanka’s disaster response framework.

Sri Lanka is well-positioned to integrate an ASP system. The country currently possesses disaster risk reduction technologies such as flood and hazard risk maps maintained by the Disaster Management Centre. The recently launched Info-NDRSC disaster data system by National Disaster Relief Services Centre is an online platform which has real-time disaster situation reporting on information such as families affected and properties damaged in different areas of the island. However, the absence of integration of these technologies with the existing social registry hinders coordinated outreach and rapid identification of vulnerable populations during crises.

At present, the country uses the Welfare Benefits Information System (WBIS), a beneficiary list registry that consolidates data from social assistance programmes, such as Aswesuma, monthly senior citizen’s allowance scheme, etc., and allows cash transfers to be directly transferred to beneficiary bank accounts. However, fragmentation across multiple welfare schemes and manual verification processes continue to slow response time in transferring assistance. It is essential to boost the use of social registries and national identification systems to combine the delivery of social protection and disaster management efficiently.

The key to ASP readiness lies not in building entirely new systems, but in integrating disaster risk mapping and digital identity platforms with the existing registry infrastructure. Investing in human resources and service delivery mechanisms also plays a vital role in ensuring an effective shock response during challenging emergency conditions.

by Kavisha Batawala