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3.5Political space and willingness

There seems to be significant national government commitment and enthusiasm to improving PASP and for the programme to play a role in emergency response. Such commitment is evidenced by the recently launched ENSSB 2, but also by the number of new initiatives planned for the coming years (eg ‘Inclusive PASP’, graduation component). The ENSSB envisages a substantial increase in PASP coverage together with the improvement of processes and systems (see Annex A). Moreover, the strategy gives a role to the programme in response to disasters and the effects of climate change, although without providing details what that role should be. In response to the ENSSB, MGCAS and INAS Central are keen on improving the PASP, expanding coverage, and making the programme more responsive to shocks, for example by bringing the implementation forward to earlier in the year, as is currently happening as response to the drought. There is an ongoing debate as to what additional roles, if any, PASP should play in terms of disaster response.

It is also clear that the World Bank has a strong influence on programme design and operations, and has introduced, either explicitly or implicitly, a number of programme design conditions. Although the programme is largely funded with external financial sources, there seems to be substantial government ownership and moreover, government seems genuinely receptive to new ideas.

Other donors have had limited influence to date on the PASP, with the exception of the WFP, although PASP under-performance may give them an opportunity to start engaging. While the ENSSB and World Bank loans emphasised expanding coverage, additional donors could support the improvement of systems, something of interest to the government and required for the achieving the impact anticipated in ENSSB.

At district level, however, willingness to improve and expand the programme is constrained by operational limitations and lack of resources.

As this report is being written, Mozambique is facing a crisis due to the government misrepresentation of its debt situation to the international community. It is beyond the reach of this report to anticipate the consequences of this issue, although greater transparency and accountability will be required in future engagement with the donor community, and programmes will be subject to greater levels of scrutiny in terms of performance and accountability. The PASP can start to address this challenge internally by improving management systems overall, starting by finalising and operationalising the MIS.

3.6Summary of main findings

Despite its concentration in areas where there are significant climate related risks (Irish Aid and IIED, 2016) the PASP is unlikely to have any significant effect on resilience, either for direct participants or for communities provided with PASP assets.

It is an incipient programme that is currently constrained by a number of design and operational limitations. Design aspects such as the proposed use of a PMT for targeting beneficiaries, the absence of a mechanism for indexing the wage, the asset selection process, the labour/capital budget allocation, and the infrequency of payments serve to undermine the performance of the PASP model. In addition serious capacity constraints, and the absence of key processes and systems such as outsourced payment mechanisms, an MIS, grievance redressal mechanisms, and technical oversight, among others, are likely to further reduce PASP’s effectiveness as a basic social protection instrument, and also its potential impact on resilience.

Moreover, extremely high expectations of what PASP can achieve put additional pressure on a programme that is not managing to deliver the most basic components. New initiatives like the provision of complementary services, the ‘Inclusive’ PASP and the re-registration of beneficiaries for the PMT, as well as issues such as a lack of clarity regarding the programme’s role in DRM, will only worsen matters.

Any impact that PASP may currently have is almost exclusively through the wages channel, and is limited to a temporary reduction in poverty with consumption smoothing and coping capacity benefits during the period of employment, with the scale of the impact at household level being limited by the value and duration of the transfer. This in itself is a significant achievement. It is, however, unlikely that PASP wages are increasing adaptive capacities and, given the low value of the wage, and the low quality of the assets produced with the impact through this vector is likely to be negligible. No impact is expected through the skills vector for two reasons: i) the complementary services component has not yet been initiated; and ii) the evidence that similar interventions internationally have limited impact due to the capacity and skill constraints of PWP implementing agencies and the prevailing economic and labour market context.

If impact can only be achieved through the wages vector, it is necessary to question whether a PWP is the optimal kind of programme to implement. Either the programme improves so that one or more of the other vectors achieve the effects desired, or a more cost-efficient intervention should be envisaged, to transfer resources to the poor.

Given the current design and operational constraints, the impact of PASP on resilience and DRM is likely to be very small. The programme would need to improve significantly before aiming to achieve goals that better performing programmes in the region have not managed to reach. In this context, in the next section we propose alternative areas of support for DFID to consider.

4Options for support

In this section we present options for DFID to support for the promotion of resilience through INAS. Given the concerns about current PASP performance and design outlined above, there is an urgent need to reduce the range of tasks the PASP is currently engaged with, to simplify systems in line with budget and capacity, to ensure basic procedures are in place, and to prevent the exacerbation of existing overload with the introduction of new initiatives.

Options are divided into four main areas: i) operational support; ii) policy support; iii) research and development; and iv) partner coordination. Policy support and research entail three key themes: the simplification of the programme model by phasing/postponing additional components in line with capacity, promoting critical thinking on key programme components (PMT, graduation and DRM), and carrying out research into key areas requiring policy development.

The table below summarises the activities within each area, which are then described in more detail in the text.

Table : Suggested areas for DFID support

Areas	Activities	Description
Operational support	Essential systems development and strengthening Improvement of PASP asset quality	Develop and implement key INAS processes and systems, which are prerequisites for effective implementation and programme expansion: payments, MIS, M&E, targeting and grievance redressal. Revisit institutional responsibilities and protocols for asset selection, shifting the mandate for selection and implementation to district services, to align with district overall development targets and priorities, with INAS’s role limited to verification of asset eligibility and financial inputs. Develop MIS and M&E to ensure asset oversight and quality control.
Policy support	Policy advocacy on key programme concepts in order to shift the narrative; graduation, PMT and DRM Phased schedule for introduction of additional programme components until basic programme performance is assured	Promote critical thinking and influence policy and programme redesign through workshops, conferences, study tours, etc. Promote review of programme performance and implications for policy schedule.
Research	Asset quality and performance	Carry out review of PASP asset functionality.
	Graduation performance	Review graduation experience to date to inform policy goals.
	PMT	Document social and economic benefits and costs, and performance of PMT approach in relation to existing system to inform phased roll-out.
	Inclusive PASP and non-infrastructural assets	Review performance of the ‘Inclusive PASP’ and experience of similar non-infrastructural PWP employment regionally.
Development partner coordination to support INAS and MGCAS	Promote development partner coordination and support Enhance DFID engagement by increased management and support capacity	Fund consultant to work exclusively on development partner coordination in relation to INAS and MGCAS and co-chair the Social Protection Working Group on behalf of DFID. Increase DFID Social Development Advisor (SDA resources allocated to engagement with INAS and MGCAS.